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Crescendo of Darkness — Coming Soon!

Skewed Notions is pleased to host HorrorAddicts.net today and a new audio book for your horror enjoyment.

Music has the power to soothe the soul, drive people to obsession, and soundtrack evil plots. Is music the instigator of madness, or the key that unhinges the psychosis within? From guitar lessons in a graveyard and a baby allergic to music, to an infectious homicidal demo and melancholy tunes in a haunted lighthouse, Crescendo of Darkness will quench your thirst for horrifying audio fiction.

HorrorAddicts.net is proud to present fourteen tales of murderous music, demonic performers, and cursed audiophiles.

Please enjoy an excerpt below from Crescendo of Darkness.

“Six String Bullets” by Cara Fox

The pull of a busker’s song becomes too much for a young woman to resist.

Ashley Dunn had walked the same way to work for the last two years, but she never noticed the busker before. He was already as much a part of the bustling commuter street as the cars speeding past or the tattered street lamps shining brightly to pierce the early morning gloom, their beams throwing sharp relief on the rain. The busker blended in seamlessly, seated cross-legged, his back to the stone wall of the Victorian bank building, and his beaten-up guitar across his lap as he played. No one else spared him a glance, but she saw him.

Their eyes met through the crowd and Ashley’s heart missed a beat.

Something about him seemed familiar. She stepped out of the steady flow of people walking with their heads down and their minds lost to the working day ahead, breaking free of the crowd as the busker’s song grew louder and clearer with every step she took. It wasn’t his song that caught her attention, but the man himself. His crooked glasses and expensive looking suit weren’t a part of the usual busker uniform seen all over town.

The sounds of the crowd faded away as Ashley came to a hesitant halt in front of him, and the enigmatic busker’s song swelled in an instant to fill the void. It had no words, but he didn’t need words to express himself. The music alone was more than capable of that. She could swear she hadn’t heard the song before, but something about it was as familiar and natural as breathing. It spoke to her heart, stripping away everything until the busker and his song were all she knew. Her eyes closed as the music sped through her veins, dazing and rooting her in place. It was such a simple melody.

It shouldn’t be able to do that to me.

However many times she told herself, it made no difference. Her heart raced and her legs shook so wildly, she thought they might give way.

No.

Ashley drew a deep breath, but the moment her eyes opened, the busker’s own eyes locked onto hers and a fierce shudder rippled down her spine. Her breath caught in her throat. As she fought to steady herself against the unexpected burst of emotion, the music soared and intensified, each note a six string bullet cutting straight to her soul.

Tears filled her eyes. All she could see was the busker, and all she could hear was his song. She didn’t know how so many other people casually passed by without even glancing at him, but she found it impossible to look away.

The busker paid no heed to his captive audience. It was as if all he knew was the music, too. His guitar case was empty, but even when she impulsively emptied her pockets into it, he didn’t miss a beat.

The gentle clinking of the coins against each other jolted Ashley back to her senses, realising she was soaked to the bone. Strange. The rain wasn’t heavy. No one was even carrying an umbrella. It would’ve taken hours for her to be so drenched.

Hours… She glanced down at her wristwatch.

Shit.

The spell broken, she turned on her heel and sped down the street, flinging apologies in all directions as she pushed past the morning commuters and dashed toward her office.

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To read the rest of this story and thirteen

other horror music shorts, check out:

 

Crescendo of Darkness

Direct link: https://www.amazon.com/Crescendo-Darkness-Jeremiah-Donaldson/dp/1987708156

Edited by Jeremiah Donaldson

Cover by Carmen Masloski

HorrorAddicts.net Press

 

Let music unlock your fear within.

HorrorAddicts.net launches new Horror Bites series!

HorrorAddicts.net launches our Horror Bites series with an
Alice-inspired story by Adam L. Bealby.

When he met Alice, he wasn’t prepared to go down the rabbit hole. His love for her pushes him into the uncomfortable realization she might be mad. He wants to keep her safe, but what if that’s not what Alice wants?

“Adam Bealby has written a mini masterpiece that explores mental illness, drug addiction, and real life horror.”

~David Watson, The All-Night Library

Horror Bites: Alice’s Scars

BY ADAM L. BEALBY

Just 99 cents at Amazon.com

 

 

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A look inside…

Alice’s Scars

BY ADAM L. BEALBY

 

When I first met her she was Katie, soon to be Alice. It was her first day at Uni, my second, and her scars intrigued me. They lined her cheeks like tribal markings and the way she caked her face in foundation, you could tell they were forever on her mind. It helped, of course, that she was a beautiful Goth girl. I wanted to save her, share her pain, kiss her, and fuck her, too. I asked her what she kept in the drawstring purse around her neck.

“Money,” she said dismissively, turning away to talk to someone else at the bar.

She disappeared soon after. I only found out later how drunk she got, how she spent the rest of the night over a toilet bowl with Jackie holding her hair clear of her mouth. Her first and last run-in with alcohol. Alice had too much else going on in her life to get any more screwed up.

I dogged her all through freshers’ week. Instead of dorms, she’d been accommodated in a little house just off campus. A new friend I met lived there too, so it was an easy thing to fall in with her motley crew, drawn together by circumstance as we were. I became a regular in their kitchen, smoking weed and trying too hard—as we all did—to be quirky and cool.

We struck up conversation over a jar of pesto. I didn’t know what it was and she couldn’t believe it. I strung it out, made it appear I was more ignorant than I actually was, and I got her laughing. When I said her pesto looked like rabbit food she blushed, right through all that paint and powder.

“You don’t know the first thing about rabbits,” she said, and she showed me what was in her drawstring purse. It was a tiny white rabbit’s foot. It freaked me out and yet I felt even more attracted to her. It was my in, a secret shared. Looking at the severed foot I felt myself getting hard and I had to sit down for fear she’d notice.

She ran away that evening. We were all stoned and a bit drunk, talking about our parents, being glib, critical, or overly generous. She burst into tears and ran out of the kitchen and into the night, not even bothering to put her shoes on. We made an extravagant show of hunting for her, shouting her name up and down the street. Pete the Poet, as we later christened him, came out to help from next door. The way John shouted Katie’s name in his Irish accent, Pete thought we’d lost a cat. We had a good laugh about that.

But it wasn’t funny when we found Katie. She was hunkered down by the bushes on a bit of common area at the end of the row.

“Katie? What are you looking for?” I asked as we gathered round in a concerned hub.

“He was here,” she muttered. She’d been pawing at the dirt. Her fingers were black. “I saw him, but he got away from me.”

“Who was here, Katie?”

She looked up. The glare from a passing car lent her eyes a lustrous sheen.

“Alice. Call me Alice from now on, okay? Do you know what time it is? The days all seem to blur into one.”

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Adam L. Bealby writes fantasy, horror and weird fiction for both adults and children. His short stories and comic work have been published in numerous anthologies, including Spooked (Bridge House Publishing), Pagan (Zimbell House Publishing), Darkness Abound (Migla Press), Once Upon a Scream (HorrorAddicts.net), Sirens (World Weaver Press), World Unknown Review Vol. 2, rEvolution (MiFiWriters) and Murky Depths magazine. He lives in Worcestershire, UK with his wife and three children, and a harried imagination. Catch up with his latest ravings at @adamskilad.

Once Upon a Scream, featuring “The Other Daughter” by Adam L. Bealby

Once Upon a Scream…there was a tradition of telling tales with elements of the fantastic along with the frightful. Adults and children alike took heed not to go into the deep, dark woods, treat a stranger poorly, or make a deal with someone-or something-without regard for the consequences. Be careful of what you wish for, you just might get it. From wish-granting trolls, to plague curses, and evil enchantresses, these tales will have you hiding under the covers in hopes they don’t find you. So lock your doors, shutter your windows, and get ready to SCREAM.

HorrorAddicts.net

for Horror Addicts, by Horror Addicts

Listen to the HorrorAddicts.net podcast for the latest in horror news, reviews, music, and fiction.

HorrorAddicts.net Press

www.horroraddicts.net

Women in Horror Month

 

Full moom behind clouds by Richard EdwardsFebruary is Women in Horror Month. You’d think celebrating women writers wouldn’t be controversial, but it is in some circles. For one thing – the thing I’m going to examine today – some folks will tell you flat-out that women can’t write horror.

What? Women can’t write horror? Who says so? A surprising number of people will tell you they don’t read horror written by women. They’ll say that women don’t write to the extremes men do. That women don’t write the graphic horror. Women are too emotional, too interested in relationships, not interested enough in gore and guts.

I’m willing to say many (not all) women write differently than most men. Different does not mean lesser. A writer writes from his or her soul or inner self or deepest, darkest, secret places. Phrase that however you wish. Who you are will affect your writing.

So does that make woman-written horror inferior to man-written horror? Not from where I stand. Horror doesn’t have to be all blood, dangling entrails, and ripped out organs. Some of the best horror is purely psychological.

To be honest, if all a book (or film for that matter) has in its bag of tricks to frighten me is popped-out eyeballs dangling onto cheekbones or gouts of spurting arterial blood, I’m not going to be scared. I’m going to be bored. Bored. Write vivid, interesting characters—someone I can root for as well as someone I can hate. Write with emotion, with depth, with intelligence. Twist my mind into a pretzel, and I’ll follow you anywhere.

 

 

Photo credit: Richard Edwards Free Pictures A-Z

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