After melting for months, it’s finally autumn! (cue massive marching band!) Which means convention season is upon us again.

British Fantasycon in Glasgow was incredibly busy, and I feel as if there were dozens of people I never even saw in passing. While there, I was honoured to get a shout-out in the speech when Chukwunonso Ezeiyoke won the Best Non-Fiction Award for Nigerian Speculative Fiction: The Evolution; I copy edited the book last year. I was also part of Slab Press’s launch for its latest anthology, Screams & Wails, which contains my short “Dani Gets a Backstage Pass”. The stories are all inspired by music (rock/metal for the most part); mine is about a girl who has to save her friend from a terrible pact and was inspired by Grunge of the early 1990s.

But I’m gearing up for 2027’s conventions, including Eastercon in Glasgow and a combo British Fantasycon/World Fantasy Convention in Birmingham in September. I’m also noodling over a book proposal, waiting to hear back about a novella, and looking forward to slowing down a bit in December, when I can do some sorely needed novel edits.

But before then, October still has its claws in me!

Halloween at Moyses Hall

On Halloween day, some local authors and I will be selling our horror books at Moyses Hall, where you can find artefacts from the witch trials and even a human-flesh-bound book (so on trend for the season!). I’ll have copies Screams and Wails along with Threading the Labyrinth (on the lighter side of horror). You can find us at Moyses Hall on the Buttermarket in Bury St. Edmunds, Oct 31 from 10-4.

Horror Interview at Waterstones Cambridge

On Wednesday 28 October, I’ll be interviewing three horror authors about their work. Join me as I talk to Dan Coxon (author and editor), Matt Hill, and V. Castro as we discuss Unearthed: New Horror of Ancient Ruins, Unhallowed Gifts, and Come Sing for the Harrowing. Tickets and more information are available here.

Online Workshop on Writing Witches Coming Up!

February will be here before we know it (seriously, it was just March!), and we all know how dreary that month can be, so why not schedule something fun to look forward to? I’ll be running my (very popular) workshop on writing witches, but over the 3-day event there will be loads of workshops and interviews for you to enjoy from your comfy couch at home! Full schedule below:

October Reading & Watching

BOOKS: Horror books on my TBR pile once I finish the Fallow Sisters series by Liz Williams (I can’t recommend these enough!): Hex by Thomas Olde Heuvelt (2013), which has been on my shelf for over a decade; NOS4A2 by Joe Hill (2013), which I read a third of but bounced off of while working on my PhD; and The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones (2025), which I picked up at Cymera, where I saw him interviewed (his output blows me away!).

FILMS/TV: Sleepy Hollow and Hocus Pocus rewatches are in the cards, but I’m really looking forward to Yaga, which will be available in the UK on Halloween. Oh, and tomorrow we are headed to the cinema to see Ghosts: The Possession of Button House, which I am stupidly excited about! I’ve missed Robin!

Until next time,