Welcome back for part two in our fall author roundtable! Last week, we met these four awesome authors and discussed their news books! Today, we talk all about their own personal favorite horror titles from the past couple years as well as what they’ve got planned for the future!
And with that, let’s take it away!
There have been so many wonderful books released over the past couple years. What have you been reading and loving in the horror genre lately?
CANDACE NOLA: There’s honestly been so many amazing things that I have read I cannot begin to make a list. Currently my favorite authors, in no particular order are, Gwendolyn Kiste (The Haunting of Velkwood was one of my favorite books this year) Jonathan Janz, Brennan LaFaro, Kristopher Rufty, Debra Castaneda, Mary SanGiovanni, Hailey Piper, Gemma Amor, and Ross Jeffery, Josh Malerman, Christine Morgan, John Boden, Chad Lutzke, L.Marie Wood, John Langan, M. Ennenbach, Joseph Sale and F.D. Taff. There are so many more I could add but these folks deliver standout stories every single time I reach for one of their books.
SARAH READ: Oh gosh, SO MUCH. Sometimes I look at all the new releases and just want to weep because I want to read them ALL, but life is finite. Sofia Ajram’s Coup de Grace was phenomenal, and that comes out soon (by the time you read this, it should be out!). Everyone should read The Reformatory by Tananarive Due. The book I enjoyed the most in 2024 was The Bullet Swallower by Elizabeth James Gonzalez, which is a magical realism western adventure novel, but it definitely flirts with the horror genre. I am currently reading Sam Rebelein’s forthcoming collection, The Poorly Made and Other Things and enjoying that. The book I’m most looking forward to reading right now is Kaaron Warren’s The Underhistory. I could talk about this for hours, but then again, that is literally my job!
GERRI LEEN: Oh, man, it’s been rich pickings. Your work was a bit of a gateway drug for me. Justina Ireland’s Dread Nation duology was too. I’m just now realizing how much I like many kinds of horror and while I’ve always loved thrillers (including Louisa May Alcott’s), I especially love them when they go over to the “everything’s not quite normal” side like Alyssa Cole’s do. I recently read Stephen Graham Jones’s The Only Good Indians and now I’m on a quest to read all his work. I just finished Diavola by Jennifer Thorne and it was like you took Herman Koch’s horrific (yet literary) family dramas (some of my favs!) and put them in the middle of a haunted house story–just loved it! I also have read some great anthologies and collections lately like Out There Screaming edited by Jordan Peele, and Dead Girl, Driving and Other Devastations by Carina Bissett. My Kindle is an embarrassment of riches with about 300 books to read, many of them horror.
VICTORIA DALPE: I feel like I never have enough time and bandwidth to read everything I want to! It’s one thing I miss about living in NYC with a long train commute everyday – it guarantees a certain amount of reading time.
I’ve been trying to attack my TBR pile a bit, but found myself really busy these last few months to read. I am hoping for more time come fall and winter. Over the summer I reread The Complete Stories of Leonora Carrington, The Night Inside by Nancy Baker and Cabal by Clive Barker. I also just read Nights at the Circus by Angela Carter, Book of Love by Kelly Link, Foul Days by Genoveva Dimova and I’m currently listening to What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher. I tend to alternate between older books and new ones that just came out. My next to read will be Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay. After that I hope to read Rachel Harrison and Hailey Piper’s new books out this fall as vampire books always get bumped to the top of my list.
I’m writing these questions in September, which means the spooky season is upon us. Do you have any exciting plans to celebrate? Also, have you written any stories that incorporate fall or Halloween that readers can check out?
CANDACE NOLA: I love Halloween but I am at two events in October that I will be traveling for so no major plans to celebrate. My Halloween night will consist of pizza and movies with my teenage son, handing out candy to trick-or-treaters and maybe reading some spooky books in my downtime. I do not have any Halloween stories out just yet, but there is one written that should make an appearance next year, as well as a short novella titled Moloch that will come out in early November that definitely fits into spooky season reading.
SARAH READ: I love spooky season! My family always makes a trek to a farm that has a lovely pumpkin patch, where we can do hay rides, apple picking, a corn maze, and eat caramel apples and baked goods. We’re also doing a family theme costume this year, which I am very excited about. My husband and I also watch our favorite comfort horror movies all October. I’m also doing at least one author event every weekend in October, all horror themed, of course. And two spooky book clubs! At least two Halloween parties… My October dance card is always full! As for stories that incorporate Halloween–actually, no! Not specifically, that I can think of. Though I do keep the spirit of the holiday alive in my heart every day.
GERRI LEEN: I plan to vote early in person and hope for a non-spooky outcome! I am also looking forward to temperatures cooling down here in the DC area–even if it’s just at night. Does sleeping with actual blankets count as exciting plans? Honestly, I love watching the leaves turn in the big wooded common area behind my house. Jeez, I sound so boring. Young Gerri who thought Halloween the greatest of all holidays would be so disappointed in me! But sometimes with a chronic illness, just getting through the day is a major triumph.
I have a twisted little flash story that deals with fall called “Salt the Earth” and a Dia de Los Muertos story “The Effect of Place on Love and Death,” and they’ll both be out soon in my upcoming story collection The Woman I Used to Be.
VICTORIA DALPE: I have a new book coming out September 10th and so I will be doing lots of fun spooky book events September-November including my book being the book club book in October for the Ashland RI Horror Book Club. I will also be on local TV and podcasts. I have a son, so I also do all the trick or treating/kid events and decorating and annual big spends at Spirit Halloween and the like, which is always fun. Always watch Peanuts Halloween a few times and tons of horror movies. My siblings and I always have a big jack o’ lantern carving day as well and fill my porch with pumpkins (which almost always get eaten by squirrels and or mold and fill with swarming bugs) it’s a blast!
What’s next for you? What projects are you currently working on, and do you have any other books on the horizon?
CANDACE NOLA: Currently I am working on Bishop 3: Darkness Descends with my co-author M. Ennenbach, a second installment to my Hank Flynn series, and a new collection. There is also a novel in the works that I hope to send out on submission next year along with some more short stories for a new collection that I hope to release next March. I have tons of ideas written down, and probably 5 more novels in various stages of completion along with a new poetry collection planned for late 2025.
SARAH READ: So much! And of course, a lot of it I can’t really talk about yet. But there are a story collection, two novellas, and four short stories in the works right now. Three other short stories that will be released soon. And I’m still working on the prequel to The Bone Weaver’s Orchard, which is called The Wards of Dunleigh Abbey. My goal is to finish the first draft of that by the end of February and have it done by summer. Fingers crossed. And with that end in sight, I’ve started outlining and researching for the next book after that, which will be something a little different for me…
GERRI LEEN: In October, I plan to release my second story collection, The Woman I Used to Be and Other Speculative Imaginings, which is a collection of previously printed short stories covering the sci fi, fantasy, horror, and magical realism genres. I’m busy doing final formatting and getting ready for that to go live. At the end of the year I plan to publish The Distance Between Things and Other Odes to Love, Betrayal, and Heartbreak. It’s a collection combining romance shorts I wrote as Kim Strattford with stories that have romantic elements that I wrote under my own name as well as some poetry–it’s a combination no one asked for, but I love the stories so I’m going for it.
In 2025, I have a mosaic novel Bluegrass Dreams Aren’t for Free coming out from WolfSinger Publications. It’s a series of interconnected stories about genetically modified racehorses who manage their own careers, race with no jockeys, and can talk, and specifically two stallions and their families dealing with triumph and failure in a world run by humans. Other than the genetic modifications, this is a mainstream anthropomorphic story that both adults and horse-crazy kids should enjoy. In 2025, I also plan to publish a book of twisted fairy tales, In the Ashes, which will be a mix of prose and poetry both original and previously published, I may also put out some poetry chapbooks. I’m in my sixties now–gotta get stuff done. “I’m in my sixties” is now my mantra for just about everything–things I want to do and things I don’t. It’s very liberating.
VICTORIA DALPE: I am in the deep edit stage of Selene Shade: Resurrectionist for Hire book 2 and working on the outlining of book 3. I also have a couple short fiction pieces I’m trying to wrap up and I have some new paintings due, so my fall should be nice and busy- which is a good problem to have!
Big thanks to our four featured authors! Please be sure to check out their wonderful books!
Happy reading!