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Welcome to the premiere horror literary convention presented by the Horror Writers Association. Registration for StokerCon 2025 is now available! This year the convention is being hosted by the city of Stamford, Connecticut, at the Hilton Stamford Hotel and Executive Meeting Center. We’re taking over from June 12th through the 15th, 2025.
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Friday, June 13
 

8:00am EDT

Welcome to Librarian's Day!
Friday June 13, 2025 8:00am - 8:25am EDT
Meet the Librarians’ Day team and fellow librarians from across the country while enjoying coffee and bites courtesy of the University of Pittsburgh Library System.
Friday June 13, 2025 8:00am - 8:25am EDT
Grand Ballroom 1

8:00am EDT

Boardroom
Friday June 13, 2025 8:00am - 7:45pm EDT
HWA Officers, Trustees, and StokerCon staff only.
Friday June 13, 2025 8:00am - 7:45pm EDT
Charter Oak

8:30am EDT

Brains! Brains! Brainstorming Ways to Engage Your Community
Friday June 13, 2025 8:30am - 9:20am EDT
Join HWA Library Advisory Council members in small group discussions to meet some of your fellow librarians, share experiences, and gather ideas for how to engage your community with the horror community.
Moderators
avatar for Meghan Bouffard

Meghan Bouffard

Information Services Librarian, Sargent Memorial Library
Public Librarian in Massachusetts. Serves as Secretary of the HWA’s Library Advisory Council. As a librarian I advocate for horror readership by challenging genre perceptions and fostering a culture of exploration. You will often find me reading stories of witches, crumbling haunted... Read More →
avatar for Jocelyn Codner

Jocelyn Codner

Reference & Outreach Librarian, Chatham University
Friday June 13, 2025 8:30am - 9:20am EDT
Grand Ballroom 1

8:45am EDT

Mind, Brains, Bodies: Interdisciplinary Discussions of Horror
Friday June 13, 2025 8:45am - 9:45am EDT
 Zombies as Monstrous Allegory
   Kati Lewis

 Avenging the Mind: Neurodiversity in the Horror Film
Deka Spears

 Trauma Amidst the Zombie Apocalypse
   George Hagman
Speakers
Friday June 13, 2025 8:45am - 9:45am EDT
Elm 1 & 2

9:00am EDT

Author Readings - Friday 09 Aspen
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
Speakers
avatar for Russ Colchamiro

Russ Colchamiro

Russ Colchamiro is author of the Sci-Fi thrillers Crackle and Fire, Fractured Lives, Hot Ash, Blunt Force Rising, and Trigger Point, the ongoing series featuring hardboiled private eye Angela Hardwicke. Russ also is the author of the rollicking time travel/space adventure, Crossline... Read More →
avatar for Jamal Hodge

Jamal Hodge

CEO, Hodge Cinema
JAMAL HODGE is a multi-award-winning filmmaker and writer from Queens NYC who has won over 80 awards with screenings at Tribeca Film Festival, Sundance, Cannes, and others. He directed the first season of Investigation Discovery Channel’s ‘Primal Instinct’ and is a Producer... Read More →
avatar for Hilary Wilson

Hilary Wilson

Literary Correspondent, The Folklore Podcast
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
Aspen 2

9:00am EDT

Author Readings - Friday 09 Glen
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
Speakers
avatar for Taylor Grothe

Taylor Grothe

Taylor is a neurodivergent (ASD) NB writer passionate about voice-driven narratives centering on strong, compelling femmes and enbies. They are 2024 MFA Candidate in Fairfield University’s Creative Writing Program. Their shorts can be found in Coffin Bell, Bag of Bones Press, Haven... Read More →
avatar for Rebecca Cuthbert

Rebecca Cuthbert

Writer, Undertaker Books
Rebecca Cuthbert writes feminist horror, gothic fiction, and dark poetry. Her books include IN MEMORY OF EXOSKELETONS (dark poetry, Alien Buddha Press, 2023); CREEP THIS WAY (nonfiction, Seamus and Nunzio Productions, 2024); SELF-MADE MONSTERS (feminist horror stories and poetry... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
Glen 1

9:00am EDT

Bleeding Hearts: Where Horror Meets Romance
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
Horror and romance might seem like strange bedfellows, but when done well, they can elevate each other in powerful, unexpected ways. This panel explores the rich intersection between terror and tenderness—where love stories unfold amid dread, danger, and darkness. As genre mashups continue to rise in popularity, especially in the wake of the romantasy boom, more authors are weaving emotionally complex relationships into their horror-forward stories.

Join us for a candid conversation with authors who are pushing the boundaries of genre: developing compelling romantic arcs within gruesome, unsettling worlds; balancing suspense and swoon; and navigating the tonal tightrope between tragedy and happily ever after. How do they craft believable romantic pairings in stories filled with paranormal or psychological horror? Can romance ground a horror narrative—or does it risk making it less believable? Is it possible to satisfy both horror and romance readers at once?

This conversation will offer insights for writers looking to explore genre fusion and readers drawn to the emotional stakes of love in the face of fear. Expect a lively, thoughtful, and slightly twisted discussion about why these two genres might be a perfect match.
Moderators
avatar for Emma Cole

Emma Cole

Editor, Harlequin
Editor @Harlequin, acquiring for Intrigue as well as for our Harlequin Trade Publishing imprint Hanover Square Press, which publishes horror, mystery, speculative fiction and nonfiction.
Speakers
avatar for Paula Guran

Paula Guran

Editor, anthologist, and reviewer Paula Guran has edited more than 50 science fiction, fantasy, and horror anthologies and more than 50 novels and collections featuring the same. She was senior editor for Prime Books for seven years. Previously, she edited the Juno fantasy impr... Read More →
avatar for Clay McLeod Chapman

Clay McLeod Chapman

Author of Wake Up and Open Your Eyes, Kill Your Darling, Stay on the Line, What Kind of Mother, Ghost Eaters, Whisper Down the Lane, The Remaking, and others.
avatar for Sumiko Saulson

Sumiko Saulson

2 Time Bram Stoker Finalist in the Poetry Collection category, Author
Sumiko Saulson is a two-time Bram Stoker Finalist in the Poetry Collection for the poetry collections Melancholia: A Book of Dark Poetry (Bludgeoned Girls Press) and The Rat King: A Book of Dark Poetry (Dooky Zines), Elgin Nominee, 3rd Place Dwarf Stars Award Winner, Winner... Read More →
avatar for Sarah Hans

Sarah Hans

Sarah Hans is an award-winning writer, editor, and teacher whose stories have appeared in more than 40 publications, including Apex Magazine, Love Letters to Poe, and Pseudopod. Her debut horror novel, Entomophobia, was released in 2022. You can read Sarah’s short stories in the... Read More →
avatar for Chloe Spencer

Chloe Spencer

Minnesota native Chloe Spencer is an award winning writer, indie gamedev, and filmmaker. She is the author of multiple sapphic horror novellas, novels, and short stories. In her spare time she enjoys playing video games, trying her best at Pilates, and cuddling with her cats. She... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
Grove 2

9:00am EDT

Horror Podcasts: Conversations That Feed the Genre
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
Join Guest of Horror Scott Edelman, host of Eating the Fantastic, and fellow panelists for a conversation on the power of podcasting to build community, preserve genre history, and spark meaningful dialogue. From one-on-one interviews to roundtable discussions and narrative formats, panelists will share their experiences creating and appearing on podcasts that deepen connections between horror creators and fans.
Moderators
avatar for Alex Hofelich

Alex Hofelich

co-Editor, PseudoPod
Alex Hofelich is Co-Editor of Pseudopod, a weekly horror podcast magazine. It is part of the pro-paying Escape Artists network, which has been delivering weekly short fiction in multiple genres since 2005. He has been involved with PseudoPod since 2009, and edited the anthology... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Scott Edelman

Scott Edelman

Author
SCOTT EDELMAN has published 125+ short stories in magazines such as Lightspeed, Analog, Apex, and The Twilight Zone, and in anthologies such as Why New Yorkers Smoke, Crossroads: Southern Tales of the Fantastic, and MetaHorror. He began his professional writing career in the comics... Read More →
avatar for Tamika Thompson

Tamika Thompson

Author
Tamika is author of THE CURSE OF HESTER GARDENS (Erewhon/Kensington, 2026) & Next Generation Indie Book Awards Horror WINNER, UNSHOD, CACKLING, and NAKED (Unnerving Books), which Publishers Weekly calls “powerful,” “unsettling,” and “terrifying.” She is also the author... Read More →
avatar for David Cummings

David Cummings

Showrunner, The NoSleep Podcast
David Cummings – voice actor, musician, raconteur. Born and raised in Toronto, Canada almost 60 years ago. In 2011, David rekindled his love of voice acting and audio horror storytelling with a new venture called, “The NoSleep Podcast”. Launched on June 13, 2011, he resides... Read More →
avatar for Stephanie Gagnon

Stephanie Gagnon

Host, Books in the Freezer Podcast
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
Aspen 1

9:00am EDT

How To Be A Pro
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
A discussion of proper etiquette and professional behavior for authors approaching agents, editors, and publishers, promoting their work, engaging in the writing community, interacting with readers, being active online, and other aspects of being a professional writer. The panel will offer tips, do's and don'ts and general advice about how to succeed in making good connections and advancing your career.
Moderators
avatar for Brian Matthews

Brian Matthews

Trustee; Co-Chair, StokerCon Governing Committee; Bram Stoker Awards® Show Coordinator; Pitch Session Coordinator, Horror Writers Association
Author, financial planner, former psychologist, husband, and father. Trustee for the Horror Writers Association, as well a National Co-Chair for StokerCon. I also run the Pitch Sessions and act as the Bram Stoker Awards Show Coordinator. That pretty much sums it up.
Speakers
avatar for Becky  LeJeune

Becky LeJeune

Agent, Bond Literary Agency
Becky LeJeune is an agent at Bond Literary Agency, a Denver-based agency run by Sandra Bond. Prior to joining the agency, Becky spent time working as a bookseller, a freelance cookbook editor, and an acquisitions editor for a small, regional press. She is a graduate of the Denver... Read More →
avatar for Emily Hughes

Emily Hughes

Author, reviewer, listmaker
Emily C. Hughes (she/her) wants to scare you. Formerly the editor of Unbound Worlds and TorNightfire.com, she writes about horror and curates a list of the year’s new scary books. Her first book, Horror For Weenies: Everything You Need to Know About the Films You’re Too Scared... Read More →
avatar for Michael Dolan

Michael Dolan

Editorial Director, Winding Road Stories
Michael Dolan is a writer and editor with over 25 years of experience at the highest levels of publishing. In addition to being the author of several books, he has served as executive editor for many publishing companies, including Condé Nast. As the founder of Winding Road Stories... Read More →
avatar for Douglas Murano

Douglas Murano

Founder/CEO, Bad Hand Books
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 9:45am EDT
Glen 2 & 3

9:00am EDT

HU: Peele and the Furious Five: Unlocking the Layers of Jordan Peele’s Storytelling
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 11:00am EDT
This is a separately ticketed event. Tickets may be purchased through the Registration portal. Click Get Tickets and scroll down to options labeled "Horror University" or "HU."  

This course delves into the five key elements that make Jordan Peele’s films both visually and narratively groundbreaking. Through the lens of "String Theory," we explore how characters react under pressure and how these moments shift their axis. "Point of View, Point Askew" examines how characters’ perceptions are upended, creating new narrative possibilities. "Family Focus" reveals the impact of generational behaviors on character arcs and outcomes. "Call and Response" analyzes the dynamic interplay between protagonist and antagonist, highlighting audience engagement and investment. Finally, "Boom, Splat!" unpacks the climactic finish, showing how hidden Easter eggs reframe our understanding of the story, offering layered interpretations and endless rewatchability. Gain the tools to analyze and apply Peele’s storytelling techniques, enrich narratives with multidimensional characters and intricate plots, master audience engagement, integrate complex themes, and draft impactful endings that encourage lasting impressions and multiple interpretations.
Speakers
avatar for Mo Moshaty

Mo Moshaty

Writer, Lecturer, Producer and Journalist, NightTide Magazine/Mourning Manor Media
Mo Moshaty is a multi-award-winning horror writer, producer, and international lecturer whose work explores trauma, folklore, and the boundaries of fear through a diverse and inclusive lens. She is the author of Maddalena – 206 Word Stories (2022), Henry – A Quaint and Curious... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 9:00am - 11:00am EDT
Alder

9:30am EDT

How to Feature Horror at Your Library
Friday June 13, 2025 9:30am - 10:20am EDT
Hear librarians from across the country share their experiences featuring horror at their libraries, from book discussions to writing groups to author events and more.
Moderators
avatar for Corey Farrenkopf

Corey Farrenkopf

Staff Librarian, Eastham Public Library
Corey Farrenkopf is a Cape Cod based writer and librarian. His work has been published in Nightmare, The Deadlands, Strange Horizons, Vastarien, Three-Lobed Burning Eye, Cosmic Horror Monthly, Bourbon Penn, and elsewhere. He is the author of the novel, Living in Cemeteries and the... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Abbey Clark

Abbey Clark

Librarian, Ottawa Public Library
I'm a Librarian with the Ottawa Public Library in Ontario, Canada who loves all things horror!
avatar for Carina Stopenski

Carina Stopenski

Teen Librarian, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Carina Stopenski (they/them) is a librarian, author, and scholar based in Pittsburgh, PA. In their day to day, Carina works as a teen librarian at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, as a freelance humanities educator for teens, and as the director of the Pittsburgh Mobile Cartoon... Read More →
avatar for Trevor Oakley

Trevor Oakley

Head of Access & Outreach, Acq & Coll Mgmt, Saratoga Springs Public Library
Horror in libraries, including/featuring horror in book festivals/community reads, horror RA
Friday June 13, 2025 9:30am - 10:20am EDT
Grand Ballroom 1

10:00am EDT

Author Readings - Friday 10 Aspen
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
Speakers
avatar for Todd Keisling

Todd Keisling

Author, Graphic Designer, Precipice Books / Dullington Design Co.
TODD KEISLING is the two-time Bram Stoker Award®-nominated author of Devil’s Creek, Scanlines, Cold, Black & Infinite, and most recently, The Sundowner’s Dance, among several others. A pair of his earlier works were recipients of the University of Kentucky’s Oswald Research... Read More →
avatar for TJ Price

TJ Price

mask
TJ Price’s corporeal being is currently located in Raleigh, NC, where he lives with his handsome partner of many years, but his ghosts can be found in northeastern Connecticut, southern Maine, and north Brooklyn. He is the author of The Disappearance of Tom Nero, a mixed-media novelette... Read More →
avatar for Nicole Wolverton

Nicole Wolverton

Nicole M. Wolverton is a fear enthusiast who is the author of the upcoming young adult horror novel MEAT SWEATS (fall 2026, Horrorsmith Publishing), as well as A MISFORTUNE OF LAKE MONSTERS (2024, CamCat Books). She served as Editor of BODIES FULL OF BURNING (2021, Sliced Up Press... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
Aspen 2

10:00am EDT

Author Readings - Friday 10 Glen
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
Speakers
avatar for Erika T. Wurth

Erika T. Wurth

Writer/Professor, Flatiron/Macmillan
Erika T. Wurth’s novel WHITE HORSE is a New York Times editors pick, a Good Morning America buzz pick, and an Indie Next, Target book of the Month, and Book of the Month Pick. She is both a Kenyon and Sewanee fellow, and Kenyon faculty. She’s published in Buzzfeed, and The Writer’s... Read More →
avatar for Kevin Wetmore Jr.

Kevin Wetmore Jr.

Volunteer Coordinator, HWA LA
Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr. is the author, editor or co-editor of thirty books, including Bram Stoker Award nominees Uncovering Stranger Things, The Streaming of Hill House, Devil’s Advocates: The Conjuring, and Eaters of the Dead: Myths and Realities of Cannibal Monsters. He is also... Read More →
avatar for Robert Ottone

Robert Ottone

Robert P. Ottone is the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of THE TRIANGLE and is also the best-selling author of CURSE OF THE COB MAN, THE SLEEPY HOLLOW GANG, THE VILE THING WE CREATED and NOCTURNAL CREATURES.His short fiction has been collected in TEAR ME OPEN as well as HER INFERNAL... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
Glen 1

10:00am EDT

Combating Loneliness in the Writing Profession
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
As we fuel both creativity and resilience, so much of our work unfolds in seclusion. We need communities for support and to stay informed in a rapidly changing field. Join these writers for a conversation on how they manage loneliness and establish connection.
--Our best strategies for combating loneliness in the writing profession
--Explore the anthology experience as editors/authors seeking connection
--Special events, conventions, readings, writing groups
--Overcoming geography and using tech
--Good manners and mind, body, spirit takeaways
Moderators
avatar for Jamal Hodge

Jamal Hodge

CEO, Hodge Cinema
JAMAL HODGE is a multi-award-winning filmmaker and writer from Queens NYC who has won over 80 awards with screenings at Tribeca Film Festival, Sundance, Cannes, and others. He directed the first season of Investigation Discovery Channel’s ‘Primal Instinct’ and is a Producer... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Crystal O’Leary-Davidson (C. O. Davidson)

Crystal O’Leary-Davidson (C. O. Davidson)

Writer and Teacher
Crystal’s work has appeared in Pseudopod, Vastarien, Cemetery Gates and in various horror anthologies. She co-edited MONSTERS OF FILM, FICTION, AND FABLE and is a founding member of the Atlanta chapter of the HWA. She teaches writing, the Gothic, and horror at Middle Georgia State... Read More →
avatar for Mark Matthews

Mark Matthews

Mark Matthews is a Shirley Jackson Award Finalist, a graduate of the University of Michigan, and a licensed professional counselor. He is the author of On the Lips of Children, All Smoke Rises, Milk-Blood, and The Hobgoblin of Little Minds. He also edited, published, and contributed... Read More →
avatar for Lauren Elise (L. E.) Daniels

Lauren Elise (L. E.) Daniels

Editor, Author, Poet, HWA Wellness Committee, Brisbane Writers Workshop
A Bram Stoker Awards® finalist, co-chair for the HWA Mental Health Initiative with Mark Matthews, and Rhode Islander living in Australia, Lauren Elise (L. E.) Daniels has worked in publishing since '92. An Emerson College MFA grad, she's edited over 140+ titles, including the Aurealis... Read More →
avatar for Geneve Flynn

Geneve Flynn

Editor and author
Geneve Flynn is a speculative fiction editor, author, and poet. Winner of two Bram Stoker Awards and the Shirley Jackson, Aurealis, and Brave New Weird Awards; recipient of the 2022 Queensland Writers Fellowship. Her work has been nominated and short/longlisted for the British Fantasy... Read More →
avatar for Katherine Silva

Katherine Silva

Author and EIC, Strange Wilds Press
Katherine Silva is an ace Maine horror author, a connoisseur of coffee, and victim of cat shenanigans. Her favorite flavors of the genre mix grief and existentialism which she combines with her love of the New England wilderness in her works. She is a three-time Maine Literary Award... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
Aspen 1

10:00am EDT

Scaring And Daring Anthology Panel
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
From Captain Hook’s run-in with dark magic to Sherlock Holmes narrowly escaping graveyard spirits to a happily never after for Cinderella, this horror anthology is anything but a bedtime story. In this terrifying new assemblage for young readers, the best-loved stories from the literary canon are revisited and reimagined with a deadly twist by some of the top authors working in middle grade today. Join contributors from the Scaring and Daring official HWA anthology as they talk about their stories.
Moderators
avatar for Eric J. Guignard

Eric J. Guignard

Gentleman Extraordinaire, Dark Moon Books
Eric J. Guignard is a writer and anthologist of dark and speculative fiction, operating from the shadowy outskirts of Los Angeles, where he also runs the small press Dark Moon Books. He’s twice won the Bram Stoker Award, won the Shirley Jackson Award, and been a finalist for the World Fantasy Award and International Thriller Writers Award.He has over 150 stories appearing in publications around the world and has edited and published thirteen anthologies, such... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Teel James Glenn

Teel James Glenn

writer
Teel James Glenn has killed hundreds and been killed more times-- on stage and screen as he has traveled the world for forty plus years as a stuntman, fight choreographer, swordmaster, jouster, illustrator, storyteller, bodyguard, actor and haunted house barker.His stories have been... Read More →
avatar for Maxwell Ian Gold

Maxwell Ian Gold

Executive Director, Horror Writers Association
Maxwell I. Gold is a Jewish American multiple award nominated author who writes prose poetry and short stories in cosmic horror and weird fiction with half a decade of writing experience. Five time Rhysling Award nominee, two time Pushcart Award nominee, and author of the Bram Stoker... Read More →
avatar for Ai Jiang

Ai Jiang

Ai Jiang is a Chinese-Canadian writer, Ignyte, Bram Stoker, and Nebula Award winner, and Hugo, Astounding, Locus, Aurora, and BFSA Award finalist from Changle, Fujian currently residing in Toronto, Ontario. Her work can be found in F&SF, The Dark, The Masters Review, among others... Read More →
avatar for Lisa Morton

Lisa Morton

Author of four novels and over 200 short stories, screenwriter, Halloween and paranormal expert, past President of the Horror Writers Association.
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
Glen 2 & 3

10:00am EDT

The Myth of Making It
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
Surviving life as a creative. How we make ends meet. What we sacrifice and what we gain. Join our group of panelists as we talk day jobs, work/life balance, career shifts, and the many unconventional paths we walk as writers. The audience will have a look behind the curtain at some of their favorite writers while being invited to share their own experiences, as we collectively dispel the myth of making it, in a casual and candid conversation with lots of back-and-forth.
Moderators
avatar for Jamie Flanagan

Jamie Flanagan

Jamie Flanagan writes television shows. Credits include The Haunting of Bly Manor, Midnight Mass, The Midnight Club, The Fall of the House of Usher. Theatre nerd. Avid gamer (tabletop and video).
Speakers
avatar for Denise Tapscott

Denise Tapscott

Enchanted Flower Productions
I'm the author of Gypsy Kisses and Voodoo Wishes as well as the sequel, Enlightening of the Damned. Not only do I play a spicy vampire named Tasha on the YouTube show The Vamps Next Door, I am proud to be a member of the podcast Beef, Wine, and Shenanigans
avatar for Meg Ripley

Meg Ripley

Writer of horror and dark fantasy, designer, and drawer. Her debut novel, NECROLOGY, (Book #1 of the Dirty) is a Foreword INDIES Bronze Medalist in Fantasy (2024). Book 2 of the Dirty, WOODFEAST, due Fall 2026, Creature Publishing.
avatar for Mercedes M. Yardley

Mercedes M. Yardley

They call me Miss Murder. I'm a two-time Bram Stoker Award-Winner in Long Fiction and Short Fiction, and a finalist in Anthology, Fiction Collection, and Short Fiction. I bake voodoo doll cookies and make darling little quilts with skulls on them.
avatar for Matthew Bartlett

Matthew Bartlett

Head Honcho, Gare Occult
Matthew M. Bartlett is the author of Gateways to Abomination, The Obsecration, and other books of supernatural and weird horror fiction.
avatar for Scott Edelman

Scott Edelman

Author
SCOTT EDELMAN has published 125+ short stories in magazines such as Lightspeed, Analog, Apex, and The Twilight Zone, and in anthologies such as Why New Yorkers Smoke, Crossroads: Southern Tales of the Fantastic, and MetaHorror. He began his professional writing career in the comics... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 10:45am EDT
Grove 2

10:00am EDT

Reclaiming and Reframing the Monstrous
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 11:30am EDT
 The monstrous-feminine: Rehabilitating the Lamia
    Brenda Sieczkowski

 Tear Everything to Pieces: The Werewolf and Its Transformation as Queer Allegory in Ginger Snaps (2000)
    Marian Phillips

 Physician, Divine, or Horse-Doctor: Sheridan Le Fanu's Swedenborgian System of Metaphysical Medicine
    Daniel Holmes

 Beyond Priests and Demons: A New Wave of Possession Novels in the 21st Century
    Cassandra Sachar
Speakers
avatar for Cassandra O’Sullivan Sachar

Cassandra O’Sullivan Sachar

Associate Professor of English/Author
Cassandra O’Sullivan Sachar is a writer and associate English professor in Pennsylvania who teaches creative writing, composition, and composition theory courses. A former secondary English teacher in Delaware public schools, she received her Doctorate of Education with a Literacy... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00am - 11:30am EDT
Elm 1 & 2

10:00am EDT

10:30am EDT

Buzzing About Horror Books
Friday June 13, 2025 10:30am - 11:20am EDT
Join librarians and book reviewers as they share the buzz about a slew of exciting new and upcoming horror titles. Come for the booktalks; stay for the free books and swag!
Moderators
avatar for Emily Vinci

Emily Vinci

Librarian, Horror Reviewer
Speakers
avatar for Ryan Elizabeth Clark

Ryan Elizabeth Clark

Marketing Manager, Queen of Scream, Gibson’s Bookstore
Indie Bookseller who specializes in Horror!
avatar for Emily Hughes

Emily Hughes

Author, reviewer, listmaker
Emily C. Hughes (she/her) wants to scare you. Formerly the editor of Unbound Worlds and TorNightfire.com, she writes about horror and curates a list of the year’s new scary books. Her first book, Horror For Weenies: Everything You Need to Know About the Films You’re Too Scared... Read More →
avatar for Stephanie Gagnon

Stephanie Gagnon

Host, Books in the Freezer Podcast
avatar for Corey Farrenkopf

Corey Farrenkopf

Staff Librarian, Eastham Public Library
Corey Farrenkopf is a Cape Cod based writer and librarian. His work has been published in Nightmare, The Deadlands, Strange Horizons, Vastarien, Three-Lobed Burning Eye, Cosmic Horror Monthly, Bourbon Penn, and elsewhere. He is the author of the novel, Living in Cemeteries and the... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 10:30am - 11:20am EDT
Grand Ballroom 1

10:30am EDT

Hang Out Room
Friday June 13, 2025 10:30am - 7:00pm EDT
No programming. Just a quiet place to hang out.
Friday June 13, 2025 10:30am - 7:00pm EDT
Linden

11:00am EDT

80's/90's Kindertrauma
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
The 80's and 90's were a splendor of dark fantasy and science fiction for children, some of which have haunted us since in a phenomenon known as Kindertrauma. Panelists will look back on some of their favorite classic kids media and discuss how the stories, characters and settings influenced their work and how that frightening nostalgia has driven the narrative of today's television shows and books.
Moderators
avatar for Katherine Silva

Katherine Silva

Author and EIC, Strange Wilds Press
Katherine Silva is an ace Maine horror author, a connoisseur of coffee, and victim of cat shenanigans. Her favorite flavors of the genre mix grief and existentialism which she combines with her love of the New England wilderness in her works. She is a three-time Maine Literary Award... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Robert Ottone

Robert Ottone

Robert P. Ottone is the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of THE TRIANGLE and is also the best-selling author of CURSE OF THE COB MAN, THE SLEEPY HOLLOW GANG, THE VILE THING WE CREATED and NOCTURNAL CREATURES.His short fiction has been collected in TEAR ME OPEN as well as HER INFERNAL... Read More →
avatar for Alyssa Alessi

Alyssa Alessi

Author•Spooktastic Book Fair creator/host
Please talk to me about 90’s horror shows and movies, ghosts, witchcraft, the struggles and triumphs of publishing and the moon.
avatar for Ann Dávila Cardinal

Ann Dávila Cardinal

Author
Ann Dávila Cardinal is a Nuyorican poly-genre author. Her young adult horror novels include Five Midnights (winner of an International Latino Book Award and a Bram Stoker finalist), Category Five, Breakup from Hell, and You’ve Awoken Her, coming June 17. Ann lives in a little house... Read More →
avatar for Jamie Flanagan

Jamie Flanagan

Jamie Flanagan writes television shows. Credits include The Haunting of Bly Manor, Midnight Mass, The Midnight Club, The Fall of the House of Usher. Theatre nerd. Avid gamer (tabletop and video).
avatar for Logan Alexander Johnson

Logan Alexander Johnson

Logan Alexander Johnson is a writer, designer, and researcher who uses words as a vehicle for activism, inclusion, and empowerment. He brings a designer’s empathy to the page, shaped by over a decade of experience in human-centered design. Logan writes stories that highlight the... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
Glen 2 & 3

11:00am EDT

Author Readings - Friday 11 Aspen 1
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
Speakers
avatar for William Sterling

William Sterling

William Sterling is an author, editor, screenwriter, and sometimes actor, always with a focus on the spooky side of things. His most recent novels include STRING THEM UP from Crystal Lake Publishing and DEAD MENS CHESTS from Hedone Press, and he is the lead editor for Truborn Press's... Read More →
avatar for Hazel Zorn

Hazel Zorn

I'm an oil painter and SFF/ Horror writer-- Recent nonfiction editorial in Blood Knife  Fiction at DSF, Starship Sofa, etc. I am a huge cicada fan.
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
Aspen 1

11:00am EDT

Author Readings - Friday 11 Aspen 2
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
Speakers
avatar for Tom Deady

Tom Deady

Tom Deady's first novel, HAVEN, won the 2016 Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a First Novel. He has since published several novels, novellas, a short story collection, and the first book in his middle grade horror series. He has a Master's Degree in English and Creative... Read More →
avatar for J.V. Gachs

J.V. Gachs

Author
J. V. Gachs is a Spanish ESL writer/ J.V. Gachs es una escritora de terror bilingüe. Her debut novel, Epiphany, was published by Off Limits Press in 2023, and in Spanish by Dolmen Editorial in 2024, and will have a rerelease in 2025 from Sobelo Books. As a self-translating author... Read More →
avatar for David Simms

David Simms

Writer. Psychologist. Musician. Reviewer.
David Simms is the author of PIERCE THE VEIL, FEAR THE REAPER, and DARK MUSE, published by Crossroad Press. His new middle grade novel, CURSE OF THE BARRENS is the latest entry in HWA legend's Elizabeth Massie's AMERI-SCARES series. Residing in Staunton, VA, he works as a psychology... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
Aspen 2

11:00am EDT

Author Readings - Friday 11 Glen
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
Speakers
avatar for Sarah Hans

Sarah Hans

Sarah Hans is an award-winning writer, editor, and teacher whose stories have appeared in more than 40 publications, including Apex Magazine, Love Letters to Poe, and Pseudopod. Her debut horror novel, Entomophobia, was released in 2022. You can read Sarah’s short stories in the... Read More →
avatar for Bil Richardson

Bil Richardson

Award winning filmmaker, author, artist, poet and historian.
A multi award-winning filmmaker, author, artist and historian. He has appeared on American Pickers, Mysteries at the Museum, America: Fact or Fiction, CBS This Morning and NPR’s All things Considered. He's been quoted in the New York Times, USA Today, London Daily Mail and hundreds... Read More →
avatar for Valerie Williams

Valerie Williams

Writer, reader, dog lover.Valerie B. Williams' short fiction has been published by Flame Tree Press, Dark Recesses Press, and Crystal Lake Publishing, among others. Her debut novel, "The Vanishing Twin" was released by Crossroad Press in October 2024.
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
Glen 1

11:00am EDT

HWA Open Member Board Meeting
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
The annual HWA Board meeting. This will include updates from Board members and a Question and Answer period.

This panel will be live-streamed.
Moderators
avatar for Becky Spratford

Becky Spratford

Readers’ Advisory Specialist; HWA Secretary, RA for All
Becky Spratford [MLIS] is a Librarian in Illinois specializing in serving patrons ages 13 and up. She trains library staff all over the world on how to match books with readers through the local public library. She runs the critically acclaimed RA training blog RA for All. She writes reviews for Booklist and a Horror review column for Library Journal. Becky was a 24 year locally elected Library Trustee and a former Board member for both the Reaching Across Illinois Library System and the Illinois Library Association. Known for her work with Horror readers, Be... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Lisa Kröger

Lisa Kröger

Trustee, Horror Writers Association
Horror writer. Author of MONSTER, SHE WROTE and TOIL AND TROUBLE. Cohost of the Know Fear Cast and The Monster, She Wrote podcast.
avatar for Brian Matthews

Brian Matthews

Trustee; Co-Chair, StokerCon Governing Committee; Bram Stoker Awards® Show Coordinator; Pitch Session Coordinator, Horror Writers Association
Author, financial planner, former psychologist, husband, and father. Trustee for the Horror Writers Association, as well a National Co-Chair for StokerCon. I also run the Pitch Sessions and act as the Bram Stoker Awards Show Coordinator. That pretty much sums it up.
avatar for Marc Abbott

Marc Abbott

Author/Teacher/Storyteller/Treasurer, Horror Writers Association
I’m the author of the horror anthologies Hell at the Way Station (Winner of the African Literary award for Best Anthology)and Hell at Brooklyn Tea. My works have been featured in Blackened Roots, The Chaos Clock, Under Twin Suns, Even in the Grave, New York State of Fright and Hells... Read More →
avatar for Linda D. Addison

Linda D. Addison

Trustee, Horror Writers Association
Linda D. Addison is an award-winning author of five collections, including How To Recognize A Demon Has Become Your Friend, recipient of the HWA Lifetime Achievement Award, HWA Mentor of the Year and SFPA Grand Master of Fantastic Poetry.
avatar for Ellen Datlow

Ellen Datlow

Trustee, Editor of short fiction through novellas
Ellen Datlow has been editing sf/f/h, short fiction for more than forty years. She currently acquires short fiction and novellas for Tor.com. She’s edited more than one hundred anthologies, including the annual The Best Horror of the Year series and has won multiple awards for... Read More →
avatar for Patrick Barb

Patrick Barb

Patrick Barb is an author of weird, dark, and spooky tales, currently living (and trying not to freeze to death) in Saint Paul, Minnesota. His published works include the dark fiction collection Pre-Approved for Haunting (Keylight Books), the novellas Gargantuana's Ghost (Grey Matter... Read More →
avatar for Lisa Wood

Lisa Wood

Vice President, Horror Writers Association
L. Marie Wood is an award-winning psychological horror author and screenwriter.  She won the Golden Stake Award for her novel The Promise Keeper.  Her screenplays have won Best Horror, Best Afrofuturism/Horror/Sci-Fi, and Best Short Screenplay awards at several film festivals.  Wood’s... Read More →
avatar for Maxwell Ian Gold

Maxwell Ian Gold

Executive Director, Horror Writers Association
Maxwell I. Gold is a Jewish American multiple award nominated author who writes prose poetry and short stories in cosmic horror and weird fiction with half a decade of writing experience. Five time Rhysling Award nominee, two time Pushcart Award nominee, and author of the Bram Stoker... Read More →
avatar for Frances Lu-Pai Ippolito

Frances Lu-Pai Ippolito

Editor, Writer, Publisher
Frances Lu-Pai Ippolito (she/her) is a Chinese American judge, mom, and writer in Portland, Oregon. Her writing has appeared in Nightmare Magazine, Flame Tree’s Asian Ghost Stories, Chromophobia, Mother: Tales of Terror and Love, Death’s Garden Revisited, and Unquiet Spirits... Read More →
avatar for James Chambers

James Chambers

Trustee; Co-Chair, StokerCon Governing Committee; Chair, Horror University, Horror Writers Association
James Chambers is the Bram Stoker Award® and Scribe Award-winning editor and author of A Bright and Beautiful Eternal World, On the Night Border, On the Hierophant Road, the graphic novel, Kolchak the Night Stalker: The Forgotten Lore of Edgar Allan Poe, and editor of Under Twin... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 11:45am EDT
Grove 2

11:00am EDT

HU: Into Darkness I Go: The Horror Hero's Journey
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 1:00pm EDT
This is a separately ticketed event. Tickets may be purchased through the Registration portal. Click Get Tickets and scroll down to options labeled "Horror University" or "HU."

Learn how to use the “hero's journey” template to write epic horror fiction! Storytellers have been using the “hero’s journey” pattern in tales for thousands of years, from the Epic of Gilgamesh to Star Wars. It’s a tried-and- true technique, one horror writers can use too, but with its own deliciously dark spin. Topics covered will include: The “hero’s journey.” How the horror “hero’s Journey” is different. The twelve stages of the horror “hero’s Journey.” The nine story outcomes of the horror “hero’s Journey.” Techniques for combining different story outcomes. How you can apply the horror “hero’s Journey” to your own stories. You’ll write several exercises exploring different aspects of the horror “hero’s Journey.”
Speakers
avatar for Tim Waggoner

Tim Waggoner

i've published over sixty novels and eight collections of short stories. I write original horror and dark fantasy as well as media tie-ins. I'm a four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award, a one-time winner of the Scribe Award, and I've been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 11:00am - 1:00pm EDT
Alder

12:00pm EDT

Author Readings - Friday 12 Aspen
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
Speakers
avatar for Angela Sylvaine

Angela Sylvaine

Angela Sylvaine is a Bram Stoker Award nominated author and self-proclaimed cheerful goth who writes speculative fiction and poetry. Her novel, Frost Bite, a ‘90s sci-fi horror comedy, and her retro ‘80s YA mall slasher novella, Chopping Spree, embody her cheerful side. Her short... Read More →
avatar for Kate Maruyama

Kate Maruyama

Kate Maruyama (she/her) writes, teaches, cooks, and eats in Los Angeles, where she lives.She is the author of Alterations (Running Wild Press, 2025), The Collective (Writ Large Press 2024), Bleak Houses( Raw Dog Screaming, 2023)Halloween Beyond: A Gentleman's Suit (Crystal Lake... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
Aspen 2

12:00pm EDT

Author Readings - Friday 12 Glen
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
Speakers
avatar for Christa Carmen

Christa Carmen

writer
Christa Carmen is the Bram Stoker Award-nominated author of The Daughters of Block Island and Beneath the Poet’s House, coming fall 2024 from Thomas & Mercer.Additional work can be found in Vastarien, Nightmare, Orphans of Bliss, Year’s Best Hardcore Horror, and the Stoker-nominated... Read More →
avatar for Patrick Barb

Patrick Barb

Patrick Barb is an author of weird, dark, and spooky tales, currently living (and trying not to freeze to death) in Saint Paul, Minnesota. His published works include the dark fiction collection Pre-Approved for Haunting (Keylight Books), the novellas Gargantuana's Ghost (Grey Matter... Read More →
avatar for Lara Frater

Lara Frater

writer
Lara Frater (she/her) is the author of Paranormal Pest Control series, the End of the Lines Zombie series and many short stories and poems. She is also the author of the non-fiction book Fat Chicks Rule. http://www.larafrater.com.
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
Glen 1

12:00pm EDT

Oh My Goth: The Gothic Heroine Renaissance
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
Gothic horror is undergoing a thrilling revival in both literature and film, and at the heart of this resurgence is the Gothic heroine—haunted, complex, and newly empowered. Once confined to windswept corridors and shadowy attics, today’s Gothic heroines are reclaiming their narratives, confronting modern anxieties like gaslighting, isolation, generational trauma, and societal expectations. This panel will explore how contemporary writers are reimagining the Gothic heroine for a new era—subverting traditional tropes while honoring the emotional intensity and atmosphere that define the genre. Why is the Gothic heroine resonating so strongly right now? What cultural forces are driving her return, and how are these characters evolving to meet today’s fears? As Gothic horror continues to surge in popularity, this conversation will explore why the genre—and its most iconic figure—is more relevant than ever.
Moderators
avatar for Tanya Pell

Tanya Pell

author
Tanya Pell's debut novel, HER WICKED ROOTS, a queer Gothic horror, releases in October 2025 with Gallery/S&S. She is the author of Cicada (Shortwave) and her short fiction can be found in the Bram Stoker Award nominated antho Mother Knows Best, the forthcoming Fever Dreams, OBSOLESCENCE, Shortwave... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Leanna Renee Hieber

Leanna Renee Hieber

Actress, Ghost Tour Guide and Author with, Kensington, Tor and Union Square Books
An actress, playwright, ghost tour guide and award-winning, bestselling author of ghost-filled fiction and non-fiction for Kensington, Tor, Sourcebooks and Union Square, Leanna’s A Haunted History of Invisible Women: True Stories of America’s Ghosts, co-authored with Andrea Janes... Read More →
avatar for Rebecca Cuthbert

Rebecca Cuthbert

Writer, Undertaker Books
Rebecca Cuthbert writes feminist horror, gothic fiction, and dark poetry. Her books include IN MEMORY OF EXOSKELETONS (dark poetry, Alien Buddha Press, 2023); CREEP THIS WAY (nonfiction, Seamus and Nunzio Productions, 2024); SELF-MADE MONSTERS (feminist horror stories and poetry... Read More →
avatar for Paula Cappa

Paula Cappa

Author
Paula Cappa is a multiple award-winning novelist and short story author of supernatural mysteries, Gothic thrillers, and dark fantasy. Her Gothic novel Draakensky, A Supernatural Tale of Magick and Romance (Crystal Lake Publishing) won the gold in Gothic at The BookFest Book Awards... Read More →
avatar for Jessica Drake-Thomas

Jessica Drake-Thomas

Jessica Drake-Thomas is a poet and novelist, as well as PhD student focusing on the Gothic. She's the author of Hollow Girls, which was nominated for the Bram Stoker Award, as well as two poetry collections, Burials and Bad Omens. She lives in Milwaukee with Nick and their two dogs... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
Grove 2

12:00pm EDT

Oi Vey, The Horror! Issac Bashevis Singer and the Unholy Horror
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
Issac Bashevis Singer, Polish-born novelist and essayist known famously for his works that inspired films such as Yentl from his acclaimed work “Yentl the Yeshiva Boy” aren’t usually the first on the shelf for horror readers. His works explore a wide array of literary themes such as cultural and political trauma,  and Jewish folklore to name a few. This panel will explore the connection between Singer’s nuanced use of the absurd and the innate darkness within his stories.
Moderators Speakers
avatar for Lila Denning

Lila Denning

HWA-Volunteer Coordinator, St Petersburg Library System
avatar for Maxwell Ian Gold

Maxwell Ian Gold

Executive Director, Horror Writers Association
Maxwell I. Gold is a Jewish American multiple award nominated author who writes prose poetry and short stories in cosmic horror and weird fiction with half a decade of writing experience. Five time Rhysling Award nominee, two time Pushcart Award nominee, and author of the Bram Stoker... Read More →
avatar for Lane Heymont

Lane Heymont

President, The Tobias Literary Agency
As Literary Assistant at the Seymour Agency, Lane led the marketing efforts for their authors and enjoyed connecting clients with readers. As a lover of literature since childhood, and at the prodding of his mentor Nicole Resciniti, he decided to pursue his passion as a literary... Read More →
avatar for John Langan

John Langan

Author, THE FISHERMAN
John Langan is the author of two novels and five collections of stories.  For his fiction, he has received the Bram Stoker and the This Is Horror awards.  With Paul Tremblay, he co-edited Creatures: Thirty Years of Monsters (2011).  He is one of the founders of the Shirley Jackson... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
Aspen 1

12:00pm EDT

Salem's Lot at 50/Nosferatu at 103
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
This panel addresses the evolution of the Nosferatu mythos since the original film and how it has evolved over the last 100 years. This evolution includes Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot (and its prequel "Jerusalem's Lot"), which takes stronger inspiration from Nosferatu than from Dracula or other vampire traditions.
Moderators Speakers
avatar for Andy Davidson

Andy Davidson

Andy Davidson is the Bram Stoker Award-nominated author of In the Valley of the Sun, The Boatman's Daughter, and The Hollow Kind. His novels have been listed among NPR's Best Books, the New York Public Library's Best Adult Books of the Year, and Esquire’s Best Horror of the Year... Read More →
avatar for Leadie Jo Flowers

Leadie Jo Flowers

How to change the world through education using science fiction (including horror and fantasy, of course). STEM education works as well!
avatar for Lisa Kröger

Lisa Kröger

Trustee, Horror Writers Association
Horror writer. Author of MONSTER, SHE WROTE and TOIL AND TROUBLE. Cohost of the Know Fear Cast and The Monster, She Wrote podcast.
avatar for Steven Van Patten

Steven Van Patten

Writer/ Producer/ Stage Manager, Laughing Black Vampire Productions
Brooklyn native Steven Van Patten is the author of the critically acclaimed Brookwater’s Curse trilogy that features an 1860s Georgia plantation slave who becomes law enforcement within the vampire community. In contrast, the titular character in his Killer Genius series is a modern... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 12:00pm - 12:45pm EDT
Glen 2 & 3

1:00pm EDT

Author Readings - Friday 01 Aspen
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
Speakers
avatar for John Kachuba

John Kachuba

Author
Shapeshifters! Ghosts! Middle Grade horror! Author of 12 books. Haycorn Smith and the Castle Ghost (middle-grade) coming June 14 from Paper Angel Press. Several of John's nonfiction books are about ghosts and the paranormal and he is a frequent speaker on that subject on TV, radio... Read More →
avatar for Jeff C. Carter

Jeff C. Carter

Host, We Bleed Orange & Black
Jeff C. Carter’s stories have been featured in dozens of anthologies, translated for international markets and adapted for podcasts.His love of science and Halloween inspires his Sci-Fi and horror writing. He lives in New Mexico with a cat, a dog and a human.He is a contributor... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
Aspen 2

1:00pm EDT

Author Readings - Friday 01 Glen
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
Speakers
avatar for Ryan Bradley

Ryan Bradley

Ryan C. Bradley (he/him) is a musician, podcaster, and the author of Say Uncle, Saint's Blood, Bad Connections: Horror Stories, and co-author of Dumb Bullshit for Brilliant Idiots. His short fiction has appeared in NoSleep, Tales to Terrify, and Dark Moon Digest among others. He co-hosts... Read More →
avatar for Douglas Gwilym

Douglas Gwilym

Bram Stoker Award nominated short story author, querying novelist, editor of NOVUS MONSTRUM
Douglas Gwilym has been known to write a weird-fiction rock opera or two, and carry a uke around at StokerCon. His short story "Poppy's Poppy" was a Bram Stoker Award finalist last year. His story "Year Six" was on the longlist in 2022, and is on Ellen Datlow’s recommended reading... Read More →
avatar for Ann Heyward

Ann Heyward

Ann O’Mara Heyward is a horror fiction and non-fiction writer in Cleveland, Ohio.  Her short story “The Carny” recently received the Supernatural Fiction Award from The Ghost Story (theghoststory.com).  Her short fiction will be adapted by the NoSleep Podcast (air date TBA... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
Glen 1

1:00pm EDT

Feedback That Doesn’t Haunt You: What to Look for in Writing Groups and Beta Readers
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
The wrong feedback can kill a story—or worse, a writer’s confidence. The right feedback? It can transform your horror into something unforgettable. In this panel, we’ll explore the full spectrum of constructive critique, from beta reader partnerships to long-term writing groups. Panelists will share experiences building supportive feedback circles, surviving toxic ones, and crafting critique that actually helps. You’ll learn how to set expectations, spot red flags, give and receive feedback that empowers, and build relationships that sharpen your storytelling and strengthen your creative resilience. Whether you’re hoping to join a writing group, build a beta reader network, or stop dreading feedback, this panel offers practical tools and cautionary tales. We’ll also leave time at the end for attendees to network and start forming their critique communities.


Moderators
avatar for Christa Carmen

Christa Carmen

writer
Christa Carmen is the Bram Stoker Award-nominated author of The Daughters of Block Island and Beneath the Poet’s House, coming fall 2024 from Thomas & Mercer.Additional work can be found in Vastarien, Nightmare, Orphans of Bliss, Year’s Best Hardcore Horror, and the Stoker-nominated... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Sam Rebelein

Sam Rebelein

Sam Rebelein holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College, with a focus in horror and memoir. Sam's work has recently appeared in Bourbon Penn, Coffin Bell Journal, Press Pause Press, Ellen Datlow's Best Horror of the Year, and elsewhere. HarperCollins' horror and crime... Read More →
avatar for Meghan Arcuri

Meghan Arcuri

Meghan Arcuri is a Bram Stoker Award®-nominated author. Her work can be found in various anthologies, including Borderlands 7 (Borderlands Press), Madhouse (Dark Regions Press), Chiral Mad, and Chiral Mad 3 (Written Backwards). She served over two terms as the Vice President... Read More →
avatar for Tom Deady

Tom Deady

Tom Deady's first novel, HAVEN, won the 2016 Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a First Novel. He has since published several novels, novellas, a short story collection, and the first book in his middle grade horror series. He has a Master's Degree in English and Creative... Read More →
avatar for Frances Lu-Pai Ippolito

Frances Lu-Pai Ippolito

Editor, Writer, Publisher
Frances Lu-Pai Ippolito (she/her) is a Chinese American judge, mom, and writer in Portland, Oregon. Her writing has appeared in Nightmare Magazine, Flame Tree’s Asian Ghost Stories, Chromophobia, Mother: Tales of Terror and Love, Death’s Garden Revisited, and Unquiet Spirits... Read More →
avatar for Jonathan Lees

Jonathan Lees

Jonathan Lees has spent over twenty years championing filmmakers through his programming work with the New York Underground Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, TromaDance, and currently at the Final Frame Horror Short Film Competition at StokerCon.
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
Glen 2 & 3

1:00pm EDT

Industrial Gothic: Horror in the Industrial and Post-Industrial Age
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
Many American cities grew powerful during the Industrial Revolution by establishing factories and mills, luring immigrants with the promise of the American Dream. When the boom ended, the cities were left in ruins. The ghosts of the past loom in every decrepit mansion, lavish cemetery, worker row house, or the block-spanning structures left to decay. This panel will explore the unique subgenre of industrial horror and towns left to ruin. What happens when a capitalistic dream dies and the machines go off, never to turn on again?
Moderators
avatar for Leanna Renee Hieber

Leanna Renee Hieber

Actress, Ghost Tour Guide and Author with, Kensington, Tor and Union Square Books
An actress, playwright, ghost tour guide and award-winning, bestselling author of ghost-filled fiction and non-fiction for Kensington, Tor, Sourcebooks and Union Square, Leanna’s A Haunted History of Invisible Women: True Stories of America’s Ghosts, co-authored with Andrea Janes... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Victoria Dalpe

Victoria Dalpe

Victoria L. Dalpe is a Providence-based horror writer and painter. She has published over forty-five short stories in various collections, the gothic horror novel PARASITE LIFE and the short story collection LES FEMMES GROTESQUES. “Dalpe’s horror stories are equal parts int... Read More →
avatar for Gwendolyn Kiste

Gwendolyn Kiste

Gwendolyn Kiste is the three-time Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Rust Maidens, Reluctant Immortals, Boneset & Feathers, Pretty Marys All in a Row, and The Haunting of Velkwood. Her short fiction and nonfiction have appeared in outlets including Lit Hub,  Nightmare, Best... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
Aspen 1

1:00pm EDT

The Fearsome Final Girl
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
A fan-favorite trope, final girls channel hope, grit, and vindication in fearsome fights for survival—but these novels offer even more to cheer on with their original portrayals of horror’s favorite heroes. Whether it be a late-70’s grandmother sleuthing around a retirement home, a good Catholic teen thrust into the rapture, or a struggling actress saddled with more responsibilities than she bargained for, these novels reimagine the convention and allow us to root for final girls that don’t fit the mold. In this panel, authors will discuss their own favorite final girls throughout horror history, their inspirations for these original characters, and their predictions for how this trope and the horror genre writ large might evolve in the future.
Moderators
avatar for Aaron Dries

Aaron Dries

Aaron Dries is a Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson Award nominated, and Ditmar, Australian Shadows and Aurealis Award-winning author based in Canberra, Australia. His novels include HOUSE OF SIGHS, THE FALLEN BOYS, A PLACE FOR SINNERS, WHERE THE DEAD GO TO DIE (with Mark Allan Gunnells... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for S. A. Barnes

S. A. Barnes

S.A. Barnes works in a high school library by day, recommending reads, talking with students, and removing the occasional forgotten cheese stick as bookmark. Barnes has published numerous novels across different genres under the pen name Stacey Kade. She lives in Illinois with more... Read More →
avatar for Nat Cassidy

Nat Cassidy

Nat Cassidy writes horror for the page, stage, and screen. His acclaimed novels Mary: An Awakening of Terror and Nestlings were featured in best-of lists from Esquire, Harper's Bazaar, NPR, the Chicago Review of Books, the NY Public Library, and more, and he was named one of the... Read More →
avatar for CJ Leede

CJ Leede

CJ Leede is a horror writer, hiker, and Trekkie. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from Columbia University, and a BA from NYU’s Gallatin School, where she studied Mythology and the Middle Ages. When she is not driving around the country, she can be found in LA with her boyfriend... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:45pm EDT
Grove 2

1:00pm EDT

What Horror Means to Me
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:50pm EDT
Join StokerCon 2025’s Guests of Honor for a lively discussion about why readers of all ages enjoy a good scare, from fictional frights to all-too-true terrors.
Moderators
avatar for Lila Denning

Lila Denning

HWA-Volunteer Coordinator, St Petersburg Library System
Speakers
avatar for Scott Edelman

Scott Edelman

Author
SCOTT EDELMAN has published 125+ short stories in magazines such as Lightspeed, Analog, Apex, and The Twilight Zone, and in anthologies such as Why New Yorkers Smoke, Crossroads: Southern Tales of the Fantastic, and MetaHorror. He began his professional writing career in the comics... Read More →
avatar for Tim Waggoner

Tim Waggoner

i've published over sixty novels and eight collections of short stories. I write original horror and dark fantasy as well as media tie-ins. I'm a four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award, a one-time winner of the Scribe Award, and I've been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award... Read More →
avatar for Gaby Triana

Gaby Triana

GABY TRIANA is the Cuban-American author of 24 books for adults and teens, including Dark and Dangerous Things, Moon Child, Island of Bones, River of Ghosts, City of Spells, Wake the Hollow, Cubanita, and Summer of Yesterday. Her short stories have appeared in Classic Monsters Unleashed... Read More →
avatar for Adam Nevill

Adam Nevill

Adam L. G. Nevill was born in Birmingham, England, in 1969 and grew up in England and New Zealand. He is an author of horror fiction. Of his novels, The Ritual, Last Days, No One Gets Out Alive and The Reddening were all winners of The August Derleth Award for Best Horror Novel. He... Read More →
avatar for Paula Guran

Paula Guran

Editor, anthologist, and reviewer Paula Guran has edited more than 50 science fiction, fantasy, and horror anthologies and more than 50 novels and collections featuring the same. She was senior editor for Prime Books for seven years. Previously, she edited the Juno fantasy impr... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 1:50pm EDT
Grand Ballroom 1

1:00pm EDT

Translating Trauma: The Legacies of Historic Horrors
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 2:30pm EDT
 Connecticut Witches in History and on Stage
    Kevin Wetmore, Jr.

 From Grover's Mill to Pontypool: Radio, Horror, and Film
    Kevin Cooney

 Cunning & the Courts: The Stamford Witch Trials 333 Years On
    Rolf Mauerer
Speakers
avatar for Kevin Wetmore Jr.

Kevin Wetmore Jr.

Volunteer Coordinator, HWA LA
Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr. is the author, editor or co-editor of thirty books, including Bram Stoker Award nominees Uncovering Stranger Things, The Streaming of Hill House, Devil’s Advocates: The Conjuring, and Eaters of the Dead: Myths and Realities of Cannibal Monsters. He is also... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 2:30pm EDT
Elm 1 & 2

1:00pm EDT

HU: Magic Realism for Rebels
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
This is a separately ticketed event. Tickets may be purchased through the Registration portal. Click Get Tickets and scroll down to options labeled "Horror University" or "HU."

Magic realism conjures the imagery of Frida Kahlo and Henri Rousseau and is something Salman Rushdie calls “a newish name for a very old thing.” Propelled across the literary world by Latin American writers of the 1950s, magic realism has deep, dark roots for storytellers that tangle with colonialism, disobedience, and subversion. Magic Realism for Rebels reintroduces this genre favorite through the horror lens with writing prompts along its elements, contours and many invitations. Respectfully, we’ll enter where personal and wider histories converge in kitchen wisdom, folklore, and social contemporary messaging.
Speakers
avatar for Lauren Elise (L. E.) Daniels

Lauren Elise (L. E.) Daniels

Editor, Author, Poet, HWA Wellness Committee, Brisbane Writers Workshop
A Bram Stoker Awards® finalist, co-chair for the HWA Mental Health Initiative with Mark Matthews, and Rhode Islander living in Australia, Lauren Elise (L. E.) Daniels has worked in publishing since '92. An Emerson College MFA grad, she's edited over 140+ titles, including the Aurealis... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 1:00pm - 3:00pm EDT
Alder

2:00pm EDT

Author Readings - Friday 02 Aspen
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
Speakers
avatar for Patty Templeton

Patty Templeton

Writer. Archivist.
she/her
avatar for Ai Jiang

Ai Jiang

Ai Jiang is a Chinese-Canadian writer, Ignyte, Bram Stoker, and Nebula Award winner, and Hugo, Astounding, Locus, Aurora, and BFSA Award finalist from Changle, Fujian currently residing in Toronto, Ontario. Her work can be found in F&SF, The Dark, The Masters Review, among others... Read More →
avatar for Jonathan Reddoch

Jonathan Reddoch

Collective Tales Publishing
Jonathan Reddoch is co-owner of Collective Tales Publishing. He is a father, writer, editor, and publisher. He writes sci-fi, fantasy, romance, and especially horror. He focuses primarily on flash fiction, but also writes poetry and short stories. He has been working on his enormous... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
Aspen 2

2:00pm EDT

Author Readings - Friday 02 Glen
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
Speakers
avatar for Pamela K. Kinney

Pamela K. Kinney

Author
Pamela K. Kinney gave up long ago, ignoring the demanding voices in her head and has been writing ever since. Her horror short story, “Bottled Spirits,” was runner-up for the 2013 WSFA Small Press Award and considered one of the seven best genre short fiction for that year. She... Read More →
avatar for Elizabeth Devecchi

Elizabeth Devecchi

Author
I am a fairly new, seasoned author who recently signed with Wicked House Publishing for my first two novels. Sewer Dogs will be published this October and A Twist of the Lens is scheduled for mid 2025. I have also published some short stories and poems. Most of my work fits into... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
Glen 1

2:00pm EDT

Building a Prolific Career in Horror
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
Join Gaby Triana and fellow panelists for a conversation on sustaining a long-term writing career in horror. They’ll share real-world strategies for producing consistently, staying inspired, and managing writing demands alongside life’s responsibilities. Whether you’re just starting out or working to expand your body of work, you’ll hear insights from both newer and more established writers on how to keep showing up for the work — and yourself.
Moderators
avatar for Ann Dávila Cardinal

Ann Dávila Cardinal

Author
Ann Dávila Cardinal is a Nuyorican poly-genre author. Her young adult horror novels include Five Midnights (winner of an International Latino Book Award and a Bram Stoker finalist), Category Five, Breakup from Hell, and You’ve Awoken Her, coming June 17. Ann lives in a little house... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Paul Tremblay

Paul Tremblay

Paul Tremblay has won the Bram Stoker, British Fantasy, and Massachusetts Book awards and is the author of Horror Movie, The Pallbearers Club, Survivor Song, The Cabin at the End of the World, Disappearance at Devil’s Rock, A Head Full of Ghosts, the crime novels The Little Sleep... Read More →
avatar for ROYCE BUCKINGHAM

ROYCE BUCKINGHAM

Author--Penguin/Random House (Blanvalet)
Royce is an author of 14 novels with Penguin/Random House (Blanvalet) in Germany and with Putnam's and St. Martin's Press in North America. He is a member of the HWA and WGAw. Royce grew up with Stephen King and D&D and has been publishing horror and fantasy as a grown-up since 2006... Read More →
avatar for Gaby Triana

Gaby Triana

GABY TRIANA is the Cuban-American author of 24 books for adults and teens, including Dark and Dangerous Things, Moon Child, Island of Bones, River of Ghosts, City of Spells, Wake the Hollow, Cubanita, and Summer of Yesterday. Her short stories have appeared in Classic Monsters Unleashed... Read More →
avatar for Hailey Piper

Hailey Piper

Hailey Piper is the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Queen of Teeth, No Gods for Drowning, The Worm and His Kings, Unfortunate Elements of My Anatomy, Benny Rose the Cannibal King, and Your Mind Is a Terrible Thing. She is an active member of the Horror Writers Association, with... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
Grove 2

2:00pm EDT

Slashers Never Die!
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
Recent years have seen a resurgence of the slasher subgenre on the page and the screen. This panel of slasher fans and writers will explore which tropes endure through the decades, which have been left in the bloody dust, and how modern writers can carve new paths to keep the blood flowing into the future.
Moderators
avatar for Brian McAuley

Brian McAuley

Author / Screenwriter / Professor
Brian McAuley’s debut novel Curse of the Reaper was named one of the Best Horror Books of 2022 by Esquire. His holiday slasher novella Candy Cain Kills earned praise from Kirkus Reviews for its “sublimely drawn characters,” some of whom survived for the sequel, Candy Cain Kills... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Craig Engler

Craig Engler

Craig Engler is the co-creator of the TV series Z Nation and executive producer of the Netflix spin-off, Black Summer. He worked at the Syfy Channel and Chiller TV before becoming the head of Shudder at AMC Networks from 2018-2022. He's currently at work on several horror screenplays... Read More →
avatar for Jonathan Lees

Jonathan Lees

Jonathan Lees has spent over twenty years championing filmmakers through his programming work with the New York Underground Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, TromaDance, and currently at the Final Frame Horror Short Film Competition at StokerCon.
avatar for Angela Sylvaine

Angela Sylvaine

Angela Sylvaine is a Bram Stoker Award nominated author and self-proclaimed cheerful goth who writes speculative fiction and poetry. Her novel, Frost Bite, a ‘90s sci-fi horror comedy, and her retro ‘80s YA mall slasher novella, Chopping Spree, embody her cheerful side. Her short... Read More →
avatar for Del Howison

Del Howison

Owner, Dark Delicacies
Del Howison is an author, journalist, SAG actor including a cameo in the upcoming horror film Big Baby produced by Cher and directed by Spider One. He is a Bram Stoker Award-winning editor of the anthology Dark Delicacies: Original Tales of Terror and the Macabre by the World’s... Read More →
avatar for Patrick Barb

Patrick Barb

Patrick Barb is an author of weird, dark, and spooky tales, currently living (and trying not to freeze to death) in Saint Paul, Minnesota. His published works include the dark fiction collection Pre-Approved for Haunting (Keylight Books), the novellas Gargantuana's Ghost (Grey Matter... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
Aspen 1

2:00pm EDT

The Tangled Skein of Short Stories
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
In his introduction to Bazaar of Bad Dreams, Stephen King noted, “I never feel the limitations of my talent so keenly as I do when writing short fiction.” Learn why short stories aren’t just lazy novels; they are an art form with its own set of rules and skills.
Moderators
avatar for Crystal O’Leary-Davidson (C. O. Davidson)

Crystal O’Leary-Davidson (C. O. Davidson)

Writer and Teacher
Crystal’s work has appeared in Pseudopod, Vastarien, Cemetery Gates and in various horror anthologies. She co-edited MONSTERS OF FILM, FICTION, AND FABLE and is a founding member of the Atlanta chapter of the HWA. She teaches writing, the Gothic, and horror at Middle Georgia State... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Ananda Lima

Ananda Lima

Author
Ananda Lima is the author of Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil (Tor, 2024) and Mother/land (Black Lawrence Press, 2021), winner of the Hudson Prize. Her work has appeared in American Poetry Review, Poets.org, Kenyon Review, Electric Literature, and elsewhere, and is forthcoming in Ghosts of Where We Are From, an anthology of dark fiction by Latin American authors, edited by Cynthia Pelayo (Primer Sue... Read More →
avatar for Norman Prentiss

Norman Prentiss

NORMAN PRENTISS is the author of ODD ADVENTURES WITH YOUR OTHER FATHER, THE APOCALYPSE-A-DAY DESK CALENDAR, and LIFE IN A HAUNTED HOUSE, and he won the 2010 Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in Long Fiction for INVISIBLE FENCES, published by Cemetery Dance (www.cemeterydance.com... Read More →
avatar for James Chambers

James Chambers

Trustee; Co-Chair, StokerCon Governing Committee; Chair, Horror University, Horror Writers Association
James Chambers is the Bram Stoker Award® and Scribe Award-winning editor and author of A Bright and Beautiful Eternal World, On the Night Border, On the Hierophant Road, the graphic novel, Kolchak the Night Stalker: The Forgotten Lore of Edgar Allan Poe, and editor of Under Twin... Read More →
avatar for Lisa Morton

Lisa Morton

Author of four novels and over 200 short stories, screenwriter, Halloween and paranormal expert, past President of the Horror Writers Association.
avatar for Tim Waggoner

Tim Waggoner

i've published over sixty novels and eight collections of short stories. I write original horror and dark fantasy as well as media tie-ins. I'm a four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award, a one-time winner of the Scribe Award, and I've been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:45pm EDT
Glen 2 & 3

2:00pm EDT

This Book is Haunted: Cursed Objects and Texts in Film and Literature
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:50pm EDT
An old tome with archaic writing, an unmarked VHS, a doll with an unsettling gaze, a camera through which the viewfinder shows a reality that seems just a bit off…Cursed objects provide not only an intriguing plot device but their uncanny realism can also make the reader or viewer feel complicit in the haunting. Join us as we explore the popularity of cursed objects and media and why these stories are essential for library shelves.
Moderators
avatar for Ben Rubin

Ben Rubin

Horror Studies Collection Coordinator, University of Pittsburgh Library System
Horror Studies Collection Coordinator for Archives & Special Collections at the University of Pittsburgh Library System - responsible for building, managing, and curating archival and rare book resources related to the horror genre and serving as subject area expert for reference... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Eric LaRocca

Eric LaRocca

Eric LaRocca (he/they) is a 3x Bram Stoker Award® finalist and Splatterpunk Award winner. He was named by Esquire as one of the “Writers Shaping Horror’s Next Golden Age” and praised by Locus as “one of the strongest and most unique voices in contemporary horror fiction... Read More →
avatar for Carina Stopenski

Carina Stopenski

Teen Librarian, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Carina Stopenski (they/them) is a librarian, author, and scholar based in Pittsburgh, PA. In their day to day, Carina works as a teen librarian at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, as a freelance humanities educator for teens, and as the director of the Pittsburgh Mobile Cartoon... Read More →
avatar for Clay McLeod Chapman

Clay McLeod Chapman

Author of Wake Up and Open Your Eyes, Kill Your Darling, Stay on the Line, What Kind of Mother, Ghost Eaters, Whisper Down the Lane, The Remaking, and others.
avatar for Emily Vinci

Emily Vinci

Librarian, Horror Reviewer
avatar for Adam Nevill

Adam Nevill

Adam L. G. Nevill was born in Birmingham, England, in 1969 and grew up in England and New Zealand. He is an author of horror fiction. Of his novels, The Ritual, Last Days, No One Gets Out Alive and The Reddening were all winners of The August Derleth Award for Best Horror Novel. He... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 2:00pm - 2:50pm EDT
Grand Ballroom 1

2:45pm EDT

Representation, Narrative, and Identity: The Cultural Politics of Horror
Friday June 13, 2025 2:45pm - 4:15pm EDT
 From Crusted Snow to Rotting Stars: ways of theorizing ‘Indigenous Horror’
    Naomi Borwein

 Cunning & the Courts: The Stamford Witch Trials 333 Years On
    Rolf Mauerer

 Shadowy Corners and Secret Liaisons: Representations of Bisexuality in Gothic Horror
    Gwendolyn Kiste

 Enough Rope to Hang Myself With: Bad Gay and Transgender Feelings in Horror Literature’s History
    David Riser
Speakers
avatar for Gwendolyn Kiste

Gwendolyn Kiste

Gwendolyn Kiste is the three-time Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Rust Maidens, Reluctant Immortals, Boneset & Feathers, Pretty Marys All in a Row, and The Haunting of Velkwood. Her short fiction and nonfiction have appeared in outlets including Lit Hub,  Nightmare, Best... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 2:45pm - 4:15pm EDT
Elm 1 & 2

3:00pm EDT

A Conversation with Del Howison
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
HWA Past President Lisa Morton sits down with Lifetime Achievement Award recipient, Del Howison, to discuss his life with Co-Lifetime Achievement Award recipient, Sue Howison, their accomplishments, their love of horror, and their horror-themed bookstore, Dark Delicacies.
Moderators
avatar for Lisa Morton

Lisa Morton

Author of four novels and over 200 short stories, screenwriter, Halloween and paranormal expert, past President of the Horror Writers Association.
Speakers
avatar for Del Howison

Del Howison

Owner, Dark Delicacies
Del Howison is an author, journalist, SAG actor including a cameo in the upcoming horror film Big Baby produced by Cher and directed by Spider One. He is a Bram Stoker Award-winning editor of the anthology Dark Delicacies: Original Tales of Terror and the Macabre by the World’s... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
Grove 2

3:00pm EDT

Author Readings - Friday 03 Aspen 1
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
Speakers
avatar for LC Allingham

LC Allingham

Author/ Editor, Speculation Publications LLC
avatar for Meg Ripley

Meg Ripley

Writer of horror and dark fantasy, designer, and drawer. Her debut novel, NECROLOGY, (Book #1 of the Dirty) is a Foreword INDIES Bronze Medalist in Fantasy (2024). Book 2 of the Dirty, WOODFEAST, due Fall 2026, Creature Publishing.
avatar for Katherine Silva

Katherine Silva

Author and EIC, Strange Wilds Press
Katherine Silva is an ace Maine horror author, a connoisseur of coffee, and victim of cat shenanigans. Her favorite flavors of the genre mix grief and existentialism which she combines with her love of the New England wilderness in her works. She is a three-time Maine Literary Award... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
Aspen 1

3:00pm EDT

Author Readings - Friday 03 Aspen 2
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
Speakers
avatar for Ananda Lima

Ananda Lima

Author
Ananda Lima is the author of Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil (Tor, 2024) and Mother/land (Black Lawrence Press, 2021), winner of the Hudson Prize. Her work has appeared in American Poetry Review, Poets.org, Kenyon Review, Electric Literature, and elsewhere, and is forthcoming in Ghosts of Where We Are From, an anthology of dark fiction by Latin American authors, edited by Cynthia Pelayo (Primer Sue... Read More →
avatar for Richard Dansky

Richard Dansky

Narrative Director, Romero Games
Richard Dansky is a 25+ year veteran of the video game industry and is widely regarded as a leading authority on game writing and narrative. He has written and narrative designed for bestselling franchises including The Division, Assassins Creed, Far Cry, and Splinter Cell. His book... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
Aspen 2

3:00pm EDT

Author Readings - Friday 03 Glen
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
Speakers
avatar for Maria Alexander

Maria Alexander

Maria Alexander is a produced screenwriter, games writer, virtual world designer, award-winning copywriter, prolific fiction writer, and poet. Since 1999, her stories have appeared in acclaimed publications and anthologies.Her debut novel, Mr. Wicker, won the 2014 Bram Stoker Aw... Read More →
avatar for Chelsea Conradt

Chelsea Conradt

Chelsea Conradt (she/her) writes twisty speculative thrillers and horror. Her novel The Farmhouse is one of Kobo’s Best of the Month for June—and hits shelves June 17. Her books are packed with both murder and kindness because we can be more than one thing.When not writing stories... Read More →
avatar for Chloe Spencer

Chloe Spencer

Minnesota native Chloe Spencer is an award winning writer, indie gamedev, and filmmaker. She is the author of multiple sapphic horror novellas, novels, and short stories. In her spare time she enjoys playing video games, trying her best at Pilates, and cuddling with her cats. She... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
Glen 1

3:00pm EDT

Southern Gothic in the Contemporary South
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
Southern Gothic literature is undeniably drenched in the south’s dark past. How have sub-genres like Southern Gothic changed in relation to the current social and socioeconomic issues in that region of the United States, and how are contemporary writers using horror to represent them?
Moderators
avatar for Jessi Ann York

Jessi Ann York

Jessi Ann York’s stories have been featured at several professional rate horror markets, including PseudoPod, Vastarien, Cemetery Gates Media, Love Letters to Poe, and more. Her first two stories, “Phases of the Shadow” and “Women of the Mere,” were mentioned as standouts... Read More →
Speakers
avatar for Rhonda Jackson Garcia AKA RJ Joseph

Rhonda Jackson Garcia AKA RJ Joseph

academic and creative writer/editor/professor, RJ Joseph, Writer/Speaker
Rhonda Jackson Garcia, AKA RJ Joseph, is a Stoker Award™ and Shirley Jackson Award nominated, Texas based academic and creative writer/professor whose writing regularly focuses on the intersections of gender and race in the horror and romance genres and popular culture. She has... Read More →
avatar for Crystal O’Leary-Davidson (C. O. Davidson)

Crystal O’Leary-Davidson (C. O. Davidson)

Writer and Teacher
Crystal’s work has appeared in Pseudopod, Vastarien, Cemetery Gates and in various horror anthologies. She co-edited MONSTERS OF FILM, FICTION, AND FABLE and is a founding member of the Atlanta chapter of the HWA. She teaches writing, the Gothic, and horror at Middle Georgia State... Read More →
avatar for Andy Davidson

Andy Davidson

Andy Davidson is the Bram Stoker Award-nominated author of In the Valley of the Sun, The Boatman's Daughter, and The Hollow Kind. His novels have been listed among NPR's Best Books, the New York Public Library's Best Adult Books of the Year, and Esquire’s Best Horror of the Year... Read More →
avatar for Gaby Triana

Gaby Triana

GABY TRIANA is the Cuban-American author of 24 books for adults and teens, including Dark and Dangerous Things, Moon Child, Island of Bones, River of Ghosts, City of Spells, Wake the Hollow, Cubanita, and Summer of Yesterday. Her short stories have appeared in Classic Monsters Unleashed... Read More →
avatar for Clare Castleberry

Clare Castleberry

Clare Castleberry is an author, artist, and narrator from Louisiana. She began her career writing adult content for online zines, then moved on to erotic horror shorts such as Hungry for Control (which also appeared in Year's Best Hardcore Horror, Volume I) and Toxic Femininity. Several... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:45pm EDT
Glen 2 & 3

3:00pm EDT

Summer Scares: A Thrilling Summer Reading Program
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:50pm EDT
Join Summer Scares current and past selected authors, spokespeople, and partners to learn more about the HWA’s popular summer reading program, how to get involved, and how to use Summer Scares resources to better serve your patrons.
Moderators Speakers
avatar for Caitlin Starling

Caitlin Starling

Author of The Luminous Dead, The Death of Jane Lawrence, and The Staving Saints. Genre hopping horror! Toxic lesbians! Too much medical detail!
avatar for Eric LaRocca

Eric LaRocca

Eric LaRocca (he/they) is a 3x Bram Stoker Award® finalist and Splatterpunk Award winner. He was named by Esquire as one of the “Writers Shaping Horror’s Next Golden Age” and praised by Locus as “one of the strongest and most unique voices in contemporary horror fiction... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 3:50pm EDT
Grand Ballroom 1

3:00pm EDT

Joyce Carol Oates Reading
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Join Guest of Honor Joyce Carol Oates for a reading from her work followed by a question-and-answer session.
Speakers
avatar for Joyce Carol Oates

Joyce Carol Oates

Joyce Carol Oates is the author of 58 novels and many novellas, plays, short stories, and other work. She is a recipient of the National Book Award, two O. Henry Awards, the National Humanities Medal, and the Jerusalem Prize and a five-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Among Oates... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 3:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
Grand Ballroom 2-3

4:00pm EDT

Mass Author Signing
Friday June 13, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
Given the size of the Pavilion, we were able to accommodate everyone who requested a seat. If you were somehow missed, please email info@stokercon.com and someone will get back to you.

Author seating will be alphabetical by last name. There will be no exceptions; so, please, don't even ask.

You will be assigned a table number, of which you will be informed upon check-in. Please set up at that table number. Volunteers will be available to help you find your table. We have roughly 190 people signing. Please be patient. That's a lot of people to seat.

There are too many people to list here in Sched. It doesn't have the capacity to hold that many names. Please check the website for a complete list. We should have that list posed within the next few days.

This event is open to the public.
Speakers
avatar for Scott Edelman

Scott Edelman

Author
SCOTT EDELMAN has published 125+ short stories in magazines such as Lightspeed, Analog, Apex, and The Twilight Zone, and in anthologies such as Why New Yorkers Smoke, Crossroads: Southern Tales of the Fantastic, and MetaHorror. He began his professional writing career in the comics... Read More →
avatar for Tim Waggoner

Tim Waggoner

i've published over sixty novels and eight collections of short stories. I write original horror and dark fantasy as well as media tie-ins. I'm a four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award, a one-time winner of the Scribe Award, and I've been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award... Read More →
avatar for Gaby Triana

Gaby Triana

GABY TRIANA is the Cuban-American author of 24 books for adults and teens, including Dark and Dangerous Things, Moon Child, Island of Bones, River of Ghosts, City of Spells, Wake the Hollow, Cubanita, and Summer of Yesterday. Her short stories have appeared in Classic Monsters Unleashed... Read More →
avatar for Adam Nevill

Adam Nevill

Adam L. G. Nevill was born in Birmingham, England, in 1969 and grew up in England and New Zealand. He is an author of horror fiction. Of his novels, The Ritual, Last Days, No One Gets Out Alive and The Reddening were all winners of The August Derleth Award for Best Horror Novel. He... Read More →
avatar for Paula Guran

Paula Guran

Editor, anthologist, and reviewer Paula Guran has edited more than 50 science fiction, fantasy, and horror anthologies and more than 50 novels and collections featuring the same. She was senior editor for Prime Books for seven years. Previously, she edited the Juno fantasy impr... Read More →
avatar for Joyce Carol Oates

Joyce Carol Oates

Joyce Carol Oates is the author of 58 novels and many novellas, plays, short stories, and other work. She is a recipient of the National Book Award, two O. Henry Awards, the National Humanities Medal, and the Jerusalem Prize and a five-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Among Oates... Read More →
avatar for Del Howison

Del Howison

Owner, Dark Delicacies
Del Howison is an author, journalist, SAG actor including a cameo in the upcoming horror film Big Baby produced by Cher and directed by Spider One. He is a Bram Stoker Award-winning editor of the anthology Dark Delicacies: Original Tales of Terror and the Macabre by the World’s... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 4:00pm - 6:00pm EDT
Garden Pavillion

4:30pm EDT

Who We’ve Become: Reassessing Relationships in Queer Horror
Friday June 13, 2025 4:30pm - 6:00pm EDT
 Not So Final After All: The Female Mutilator as the New Feminist Antagonizer
    Carina Stopenski

 “You’re the Prince”: Theorizing the Indulgent Father Archetype in The Loved Ones
    Cody Parish

 "When They Were Young, They Were the World's Darlings"; A Long-Overdue Appreciation of Billy Martin       (Writing as Poppy Z. Brite)
   Jaime Weida
Speakers
Friday June 13, 2025 4:30pm - 6:00pm EDT
Elm 1 & 2

6:00pm EDT

Nightfire Happy Hour!
Friday June 13, 2025 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Nightfire is sponsoring a Happy Hour, where you can stop by, meet and chat their authors, and have a drink or two.

There will be a hosted bar at this event.
Speakers
avatar for Anne Heltzel

Anne Heltzel

Senior Editor, Abrams Books
I'm a YA fiction/nonfiction editor at Amulet, an imprint of Abrams Books--talk to me about my upcoming projects or pitch me something new!
avatar for S. A. Barnes

S. A. Barnes

S.A. Barnes works in a high school library by day, recommending reads, talking with students, and removing the occasional forgotten cheese stick as bookmark. Barnes has published numerous novels across different genres under the pen name Stacey Kade. She lives in Illinois with more... Read More →
avatar for Cassandra Khaw

Cassandra Khaw

CASSANDRA KHAW is the USA Today bestselling author of Nothing But Blackened Teeth and the Bram Stoker Award-winner, Breakable Things. Other notable works of theirs are The Salt Grows Heavy and British Fantasy Award and Locus Award finalist, Hammers on Bone. Khaw’s work can... Read More →
avatar for Nat Cassidy

Nat Cassidy

Nat Cassidy writes horror for the page, stage, and screen. His acclaimed novels Mary: An Awakening of Terror and Nestlings were featured in best-of lists from Esquire, Harper's Bazaar, NPR, the Chicago Review of Books, the NY Public Library, and more, and he was named one of the... Read More →
avatar for CJ Leede

CJ Leede

CJ Leede is a horror writer, hiker, and Trekkie. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from Columbia University, and a BA from NYU’s Gallatin School, where she studied Mythology and the Middle Ages. When she is not driving around the country, she can be found in LA with her boyfriend... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 6:00pm - 7:00pm EDT
Grand Ballroom Foyer

8:00pm EDT

Final Frame Short Film Competition
Friday June 13, 2025 8:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Do you like scary movies? Yes? Then join us to watch some of the best short horror films during our annual Final Frame Short Film Competition!

Jonathan Lees will once again curate and moderate this stellar film competition. Our judges this year are Aaron Dries, Lisa Morton, Jamal Hodge, Lisa Wood, Jamie Flanagan, and producer and former head of SHUDDER, Craig Engler!
Moderators
avatar for Jonathan Lees

Jonathan Lees

Jonathan Lees has spent over twenty years championing filmmakers through his programming work with the New York Underground Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, TromaDance, and currently at the Final Frame Horror Short Film Competition at StokerCon.
Speakers
avatar for Craig Engler

Craig Engler

Craig Engler is the co-creator of the TV series Z Nation and executive producer of the Netflix spin-off, Black Summer. He worked at the Syfy Channel and Chiller TV before becoming the head of Shudder at AMC Networks from 2018-2022. He's currently at work on several horror screenplays... Read More →
avatar for Lisa Morton

Lisa Morton

Author of four novels and over 200 short stories, screenwriter, Halloween and paranormal expert, past President of the Horror Writers Association.
avatar for Jamal Hodge

Jamal Hodge

CEO, Hodge Cinema
JAMAL HODGE is a multi-award-winning filmmaker and writer from Queens NYC who has won over 80 awards with screenings at Tribeca Film Festival, Sundance, Cannes, and others. He directed the first season of Investigation Discovery Channel’s ‘Primal Instinct’ and is a Producer... Read More →
avatar for Lisa Wood

Lisa Wood

Vice President, Horror Writers Association
L. Marie Wood is an award-winning psychological horror author and screenwriter.  She won the Golden Stake Award for her novel The Promise Keeper.  Her screenplays have won Best Horror, Best Afrofuturism/Horror/Sci-Fi, and Best Short Screenplay awards at several film festivals.  Wood’s... Read More →
avatar for Jamie Flanagan

Jamie Flanagan

Jamie Flanagan writes television shows. Credits include The Haunting of Bly Manor, Midnight Mass, The Midnight Club, The Fall of the House of Usher. Theatre nerd. Avid gamer (tabletop and video).
avatar for Aaron Dries

Aaron Dries

Aaron Dries is a Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson Award nominated, and Ditmar, Australian Shadows and Aurealis Award-winning author based in Canberra, Australia. His novels include HOUSE OF SIGHS, THE FALLEN BOYS, A PLACE FOR SINNERS, WHERE THE DEAD GO TO DIE (with Mark Allan Gunnells... Read More →
Friday June 13, 2025 8:00pm - 10:00pm EDT
Grand Ballroom 2-3

10:00pm EDT

Final Frame Film Competition Reception
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00pm - 11:45pm EDT
Come talk about the films while the judges decide the winner!

This is a catered event with a cash bar.

Catering: Warm Flour Tortillas, Chicken and Beef Carnitas, Jack Cheese, Jalapenos, Tomato, Shred Lettuce, Sour Cream, Fresh Salsa, Black Beans, Corn Tortilla Chips, and Guacamole
Friday June 13, 2025 10:00pm - 11:45pm EDT
Grand Ballroom Foyer
 
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