Plenty of weird traditions on display in my first collection. Nothing good can come of West Pennfield Township’s Halloween festivities. #HorrorWritersChat

Missed the hastag! #HorrorWritersChat While I'm here, let's take a moment to highlight the Horror Writers Chat anthology again: a.co/d/001Wn9Pv

NEW HORROR GRAPHICS To match our new #HorrorWritersChat brand identity (as seen in our restyled graphics), I've created new promo graphics for our first anthology THE SHADOWS THAT WE CARRY Please feel free to use these graphics across your socials. #TheShadowsThatWeCarry

Thanks Gree_! For Pride my partner and I have made the first 40 issues of our illustrated fantasy/horror zine pay-what-you-feel. Below is the bundle containing The Belmont Family Picnic, the eldritch annual meal story I mentioned earlier. It's one of my favourites I've written. #HorrorWritersChat

Thank you so much for hosting Gree! Love #HorrorWritersChat I hope lots of people are reading the anthology The Shadows That We Carry. So many good stories! 💙 Also, I have a new short story on my Itch page. It's a sci-fi about teleporting. anna-verner.itch.io

Thank you, Gree! Loving the Wednesday tradition of #HorrorWritersChat For more ritual and subverted traditions, look no further than The Five Turns of the Wheel. Idyllic. Traditional. Deadly. Come join the Dance. brigidsgatepress.com/product/the-... #booksky #folkhorror

Thank you for the great #Horrorwriterschat! I loved the creepy story. If you would like to see what I do with Christmas traditions, I have two Christmas horror novellas. The Thing in Christmas Town and Hanging On. You can pick them both up in a bundle on my Ko-Fi ko-fi.com/s/bb9e5c2ad3

Lastly, if you want to support me, check out the posts on my blog. There you can find lists of my work, and the page containing my tipping links. We're also looking for creators to join SBA's site, so keep that in mind as well. Thanks, and happy creating. roseblack2222.blogspot.com?m=1 (3/3)

The second thing is my just-posted article where I review The Backrooms film. I had a lot more to say about it than I thought. If anyone else wants to give their opinions on it, feel free. Other than that, I hope you enjoy it. (2/3) shadowboxarchives.com/2026/06/03/t...

My second novel, "Heliruna", which has strong folk horror elements, is going on preorder soon. Follow me for updates when that happens. When it does go on preorder, the first to be notified will be the members of my discord server! You can join that here: discord.gg/gc5rYvjXhu

Thanks Gree My second book deals with tradition "an erotic sci-fi thriller that’s also a melancholic tale of departed romance. It puts forward the burden of blame, and leaves you to ponder the obligation of responsibility." www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B... #HorrorWritersChat #Booksky #Authorsky

Awesome questions, Gree! #HorrorWritersChat It's pride month, and my nonbinary ace-spec vampire and werewolf are carrying out the long-respected tradition of taking down a fascistic government ;) Curious? Check out the BackerKit here! (Contemporary dark fantasy) www.backerkit.com/c/projects/a...

Once again I offer up my Cthulhu Mythos noir short story. I finished the rough outline for the next in the series today and plan to release the finished story later this month. Wish me luck and get to know Lazarus and his rival Harlan ahead of time in Lock the Last Door #HorrorWritersChat

#HorrorWritersChat "Silent Night" comes to mind (and I've already mentioned it). You spend the whole movie trying to decide whether what's happening is real or if they just believe it is. (I need to read more books by authors here on the subject too!)

Thanks as always for the great questions! I hope everyone starts a new tradition of buying everyone's work (or at least mine) You can find my books here: www.amazon.com/stores/A.C.-... or at aaronccross.com I also have a Patreon with stories as well! Some are free! www.patreon.com/c/aaronccross

There's so many good ones, but my all time favorite has to be "The Wicker Man" '73, especially including the twist that it's all at the behest of a single evil, evil man. I still badly need to read the book it's based on ("Ritual" by David Pinner). Maybe I'll get to it this year. #HorrorWritersChat

Thanks, Gree! Find me at writesinister.substack.com And listen to Echoes of Elsewhere, a Call of Cthulhu/D&D crossover podcast that's weird and good and I'm in it. Find it on Youtube, in the podcast aisle of your local internet, or here: rss.com/podcasts/ech.... #horrorwriterschat #podcast

#HorrorWritersChat TYVM Gree! You can now listen to me talking about horror, and writing, and writing about horror, on Hannah’s Bookshelf which went out on the radio on Saturday. Here’s a listen link. www.mixcloud.com/Hannahs_Book...

Thanks @greethewriter.bsky.social for hosting another great #HorrorWritersChat As always, my TBR, TBW, and TBL are now overflowing again. But if folks want MORE they can check out my three spring/summer anthology releases: dangerouswhenbored.com/collections/...

Like nightmarish traditions? Check out my LWF series. Book 1 is available lots of places, and Book 2 is less than a month away from release! Learn more about both books and find purchase/pre-order links on my website: www.amberhathaway.com/books #HorrorWritersChat

#HorrirWritersChat Admittedly, I haven’t done that much with traditions, though reading through these*, I may give it a try now; thanks! *Forgive the delay, I was promised free video games and ice cream; I’m plotting how to get back at them for this…

I quite like the drawing of the cards from Yellowjackets, it's something simple yet dire. But The Cabin in the Woods really stands out. A group of college kids must be slaughtered by monsters every year or else the world ends. That's just fun. #HorrorWritersChat

The Folk in the Woods by @erynmccee.bsky.social is a fantastic horror exploring folk horror, tradition and relationships. #Horrorwriterschat

#HorrorWritersChat Someone already mentioned it, but The Lottery. Hands down. Holy shit does that stick with you.

Shirley Jackson's The Summer People, and it's not even close, to be honest. Just that subtle sense of everything closing in around the city couple, the quiet collusion of the community. #HorrorWritersChat

#HorrorWritersChat - My personal favorite depiction of tradition in horror? That's easy - Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery". What scares me about this sort of thing is when no one questions the tradition even if it's outright hostile and dangerous. Another one is the original movie "The Wicker Man".

Wicker Man is obviously so good! And I also think Krampus (2015) is the best Christmas movie ever. I always watch that movie on Krampus night with hot chocolate. Cause, you know, gotta keep the fire hot. #HorrorWritersChat

#HorrorWritersChat The most terrifying thing to me is when a tradition is put into place solely to manipulate. Think the classic movie The Wickerman, or for a more mundane, less overly sinister example, the hero worship of the American founding fathers. That's something I do use, sometimes.

#HorrorWritersChat Gonna be real original here and say The Lottery, hands on. I don’t think you can beat that.

Seen the end of the movie KILL LIST? Yeah, that's a pretty horrible depiction of tradition Oh and I suppose any wedding in a Richard Curtis movie They chill my blood #HorrorWritersChat

#HorrorWritersChat I’m struggling to think of any - but as a general point: Horror has a duty to subvert tradition, or face lapsing into cliche itself. And folks, we need to be at war with cliche. If we’re not, we end up in the trenches of ‘tropes’. Not a good place to be.

Wicker Man for harvest times (and Christopher Lee!). What Rare Exports does with the Santa Claus tradition. #horrorwriterschat

I think I tend to use the seasons most often, possibly because they feel the most inexorable? You can defy your family, maybe even a god? But the unforgiving and relentless orbit of our helium tyrant? #HorrorWritersChat

So many of my stories center around family, whether it means going to extremes to protect one or stumbling into one whose traditions are at best unseemly. #HorrorWritersChat

#HorrorWritersChat Christmas horror, a holiday known for peace and joy being twisted into a nightmarish hellscape? What's not to like? Also, because of that one scene, The Backrooms is officially a Christmas movie. I have spoken.

Q4: #HorrorWritersChat I mean, it's kinda hard to go wrong with the Wicker Man. Like, that's gotta be the benchmark, right?

I absolutely love folk horror in books and movies. It’s one of my favorite sub-genres. I haven’t written a folk horror story myself. This has inspired me! #HorrorWritersChat

Mark, the main character in Phengaris, is not a fan. He absolutely despises all the po-faced traditions and etiquette that surround a deathbed. And he also hates birthdays, which rather puts him at odds with his mother's best friend Helen. #HorrorWritersChat

The one that first springs to mind is Robin Redbreast. One of the original Village Conspiracies with blood and soil and gaslighting and blindly following the verger because he's "known" to know things. The rebirthing of traditions that weren't as a fascist baby-making cult is 👌 #HorrorWritersChat

#HorrorWritersChat I haven't done it, but I think family is the scariest way to have established a tradition. You trust these people that your traditions are for a reason. It's not until you spend time with a different family that you wonder are my family traditions wrong, or are these people's?

Traditions that attempt to enforce unjust systems, such as patriarchy, are the scary ones imo. Not published yet, but my WIP involves a villain hosting something called The Trad Games. It's even more sinister than it sounds. #HorrorWritersChat Q3

I'd say family/community: the ones that are supposed to love and protect you. They gave you everything, so you owe them loyalty and obedience. You belong to them. You wouldn't betray your family, would you, my dear child? #HorrorWritersChat

#HorrorWritersChat - I find family traditions most terrifying because family members often know all your dirty secrets. They know exactly how to push your buttons. I use these problems in my stories, you bet!

Traditions established for/by a family could become the most terrifying. We're socialised to comply, to follow them without question. My characters go against such traditions and risk acceptance, security, home. Sometimes they risk losing their life. But not to question is worse #HorrorWritersChat

#HorrorWritersChat I haven't delved much into tradition in my horror stories. I do have a flash fiction of a family baking gingerbread people, but they have trouble with the clothes, and that's when you realise their giants baking real people.

In the three stories I mentioned (Belmont/Alkelda/Haggerty), the tradition is bound up in family, but exactly what the tradition is for is unclear (to them, the reader, and me). Not knowing why we do something but doing it anyway is a source of horror for me, and leads to horrors. #HorrorWritersChat

Hmm let me think. Most of my recent stories are sci-horror, where the horror comes from a new technology. So so far I haven't written one where it comes from a tradition. But I find both kinds of stories interesting. #HorrorWritersChat Q2

I've written stories where the characters believe a ritual will bring good luck, play bizarrely inappropriate games at a funeral or believe that standing in a particular spot will allow the CEO of the company to tell them their next task. Anything can be ritualised #HorrorWritersChat

I like to draw my monsters directly from tradition. My first novel was about Bigfoot, a modern American traditional monster with strong indigenous roots. My second is about a very ancient legend I could find scant texts on and had to largely reconstruct myself, and my third borrows from Navajo myth.