written by David Steffen
Nightmare Magazine is the horror sister magazine of Lightspeed Magazine, edited by John Joseph Adams, and their podcast produced by the excellent Skyboat Media. The podcast publishes about half of the stories they publish in text. They didn’t publish enough stories in 2015 for a list, so this list covers both 2015 and 2016. They published 46 stories between the two years.
2015 marked the publication of their Queers Destroy Horror special issue (guest edited by Wendy N. Wagner). 2016 marked the publication of their People of Colo(u)r Destroy Horror (guest edited by Silvia Moreno-Garcia).
The stories eligible for the upcoming Hugo and Nebula award seasons are marked with an asterisk (*).
The List
1. “The Modern Ladies’ Letter-Writer” by Sandra McDonald*
Written as a writing etiquette guide. It gets weird.
2. “Golden Hair, Red Lips” by Matthew Bright
One of the stories in the Queers Destroy Horror special issue, this one is a modern take on the story of Dorian Gray during the breakout of the AIDS epidemic.
3. “The Cellar Dweller” by Maria Dahvana Headley
“Buildings were built, in the beginning, everyone knows, to hold the dead down.”
4. “Where It Lives” by Nathaniel Lee
When your mental state has the ability to transform you physically, where does that lead?
5. “Bringing Out the Demons” by John Skipp*
For those haunted by demons, they can either learn to control them or to give in their power. And who better to help someone whose demons are not under control, than others who know what they’re going through?
Honorable Mentions
“An Army of Angels” by Caspian Gray
“Vulcanization” by Nisi Shawl*
