Bram Stoker Award-winner for Superior Achievement in Non-Fiction!

Nightmares come to life in this comprehensive how-to guide for new and established authors…

Book two in Crystal Lake Publishing’s The Dream Weaver series picks up where the Bram Stoker Award-nominated Where Nightmares Come From left off.

It’s Alive focuses on learning the craft in order to take your story from concept to completion.

With an introduction by Richard Chizmar and cover art by Luke Spooner. Featuring interior artwork from horror master Clive Barker!

Table of Contents:

• Introduction by Richard Chizmar
• Confessions of a Professional Day Dreamer by Jonathan Maberry
• What is Writing and Why Write Horror by John Skipp
• Tribal Layers by Gene O’Neill
• Bake That Cake: One Writer’s Method by Joe R. Lansdale and Kasey Lansdale
• Ah-Ha: Beginning to End with Chuck Palahniuk and Michael Bailey (Discussing the Spark of Creativity)
• They Grow in the Shadows: Exploring the Roots of a Horror Story by Todd Keisling
• Sell Your Script, Keep Your Soul and Beware of Sheep in Wolves' Clothing by Paul Moore
• The Cult of Constraint (or To Outline or Not) by Yvonne Navarro
• Zombies, Ghosts and Vampires─Oh My! by Kelli Owen
• The Many Faces of Horror: Craft Techniques by Richard Thomas
• Giving Meaning to the Macabre by Rachel Autumn Deering
• The Horror Writer’s Ultimate Toolbox by Tim Waggoner
• Sarah Pinborough Interview by Marie O’Regan
• Conveying Character by F. Paul Wilson
• Sympathetic Characters Taste Better: Creating Empathy in Horror Fiction by Brian Kirk
• Virtue & Villainy: The Importance of Character by Kealan Patrick Burke
• How to write Descriptions in a story by Mercedes Yardley
• “Don’t Look Now, There’s a Head in That Box!” She Ejaculated Loudly (or Creating Effective Dialogue in Horror Fiction) by Elizabeth Massie
• Point of View by Lisa Mannetti
• What Came First the Monster or the Plot? In Conversation with Stephen Graham Jones by Vince A. Liaguno
• Building Suspense by David Wellington
• Conveying Horror by Ramsey Campbell
• Unveiling Theme Through Plot: An Analysis of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Birthmark” by Stephanie M. Wytovich
• Interview with Clive Barker by Tim Chizmar
• World Building (Building a terrifying world) by Kevin J. Anderson
• Speak Up: The Writer’s Voice by Robert Ford
• Writing for a Better World by Christopher Golden
• Shaping the Ideas: Getting Things from Your Head to the Paper or on Screen. Interview with Steve Niles, Mick Garris, Heather Graham, Mark Savage, and Maria Alexander by Del Howison
• On Research by Bev Vincent
• Editing Through Fear: Cutting and Stitching Stories by Jessica Marie Baumgartner
• Leaping into the Abyss by Greg Chapman
• Edit Your Anthology in Your Basement for Fun and Profit! . . . or Not by Tom Monteleone
• When It’s Their World: Writing for the Themed Anthology by Lisa Morton
• Roundtable Interview by John Palisano
• The Tale of the Perfect Submissions by Jess Landry
• Turning the Next Page: Getting Started with the Business of Wri

NOT THE END OF THE STORY!

The lore of Averoigne didn’t end with Clark Ashton Smith. Over the decades other writers, fascinated by this "Lovecraft country" of medieval France, added their own contributions in tales spanning history from the Roman era to modern day. Revisit Vyônes and Périgon, meet Luc le Chaudronnier and Azédarac once again, as old foes like the Gargoyles of Vyônes Cathedral and the Colossus of Ylourgne return to wreck more havoc.

But new threats are always lurking in the shadows - join the peasantry of Averoigne in their struggles to survive in their cursed, monster-haunted homeland as they face dangers ranging from ghostly cats to man-eating ogres. Tales of harpies and werewolves, witches and necromancers, changelings and cockatrices await you, as well as adversaries of the more mundane variety like fanatical Inquisitors, heretical cults, and druids serving dark gods.

For the first time collected together into one volume, you can read over two dozen poems and stories of Averoigne (including some never before published) by Mythos authors like DJ Tyrer, Ron Hilger, Richard Tierney, Brian McNaughton, Michael Minnis, and James Chambers, including:

• THE ORACLE OF SADOQUA by Ron Hilger
• THE WEDDING OF SHEILA-NA-GOG by G. Arthur Rahman & Richard L. Tierney
• THE CULT OF THE SINGING FLAME by David Reid Ross
• THE DOOM OF AZÉDARAC by Ron Hilger
• THE PINK FLOWER OF SAINT ZÉNOBIE by Aaron Hollingsworth
• HUGH THE DISCERNING by Garnett Elliott
• THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF GHOSTLY CATS by Michael Minnis
• UNHALLOWED GROUND, UNHOLY FLESH by James Chambers
• THE LITTLE AND THE BIG by Michael Minnis
• THE PASSING OF BELZÉVUTHE by Simon Whitechapel
• THE BUTCHER OF VYÔNES by Michael Minnis
• BLACK ART IN VYÔNES by Keith Chapman
• THE COCKATRICE OF CORDELIERS by Michael Minnis
• CLOTAIRE OF THE CROSS by Colin Harker
• SYMPOSIUM OF THE GARGOYLE by Simon Whitechapel
• THE QUARRY by Simon Whitechapel
• THE GARGOYLES OF NOTRE DAME by Matthew Baugh
• THE RETURN OF THE COLOSSUS by Brian McNaughton
• THE MUSE OF AVEROIGNE by Ron Hilger & Henry J. Vester III
• THE FELL FÊTE by Manuel Arenas
• BOUFONOULA by D.J. Tyrer
• A HONEYMOON IN AVEROIGNE by Trevor O. Childers

... PLUS over a dozen poems of Averoigne by H.P. Lovecraft, DJ Tyrer, Ashley Dioses, Wade German, Cardinal Cox, Ron Shiflet and others, AND a Map of Averoigne by multiple Hugo-award winning artist Tim Kirk!

While mankind can scarce hope to pierce the Veil without crossing it, a few intrepid souls will ever bend their will against the aether, combining artifice and the arcane to uncover its secrets. 

From voodoo death cults to the Day of the Dead, mummy parties, the wheel of reincarnation, the practice of death portraits, and so much more, these tales leave no gravestone unturned. 

Be it heaven or hell or the limbo in between, the hereafter is about to get 'Punked.

With stories by Jody Lynn Nye, David Sherman, Gail Z. Martin and Larry N. Martin, James Chambers, Michelle D. Sonnier, Jeffrey Lyman, Bernie Mojzes, Jeff Young, David Lee Summers, L. Jagi Lamplighter, and Danielle Ackley-McPhail.

When fire and steel meet flesh and bone, a soldier learns a hard truth: you’re not fighting for Glory and Honor, but for survival, for you and your comrades, and you will be damned if you’re going to leave any of them behind.

Join us for twelve tales of military heroism and courage in the face of a hostile enemy.

With stories by Brenda Cooper, Bud Sparhawk, David Sherman, Robert E. Waters, Jeff Young, James Chambers, Lisanne Norman, Robert Greenberger, Aaron Rosenberg, Christopher M. Hiles, Eric V. Hardenbrook, and Danielle Ackley-McPhail

There are creatures lurking in our world. Obscure creatures long relegated to myth and legend. They have been sighted by a lucky-or unlucky-few, some have even been photographed, but their existence remains unproven and unrecognized by the scientific community.

These creatures, long thought gone, have somehow survived; creatures from our nightmares haunting the dark places. They swim in our lakes and bays, they soar the night skies, they hunt in the woods. Some are from our past, and some from other worlds, and others that have always been with us-watching us, fearing us, hunting us.

These are the cryptids, and Systema Paradoxa tells their tales.

***

Summer on Long Island-hot, humid, idyllic... and terrifying?

When fledgling photojournalist Ben Keep lands a freelance assignment to document the rediscovery of supposedly long-lost cryptid remains, he partners with biologist Annetta Maikels for the story-but the strange bones only open the door to deeper mysteries and dark secrets.

As Ben and Annetta continue to investigate, evidence of more than one living, breathing cryptid surfaces in what wildlands remain between the summer hotspots of Eastern Long Island, leaving them wondering...

Will they solve this decades' old mystery, or become one more vanishing chapter in the ongoing tale?