The boom times for paperback horror novels were the 1980s and 1990s, and right next to bus station bookstore perennials Tom Clancy, Robert Ludlum and Stephen King, who might serve as these writer's more successful patron saint.  Here, among these books were dozens of evil canine also-rans, a pack of not-quite-Cujos, not to mention psychic tots that more than resemble Danny Torrance, and post-Pennywise scary clowns.  But these were also books that were a bit too pulpy and trashy for the King -- think Satanic orgies, demonic babies eating their way out of cursed mothers, and incestuous gothic tales to make V. C. Andrews blush.

Life, the newest movie (aside from Alien: Convenant) to pay homage (read: rip off) the Alien series, is also pretty vacuum-ous.  The attractive-but-bland stock characters are paper thin, and the plot can be summarized by a phrase, like “alien kills everyone”.

Kiernan's prose provides the greatest part of that wonder.  Achingly beautiful, always strange and never quotidian, she never lets the reader find any firm ground.  Fittingly for a story which involves a Manson-like cult, it feels hallucinatory, dreamlike.  And unlike most stories that fit, even peripherally, into Lovecraft's mythos, the story does not try too hard to replicate the feeling induced by the Master's works.

Of course its an absurdity to ask such a question.  Be it resolved that everyone is different.  Be it resolved that all writing is different.  Even so: when you write, if you write, are you trying to say something?

After the fall of Antioch during the First Crusade, the knights were restless and without leadership. The papal legate had died, leaving the princes in charge and bickering among themselves. The Fatimid Caliphate brought talk of peace to the Crusaders' table. But the Crusaders, though partly divided, were hungry for war. They trekked their way down the coast of the Mediterranean Sea towards Jerusalem.

On June 7, 1099 CE, the Crusaders arrived at the city walls they'd so longed to reach. Some of the soldiers fell to their knees in gratitude to the Lord that had ferried them here. They prayed that God grant them the strength to take the city from the Fatimids, and 5,000 knights rushed into battle.

Summer is here, and so is LGBT Pride Month! As we gear up for the raucous celebration to commemorate the Stonewall riots, I can already hear the complaints of well-meaning individuals—there's too many leather-clad men, why don't people wear more clothes, oh the debauchery! If LGBT people want to be accepted, why do they work so hard to be different?

It's LGBT Pride Month. That's why.

I have a shocking confession to make: I don’t like horror movies. At this point, I’m assuming you’ve either picked yourself up from the floor, or else the confession isn’t really that shocking. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve seen plenty of horror movies. I just don’t go out of my way to watch them because I can’t shut off my overactive imagination. Whether it’s mirrors, the dark, looking through windows into the dark, open closet doors, or the thought of a monster ready to grab me by the ankles and drag me under the bed, seeing these things on the big screen only reinforces the real-life fears I have.

So, now that you know what you’re dealing with, I thought I would further humiliate myself and tell you about my top five embarrassing reactions to some horror movies I’ve seen.