June 2014
CONTENTS
Introduction
Summer Flash Fiction
Black is the Brightest Colour – Anthony Cowin
Dark Fiction
Little Mothers – Ciprian Mitoceanu
Alchemy – Amdi Silvestri
Standing on the Edge of the World – Alex Živko-Clark
Crow Bait – Anya J. Davis
The Long Pier – Jake Swan
Featuring the Sensational Amanda Grimes
One Way – Stephanie Ellis
The Monk – Marc E. Fitch
Melissa – Peter Swindells
Why Can’t I Wipe It All Away? – Paul Holbrook
Autumn Contest
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Massacre Contributors
Ciprian Mitoceanu – Little Mothers
Ciprian Mitoceanu is a Romanian writer of SF, thriller, and horror fiction. His stories have appeared in numerous Romanian language anthologies and magazines. A prodigious author, he is often described as Romania’s answer to Stephen King.
You can find Ciprian Mitoceanu here:
Website – www.mitoceanu.com
Facebook – CiprianMitoceanuWriter
Facebook – cmitoceanu
Previous Publications
Coltii (Fangs) – Tritonic PH, Bucharest, 2008
Amendamentul Dawson (The Dawson Amendment) – Millennium Books, Satu Mare, 2012
In sangele tatalui (In the Blood of the Father), the second novel in The Dawson Amendmentcycle – Millennium Books, Satu Mare, 2012
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Amdi Silvestri – Alchemy
Amdi Silvestri was born in 1977 and is a resident of Copenhagen, Denmark. No genres are barred to him, but most of his work are in the fields of weird fiction, horror and science fiction. He is the author of three collections of short stories, a horror novel and, most recently, a book containing two novellas (both about the end of the world). Sadly he normally writes in Danish, so only a limited selection of his stories is available (in this case limited means one) in English. It can be found here. Amdi Silvestri is also a member of Dansk Horror Selskab (a guild focused on promoting horror) and his next book will be a strange tale about gothic horror and annoying neighbors
You can also find Amdi Silvestri here:
Website – asilvestri.blogspot.dk
Twitter – @authorsilvestri
Pinterest – authorsilvestri
Facebook – A-Silvestri-Forlaget-Valeta/159533890757019
Previous Publications
Imprint – Winner of Massacre Magazine’s Spring Fearsome Flasher contest
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Alex Živko-Clark – Standing on the Edge of the World
Alex lives with his wife, Ines, in northern Croatia. Their portion of the world, with its mountains and shipyards and island-dotted seas is the perfect playground for authors and its terrain and vibrancy has leached into Alex’s stories many times.
You can follow Alex Živko-Clark on Twitter:
@AlexZivcoClark
Previous Publications
Utopia Dystopia – September ’13 issue of The Horror Zine
The Face of the Idiot – Hellfire Crossroads #1
The River Man – Morpheus Tales #22
22:22 – Massacre Magazine, Issue 2
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Anya J. Davis – Crow Bait
Anya J. Davis is a freelance copywriter and editor by day, spending her most of her time lost in a world of product descriptions and blog posts or growling about misused apostrophes. When darkness falls, she can be found sipping a glass of wine, listening to Skinny Puppy and Fields of the Nephilim, and writing tales of terror in a vain attempt at therapy to cure herself of her nightmares.
A graduate of the Open University, with a BA (Hons.) in Humanities including Literature, Anya lives in Devon, in the South West of England.
Anya is currently working on a collection of short horror stories and a novel.
You can find Anya here:
Twitter – @Traumahound23
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Jake Swan – The Long Pier
Jake Swan works as a physician in Saint John, New Brunswick. His short story The Old Man was published in the Telegraph Journal Reader. During his four year stint in medical school, he wrote a humour column for the MUN Med News. Jake’s hobbies include mushroom picking, playing the air guitar during his commute to and from work and good-natured cynicism.
When asked where he learned to write, with a cryptic smile, Jake will respond, “The school of hard knocks.” When pressed on the subject, he will admit that he doesn’t know what that means, exactly, and only said it because it sounded “cool”.
Find more about Jake Swan here:
music.cbc.ca/#/artists/Jake-Swan
Facebook – jake.swan.39
Previous Publications
The Old Man – Short Story, Telegraph Journal Reader
Family Member – Short Story, MUN Med News
Fatherhood and Fatness – Short Story, Motherhood and Fitness Website
Loathsome Things – Novel, not yet published
There Are Worse Things Than Loneliness – Massacre Magazine, Issue 1
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Stephanie Ellis – One Way
Stephanie Ellis is currently a Teaching Assistant in a Southampton secondary school but previously worked for many years as a technical author. Her short stories, firmly based in the horror genre, have found success with a variety of publishers and over the coming year will be found in the Fringeworks anthologies – Raus! Untoten!, Last Diner, Deadman’s Tales and Cadavers as well as the future Distorted Perceptions anthology by Death Throes Publishing.
She also dabbles in poetry (printed in local and national press) and has recently distorted a number of favourite childhood nursery rhymes into something darker and more sinister, these can be found on her own website.
Her own taste in reading varies widely from Terry Pratchett, to Bernard Cornwell to current favourite Neil Gaiman – and oh yes, Stephen King and Edgar Allan Poe also get a look in.
You can find out more about Stephanie Ellis here:
stephellis.weebly.com
Readwave.com (where she is also a staff reviewer)
Twitter – @el_stevie
Current and Upcoming Publications
Demon Rum and Other Evil Spirits – Angelic Knight Press
Pun Book of Horror – Fringeworks
Vampires Don’t Sparkle – Sky Warrior Books
Horror in Bloom – Visionary Press
Previous Publications
Beiwe – Sanitarium Magazine, Issue 15
The Sandman’s Warning – Far Off Places Magazine, Under the Bed Issue
One, Two, I See You – 100 Words or Less Horror Horror Stories, PopCorn Horror
Poems in What the Dickens ezine, Issues 4, 5, 6 and 8
The Gorgon’s Kiss – Massacre Magazine, Issue 2
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Marc E. Fitch – The Monk
Marc E. Fitch is a graduate of the Western Connecticut State University Master of Fine Arts Program. He has been the recipient of the W.C.S.U. Barbara Winder Award and the Connecticut Review’s Leslie Leeds Poetry Award. He is the author of Paranormal Nation: Why America Needs Ghosts, UFOs, and Bigfoot (Praeger) and the novel Old Boone Blood. His fiction has appeared in such publications as ThugLit, The Big Click, eHorror, The Connecticut Review, and in Cezanne’s Carrot. He is a contributor to American Thinker and the Republican-American. Marc has also just signed a contract for his new horror/thriller novel, Paradise Burns, which is to be published by Damnation Books. He currently lives in Harwinton, CT with his wife and four children and works in the field of mental health.
You can find out more about Marc E. Fitch on his website:
www.marcfitch.com
Previous Publications
Paranormal Nation: Why America Needs Ghosts, UFO’s and Bigfoot – Praeger
Old Boone Blood – Lulu.com
Altar Boys – The Big Click
Monster – ThugLit
Dirty Water – eHorror
The Hit-Man – A Twist of Noir
The Lost Ear of Corn – Cezanne’s Carrot
Head of the Meadow – Prick of the Spindle
No Justice, No Peace… Ever – American Thinker
Trouble in the Dirty Water – American Thinker
Savage Work – Massacre Magazine, Issue One
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Peter Swindells – Melissa
Peter Swindells lives in Liverpool with two children and a cat; he is allergic to cats. He received virtually no secondary education and went on to gain wide experience of minimum wage employment. At 25 he completed an access course, went to university and gained First class Honours in Psychology and also qualified for Mensa. He is now pouring his efforts into fulfilling his dream of becoming a professional writer.
You can find Peter Swindells on Twitter: @P161803
Future Publications
Clockwork Kiru: Steampunk Haiku – Dreamscape Press
Previous Publications
Horror In Bloom – Visionary Press
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Paul Holbrook – Why Can’t I Wipe It All Away?
Paul Holbrook enjoys scaring people. Fact.
This is lucky for him, as he seems to have an unnatural knack for it. He has lost count of the amount of people who have said these exact words to him: “You scare me, Holbrook, you really do.”
They say it all the time to him; on the bus, at work, in dark alleyways at night, at the breakfast table. One aspect is always constant though; there is always a little flicker in their eye, a twitch of their feet (in preparation for escape), and the slightly embarrassing smell of intestinal gas as the fear hits their bowels. The very idea of sending a cold shudder down the spine of some unsuspecting reader/colleague/human is the reason he gets up in the morning and, in turn, it is also the reason why his wife sleeps with one eye open.
When he is not attempting to weaken the bladders and sphincters of complete strangers, and those who encounter either him or his writing, he manages to hold down a job… which is also a matter for concern.
As well as having his work appear in the first two issues of Massacre Magazine, Paul has also written a novel, Memento Mori, a tale of murder, madness and Victorian post-mortem photography, which he is trying very hard to get published at the moment.
He is currently writing its sequel, Domini Mortum, which he will finish this summer.
You can enter Paul Holbrook’s odd world here:
Twitter – @cpholbrook
Facebook – mementomorinovel and dominimortum
Previous Publications
The Book of the Dead – Caraticus P. Holbrook. A collection of horror poems and short stories.
Chain Me Not In Heaven – Massacre Magazine, Issue 1
My Search for Perfection – Massacre Magazine, Issue 2
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