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Horror Pride Month: Horror Author Eric LaRocca

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Eric LaRocca

Author Eric LaRocca is getting a lot of attention right now. His recent novella Things Have Gotten Worse Since Last We Spoke has been on everyone’s to-read list, and naturally, his new collection The Strange Thing We Become and Other Dark Tales from Off Limits Press is going to be a hot ticket item when it publishes on September 1, 2021. The out gay author practically wrote himself onto the roster for this year’s Horror Pride Month.

LaRocca grew up in a small Connecticut town. His dad was a pilot for American Airlines and his mother, from an early age, encouraged his reading, taking him to the library where he began consuming classics from authors like Agatha Christie. She also began exposing him to classic films.

“It was my mom who introduced me to the Universal monster movies,” the author said. “Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Wolfman, and The Mummy. I really took an interest in those characters. I think it’s because they’re such inherently queer characters to begin with. The monsters we’ve come to know and love exist in such a queer space being the other and being reviled and maligned. Being cast out. I really identified with them.”

This expanding horizon on film, pushed the boundaries of the young author-to-be’s reading list as well. He was soon consuming the works of Bram Stoker and Mary Shelley before discovering openly queer authors like Clive Barker, Poppy Z. Brite, and Michael McDowell.

“I really tried to do as best I could educating myself with what horror could offer me and what horror is,” he explained. “It really stems from my mom introducing myself to those classic films. I always felt like an outsider growing up. I always felt like I was on the outside looking in. Horror was a space for me to exist. It was a great place for me to confront my own fears and insecurities.”

Like those monsters he loved, his own inherent queerness became more apparent to LaRocca as he got older, though he says, a part of him always knew that he was different from his friends.

Like so many of us, it was a matter of waiting until the time actually felt right and safe. That began with friends when he was a teenager before eventually working his way up to telling his parents when he was around 18 years old.

“Looking back,” the author said. “I don’t know why I was so fearful. I have the most supportive parents on the face of the earth. They have never done anything to make me think that they would have abandoned me or put me out because I’m gay. My fears of my true self were unfounded. They were more based on society’s perception of gay men and women. Growing up in the early 2000s, one of the popular phrases was ‘Oh that’s so gay’ equated to ‘that’s so stupid’ or ‘that’s so dumb.’ So it was really me reacting to my peers and how they treated me.”

As he was integrating his ideas on identity for himself, he was also giving more attention to his writing. At 14, young LaRocca pitched an idea to his local theater group for a play and they agreed to produce it. Later, he would incorporate his love of horror to playwrighting, as well, creating a show about Elizabeth Bathory at Hartford Stage.

Looking back over the many things he’s read and enjoyed, the author said, there is one piece that continues to stick out for him after all these years.

“The one book that really kind of opened my world and made me realize it’s more than fine to be a gay man writing horror was Clive Barker’s The Hellbound Heart,” he said. “That piece really just completely resonated with me on such a visceral level. Just the unabashed sexuality of it, the perversity, the absurdity. I discovered him when I was maybe 16 or 17. From there, my world just completely changed. I felt like the limitations I put in my mind not only in horror but as a person were just completely erased and I felt like I was just completely limitless with possibilities in regards to writing and with myself as a human being. I feel like Clive Barker really just destroyed all barriers. His imagination is completely unparalleled. It was a seminal piece for me to digest and define myself.”

The story also influences his own writing. One can see glimmers of the body horror of Barker and filmmakers like David Cronenberg in the pages of Things Have Gotten Worse Since Last We Spoke, a novella that not traverses the course of a manipulative relationship but also takes a look at the darker corners of internet culture which LaRocca compares to the wild west.

As for his upcoming collection The Strange Thing We Become and Other Dark Tales from Off Limits Press, Eric LaRocca had this to say.

“It is a collection of dark fiction—not all of the pieces are outright horror. A lot of them are the sort of slow, more reflective kind of slow-burn horror. And some are just more unsettling and very disturbing.”

I, for one, can’t wait to read it.

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‘Alien’ is Being Made Into a Children’s ABC Book

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Alien Book

That Disney buyout of Fox is making for strange crossovers. Just look at this new children’s book that teaches children the alphabet via the 1979 Alien movie.

From the library of Penguin House’s classic Little Golden Books comes A is for Alien: An ABC Book.

Pre-Order Here

The next few years are going to be big for the space monster. First, just in time for the film’s 45th anniversary, we are getting a new franchise film called Alien: Romulus. Then Hulu, also owned by Disney is creating a television series, although they say that might not be ready until 2025.

The book is currently available for pre-order here, and is set to release on July 9, 2024. It might be fun to guess which letter will represent which part of the movie. Such as “J is for Jonesy” or “M is for Mother.”

Romulus will be released in theaters on August 16, 2024. Not since 2017 have we revisited the Alien cinematic universe in Covenant. Apparently, this next entry follows, “Young people from a distant world facing the most terrifying life form in the universe.”

Until then “A is for Anticipation” and “F is for Facehugger.”

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Holland House Ent. Announces New Book “Oh Mother, What Have You Done?”

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Screenwriter and Director Tom Holland is delighting fans with books containing scripts, visual memoirs, continuation of stories, and now behind-the-scenes books on his iconic films. These books offer a fascinating glimpse into the creative process, script revisions, continued stories and the challenges faced during production. Holland’s accounts and personal anecdotes provide a treasure trove of insights for movie enthusiasts, shedding new light on the magic of filmmaking! Check out the press release below on Hollan’s newest fascinating story of the making of his critically acclaimed horror sequel Psycho II in a brand new book!

Horror icon and filmmaker Tom Holland returns to the world he envisioned in 1983’s critically acclaimed feature film Psycho II in the all-new 176-page book Oh Mother, What Have You Done? now available from Holland House Entertainment.

‘Psycho II’ House. “Oh Mother, What Have You Done?”

Authored by Tom Holland and containing unpublished memoirs by late Psycho II director Richard Franklin and conversations with the film’s editor Andrew London, Oh Mother, What Have You Done? offers fans a unique glimpse into the continuation of the beloved Psycho film franchise, which created nightmares for millions of people showering worldwide.

Created using never-before-seen production materials and photos – many from Holland’s own personal archive – Oh Mother, What Have You Done? abounds with rare hand-written development and production notes, early budgets, personal Polaroids and more, all set against fascinating conversations with the film’s writer, director and editor which document the development, filming, and reception of the much-celebrated Psycho II.  

‘Oh Mother, What Have you Done? – The Making of Psycho II

Says author Holland of writing Oh Mother, What Have You Done? (which contains an afterward by Bates Motel producer Anthony Cipriano), I wrote Psycho II, the first sequel that began the Psycho legacy, forty years ago this past summer, and the film was a huge success in the year 1983, but who remembers? To my surprise, apparently, they do, because on the film’s fortieth anniversary love from fans began to pour in, much to my amazement and pleasure. And then (Psycho II director) Richard Franklin’s unpublished memoirs arrived unexpectedly. I’d had no idea he’d written them before he passed in 2007.”

“Reading them,” continues Holland, “was like being transported back in time, and I had to share them, along with my memories and personal archives with the fans of Psycho, the sequels, and the excellent Bates Motel. I hope they enjoy reading the book as much as I did in putting it together. My thanks to Andrew London, who edited, and to Mr. Hitchcock, without whom none of this would have existed.”

“So, step back with me forty years and let’s see how it happened.”

Anthony Perkins – Norman Bates

Oh Mother, What Have You Done? is available now in both hardback and paperback through Amazon and at Terror Time (for copies autographed by Tom Holland)

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Sequel to ‘Cujo’ Just One Offering in New Stephen King Anthology

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It’s been a minute since Stephen King put out a short story anthology. But in 2024 a new one containing some original works is getting published just in time for summer. Even the book title “You Like It Darker,” suggests the author is giving readers something more.

The anthology will also contain a sequel to King’s 1981 novel “Cujo,” about a rabid Saint Bernard that wreaks havoc on a young mother and her child trapped inside a Ford Pinto. Called “Rattlesnakes,” you can read an excerpt from that story on Ew.com.

The website also gives a synopsis of some of the other shorts in the book: “The other tales include ‘Two Talented Bastids,’ which explores the long-hidden secret of how the eponymous gentlemen got their skills, and ‘Danny Coughlin’s Bad Dream,’ about a brief and unprecedented psychic flash that upends dozens of lives. In ‘The Dreamers,’ a taciturn Vietnam vet answers a job ad and learns that there are some corners of the universe best left unexplored while ‘The Answer Man’ asks if prescience is good luck or bad and reminds us that a life marked by unbearable tragedy can still be meaningful.”

Here’s the table of contents from “You Like It Darker,”:

  • “Two Talented Bastids”
  • “The Fifth Step”
  • “Willie the Weirdo”
  • “Danny Coughlin’s Bad Dream”
  • “Finn”
  • “On Slide Inn Road”
  • “Red Screen”
  • “The Turbulence Expert”
  • “Laurie”
  • “Rattlesnakes”
  • “The Dreamers”
  • “The Answer Man”

Except for “The Outsider” (2018) King has been releasing crime novels and adventure books instead of true horror in the past few years. Known mostly for his terrifying early supernatural novels such as “Pet Sematary,” “It,” “The Shining” and “Christine,” the 76-year-old author has diversified from what made him famous starting with “Carrie” in 1974.

A 1986 article from Time Magazine explained that King planned on quitting horror after he wrote “It.” At the time he said there was too much competition, citing Clive Barker as “better than I am now” and “a lot more energetic.” But that was almost four decades ago. Since then he’s written some horror classics such as “The Dark Half, “Needful Things,” “Gerald’s Game,” and “Bag of Bones.”

Maybe the King of Horror is waxing nostalgic with this latest anthology by revisiting the “Cujo” universe in this latest book. We will have to find out when “You Like It Darker” hits bookshelves and digital platforms starting May 21, 2024.

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