Tagged: Jonathan Worlde

Trembling With Fear 01/16/2022

Welcome back to Trembling with Fear, our online flash zine. Many thanks to those who responded to our call for drabbles! We had a number but keep them coming!

I’m sat here waiting for the glazier as I type. The damage to our house caused by Storm Arwen back in November is finally getting looked at – the fixing will be in a couple of weeks though! Another plus has been the release of my latest novella, Paused, which I hope people will like. Initial feedback has been pretty good. I’ve a few writing projects on the go but rest assured, the 2021 TWF anthology is one of them!

Latest reads? Chad Lutzke’s Cannibal Creator, not something I would normally pick up but I’m glad I did as I discovered what a great storyteller he is. It also prompted me to finally read Of Foster Homes and Flies (a heartbreaker) and Wormwood (brutal in parts but poignant) which he co-wrote with Tim Meyer. All three of these books are novellas. I also took Kenneth W. Cain’s A Season in Hell.

Trembling with Fear starts this week with Personal Reflections on Bloody Mary by Jennifer Lee Rossman. Written in a casual tone, it sprinkles little asides and snippets as if chatting to the reader directly. It explicitly refers to our understanding of Bloody Mary, as something we can dismiss as no more than childish belief and then undermines that completely by introducing a much darker, and ultimately horrific, element. A skilfully told tale.

Captain of the Dead by Dee Grimes takes us out to sea for a survival story, but who ultimately survives is the twist.

Salon Secrets by Elyse Russell brings in my own personal horror – the trip to the hairdresser which necessitates small talk. It’s where gossip spreads and secrets are learned, or you’d think so.

Water Babies by Jonathan Worlde is a great, almost humorous twist on an alien invasion.

Steph

 

Stephanie Ellis

Editor, Trembling With Fear

Progress on the new layout and changes are slow, but they are happening! 

Interested in writing for the site? For those who love speculative fiction- we’re always open to guest posts, blog tour stops, ongoing column writers, book reviewers, and author interviewers! Please reach out on our contact page!

Last time on the following for now: 
Just a reminder – we lost about 300 subscribers when switching from Mailchimp to Sendfox is to add an opt in form on the main HorrorTree page again (top right if you’re in desktop mode or under the “more” section if you scroll down quite a ways on mobile. I’ve also added one to our contact page AND you can also subscribe directly to our newsletter right here. Our newsletter is compiled weekly by the extremely talented Holley Cornetto and contains our favorite posts from the week, more original free fiction from around the web, and any site news we have to share with you!

We also have a new perk coming to our Patreons soon which Steph is putting together. A perfect time to sign up! (Especially with having lost a couple on the new year.)

Stuart Conover

Editor, Horror Tree

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Trembling With Fear 09/05/21

Please note: We are temporarily closed to short flash stories (unless for one of the Specials) but open to drabbles, unholy trinities and serials. We hope to reopen later in the year once we have caught up with the publication of those already accepted. Please also remember to read our guidelines, especially on word counts!

Time is flying and this is the first September where I don’t have to go back to school, something I can’t quite get over. Instead, I am looking forward to autumn with a quiet joy as most horror writers do, this is very often the time when our work gains more notice by virtue of Halloween (remember our Special, folks, if you want to submit to that) and those long dark nights.

This last week I was able to trigger the pre-order for the Daughters of Darkness II anthology which I wanted to match with Mary Shelley’s birthday of August 30th. As amazon says give it 72 hours – but I knew it was faster – I pressed the button halfway through the 28th. A few hours later it was live. I wish that amazon would allow you to set the date when pre-order is to go live, otherwise you end up telling people not to say anything if they notice so you can get a proper announcement done! As they say, timing is everything and that was pretty rubbish 😊 I also managed to get that short story done for the 1st Sept. Probably won’t be successful as I had to push to do it but at least I managed something. And it’s a piece I can return to in the future if it doesn’t hit the requirements.

Reading this week has been The Bridge by J.S. Breukelaar, a recent guest at Shotgun Logic. I didn’t do that podcast as it would’ve been 2 a.m. in the UK! I still read the book however. A deep, absorbing dark fantasy with elements of Greek mythology, I really enjoyed it. Next to read is Priory by Becky Wright. I have also developed a habit of reading a non-horror book –  when I can – at the end of the day, to switch off from the genre and keep my reading ‘wide’. I’m currently revisiting Scandi noir with Hakan Nesser’s The Root of Evil.

This week, Trembling with Fear leads with The Run by Alec Thomson. A beautifully poignant piece, rich with atmospheric setting and gentle empathy for an end of life situation. What would a mother do for her son, or a son for his mother? A simple run becomes a last gift.

The Colony by Jonathan Worlde gives us a little sci-fi adventure in a place that appears almost too good to be true.

Omnipotent Apathy by Jake Fitzgerald takes us into the teenage mind, a seething cauldron if ever there was one, and gives it form. That last line is so true!

Our Sighting by Kevin M. Folliard is a nice example of be careful what you wish for? Do you want to prove the existence of aliens? Then go looking. But will you come back?

Enjoy our stories and send in yours!

Steph

 

Stephanie Ellis

Editor, Trembling With Fear

A week into the MBA program and my biggest accomplishment (aside from starting a short story and submitting a drabble) was to really catch up on Horror Tree backend work. E-mails have been responded to, short stories and drabbles read. A short story has been edited for one of our Patreons. Now, onto more things!

Trembling With Fear is open for our Halloween Edition until October 13th, so be sure to get your stories in! Full details can be found here.

Offhand, if you run a website and would like to write an article about Horror Tree or Trembling With Fear, we’d really appreciate that! Please reach out with any questions for facts in the article (who does what, when sections were started, etc), any promotional artwork, or with a link once it is live so we can feature it on the site and on our social media.

Have a great week everyone! 

Stuart Conover

Editor, Horror Tree

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