Kickstarter for Turn Over the Moon Is Finished: Thank You Everyone!

On October 31, 2020 By Ryan HarveyIn Announcements, my fiction

The Kickstarter campaign for my novel Turn Over the Moon concluded this morning, with a total of $2,187 raised, twice our original goal! Thank you to everyone who contributed. I’m incredibly grateful to see this level of support.

Because we reached the $2,000 stretch goal, all the backers will be listed in the book. I have to make the changes to the files, and then the novel will be ready for its publishing debut. All backers will receive their copies and other rewards during November. We’ll keep everyone up to date.

A Messy List of My 10 Favorite Hammer Horror Films

On October 29, 2020January 1, 2021 By Ryan HarveyIn movies

I’m not a fan of making Top 10 Lists because setting anything in stone—unless you’re a gorgon—is only asking for regrets later. Favorites are fluid, and personal tastes fluctuate. But readers like lists, as do search engines, so for my Happy Halloween post, I’ve put together a sloppy list of my favorite horror movies from Hammer Film Productions during their original years.

Hammer movies are my horror brand. They’re what I think Gothic horror should be. They’re my constant companions each October. And here are ten, listed alphabetically so I won’t get into fights with myself over ranking, that I think represent the best of the studio during its grand era.

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Before The Wolf Man: Man Made Monster (1941)

On October 27, 2020 By Ryan HarveyIn movies

A minor film taken on its own, Man Made Monster introduced movie audiences to two of the major stars of the 1940s Universal horror movie factory: actor Lon Chaney Jr. and director-writer-producer George Waggner. Chaney Jr. (born Creighton Chaney) became Universal’s primary monster performer for the rest of the decade thanks to his success in the title role of The Wolf Man. George Waggner also rode the success of The Wolf Man as its director and rose to be the studio’s go-to producer and director for the remainder of the classic horror cycle.

Before the two hit their heights, they had a low-budget trial run with this little electrical SF horror movie.

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Nonfiction Update: I’ve Got a New Home

On October 23, 2020 By Ryan HarveyIn Announcements, my nonfiction

In September I announced that the Perilous Worlds project was done, and all my posts for them had vanished (temporarily) into the ether. I also hinted that our blogging crew might emerge at another website, and now it’s happened: I’m blogging as part of the web-presence for the magazine Tales From the Magician’s Skull at the Goodman Games website. I already had a relationship with Magician’s Skull because my friend Howard Andrew Jones edits it and my story “Dead Queen’s Triumph” appeared in the April issue.

My first article at Goodman Games is already live, a Halloween-themed look at the “weird menace” pulps and Robert E. Howard’s brief foray into this gory and bizarre corner of pulp history. This was one of the articles I had written for Perilous Worlds that dropped into limbo before it could be published, so I’m happy to see it crawl up from the lower depths to plague the world this October with grotesque mad science and deformity.

I believe some of my articles previously published at Perilous Worlds will resurface at Goodman Games, so I’m going to hold off on my earlier plans to post them on this blog. The future for this project is still coming into focus, but I’m glad to have a new home for my nonfiction.

The Price of October: The Fall of the House of Usher (1960)

On October 15, 2020October 29, 2020 By Ryan HarveyIn movies

In 2013, a mere million years ago, Shout! Factory delivered to the world one of the most delightful October movie packages: The Vincent Price Collection, a Blu-ray set with six classics, including four from the Edgar Allan Poe/Roger Corman/AIP series. (The Haunted Palace is based on a short novel by H. P. Lovecraft, but AIP slapped the title of an obscure Poe poem onto it to make it another entry in the cycle).

Horror movie expert Brian Collins has said that if you go all of October without watching a Vincent Price movie, you’re doing it wrong. I won’t issue an absolute like that—and Collins has admitted he’s gone at least one October without Price—but it makes sense. Price as a persona matches the season: he combines sinister evil, charm, and the feeling of quality company. Halloween should feel sinister and cozy. It’s a holiday after all, meant to be fun, and Vincent Price invites us with his dulcet tones and long, gray face to enjoy ourselves for a few spooky hours and leave with good memories.

And the best Vincent Price films for the season are the AIP-Poe films, which started with The Fall of the House of Usher. This was the first film I watched off the collection when I got it in 2013, and it was the Price film I chose this October to fill my quota.

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