Another signed Ray Bradbury first:
Bradbury, Ray (Leo and Diane Dillon, illustrators). Switch on the Night. Umbrella/Knopf, 1993. First edition hardback thus (“10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1” numberline), a Fine copy in decorated boards, sans dust jacket, as issued, signed by Bradbury. Illustrated children’s book first published in 1955 with a different illustrator, this is first edition with the Dillon art. Bought off eBay for $20.50.
Just what it says: Places people went into but never came out. Three are in the U.S., one of which, Jacob’s Well, is in Texas.
Some of these (like the Paris Catacombs) are well known, but others are fairly obscure.
None sound like enticing vacation destinations…
Kris Straub, the creator of Candle Cove, has a series of creepy mock, late-night found horror UHF TV segments edited together from public domain footage.
Here’s one for a weather alert:
Here’s an infomercial on “Real Sleep”:
Here’s one from earlier this year that asks what AI would look like in the 64K era.
More can be found here.
This is less “Halloween horror” that “Halloween comedy,” namely Dog 1, Creepy Japanese Ghost 0:
Get the hell out of my neighborhood!
Go be a ghost somewhere else! https://t.co/tg4o4BQKSR— The Figen (@TheFigen_) May 14, 2026
The Halloween Season is upon us again.
I’m not particularly a fan of the “thinly animated scary story,” but this one stands out quite a bit, as the military details are what make the entire thing more plausible.
These feature “pale crawlers.”
The first story doesn’t do much for me, but the second, featuring a national guardsman on nighttime land navigation (“lan nav”), which means moving around in the dark and navigating by landmarks and a map.
While out there he spots something.
Then the thing starts tracking him on a parallel course…
Nicely creepy.
Another limited edition came in from SST:
Romero, George A. and Daniel Kraus. Pay the Piper. Short Scary Tales (SST), 2026. First hardback edition, #330 of 500 copies signed by Kraus and illustrator Dirk Berger, a Fine copy in a Fine slipcase, with numbered bookmark and tissue closure stickers laid in. First signed, limited edition and first hardback of this Louisiana swamp monster with a grudge novel started by Romero and finished by Kraus. Oh, and Kraus just happened to win the Pulitzer Prize this year for his novel Angel Down.
I will have one copy of this available in the next Lame Excuse Books catalog, due out in just a couple of days.
Here’s a bibliography of a publisher I collect that I never picked up when it came out because I was already aware of every book in it because I was on the Ziesing mailing list for the last half of the period covered. But I do like having bibliographies, so I finally picked it up.
(Ziesing, Mark V.) Mark V. Ziesing Bibliography 1982-1993. Airtight Seels Allied Production (A.S.A.P.), 2003. First edition chapbook original, #43 of 200 numbered copies signed by “Introduction” author Lucius Shepard, “The Bus of Many Windows: A Digression on Mark V. Ziesing” author James P. Blaylock, illustrator Phil Parks, and Mark and Cynthia Ziesing, a Fine copy. Bought from the Mysterious Bookshop for $12.
I can tell you there are at least three notable errors/omissions.
First, it fails to note that there were far more than 1,600 trade editions of Joe R. Lansdale’s Cold in July and Savage Season. I’ve heard it rumored as many as 6,000 total (including the 500 copy limited edition) were printed, though I’m guessing 4,000 might be closer.
Second, it doesn’t mention that for some titles (including the Cold in July/Savage Season set, and Howard Waldrop’s Them Bones/A Dozen Tough Jobs sets) Ziesing ended up with extra slipcases and sold unsigned sets in them (as unsigned sets), I think upon request.
Third, it fails to mention the unpublished, first state dust jacket for Ray Garton’s Trade Secrets, the jacket copy for which was written by Andy Watson and which Mark Ziesing felt was too explicit. I lost an eBay bid for a copy with it, and my understanding is that about 10 copies escaped pulping.
One of my more obscure collecting vectors is festschriften, a volume in which a science fiction writer or editor is lionized by other luminaries. Other volumes I have include Polder (celebrating John Clute) and Moorcock@60.com, about which I’m pretty sure you can figure out who’s being celebrated. This volume celebrates Britsh horror editor Stephen Jones, who I know a bit.
(Jones, Stephen) Val Edwards, editor. The Mammoth Book of Stephen Jones. PS Publishing, 2003. First edition trade paperback original, one of 200 copies printed, a Fine copy. Festschrift in honor of Stephen Jones on his 50th birthday, with contributions from the likes of Stephen King, Clive Barker, Kim Newman, Lisa Tuttle, Pat Cadigan, Ramsey Campbell, etc. Bought from Cold Tonnage Books at the same time as the Pat Cadigan chapbook for about £20 pounds, plus shipping for both (which was pretty reasonable for UK post).
I don’t think any of these were for sale from the publisher, just issued to contributors (which is the usual case with festschriften).
Here’s a chapbook I was unaware of before it popped up in a Cold Tonnage Books catalog:
Cadigan, Pat. Chalk. This Is Horror, 2013. First edition chapbook original, #46 of 125 copies, a Fine copy, signed by Cadigan, with an 8 written on the title page and eight Xs on the inside front cover. (I sent Pat an email asking what was up with that.) Horror novella about two girls that can disappear in plain sight. Bought for £10.
This was the last Simmons title I didn’t own.
Simmons, Dan. The Abominable. Little Brown, 2015. First edition hardback, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket, signed by Simmons. Bought off eBay for $50, the opening bid.
The only Simmons first I lack is the trade first of The Fifth Heart, which preceded the Subterranean Press limited edition (which I have).