Welcome to the Atrocissimus

By this point, I've made it abundantly clear that demons are the great enemy slithering in the Atrocissimus, and it is because of these foul creatures and their Satanic master that we have so much horror in the world. Yet the simple reality of the matter is that the demons' power would never fully be manifested in this world if not for the actions of witches and wizards. These people are essentially the portals through which demonic power flows from the abyss into the material world.  Magic users -- just like werewolves, vampires, and zombies -- have of late been rehabilitated in the media, especially TV shows and movies. Rather than twisted humans who have turned their lives over to evil for wealth and power, they've recently been portrayed as plucky teenagers expressing their independence, wise elder leaders fighting to protect the weak, or just light-hearted gifted folks out to have a good time.  They are none of these things. They are evil, purely evil, in league with S...

Fear of the dead returning from the grave, dragging their fetid, rotting bodies closer and closer to their targets to torment, exact revenge, or eat brains is something that has gripped humanity from time immemorial. For as long as humans have dreaded death and feared the dead -- which has been always -- the thought of corpses returning to haunt the living has provoked great fear.  Recently, zombies have become more popular than ever. There have been numerous blockbuster movies and TV shows that explore zombies in completely traditional ways, some with new takes on the concept, some even flipping the narrative on its head. Sometimes, modern depictions of zombies are seen as being representative of the existential dread so many feel in the modern era, or of some slowly creeping doom, or even the drudgery of work. Either way, the "zombie apocalypse" is a well-known trope of modern storytelling.  But I know something those who only tell stories don't, something those who don...

The Atrocissimus is full of mysterious entities and creatures that defy explanation. It is a vast arcane landscape, occult in the most literal definition of the word -- secret in all ways possible.  But beyond the creatures that exist there, the working of the demons and their evil designs, the thin veil that exists between their world and ours, there is actually a mystery far greater than all of these in the Atrocissimus: Me. How is it that I have all this knowledge? How is it I can chronicle the demonic entities, their designs, their lusts, their attacks against humanity? How is it that I've peered into the flaming maelstrom of Hell and have come back to tell its secrets? That is indeed a mystery. It is one that will be explored as time goes on in my future stories. If you want to learn more about me, check out this website by an annoying investigative reporter that seems obsessed with my past. You can also watch this video...

 After writing yesterday about werewolves, I got to thinking that perhaps you'd all like to read a little bit from the book I'm currently working on. So, I'm sharing a significant portion from the first chapter of my upcoming second book, All-American Werewolf .  Enjoy! 🖉 Lenny Stevens sat on the front porch of his small rural house in the brutal early July heat, slowly moving on the two-person swing hanging there. The slight, gentle movement he made as he swung through the humid night air was the closest thing he’d get to a breeze that night; the heat wave that had gripped Maryland for the entire summer continued to hold the region in its grasp. If the heat this summer weren’t bad enough then the humidity made it even worse. As Lenny lit a cigarette and breathed in the moist late-night air, he could smell the damp just hanging in it. The bedroom felt like an oven since Lenny and his wife couldn’t afford to replace their air conditioner, so rather than spend one more sleep...

Werewolves, or some other kind of shape-shifting beast, is also one of those legends that we see in cultures all over the world. Regardless of the specifics --  whether the human turns into a wolf or a tiger or a lion; whether they change at will or at certain times, like during a full moon; or whether it's seen as a curse or a gift -- the creatures have always been vicious killing machines, and all but unstoppable.  They have always represented raw power, a primal, carnal lust, and a release of all civilized constraints. When combined with the desire to rend flesh and shred bodies, we can see how this would be so terrifying! I don't say too much about them in The House on Blackstone Hill (which you can purchase here if you want): Vampires and werewolves are also very real, and for as horrifically terrifying as they are normally portrayed to be in modern culture, they are far more so in real life. More on them later as well.  As terrifying as the werewolf is, there's a r...