October Thoughts

As I noted in my earlier post about The Grey Knight, now that it’s October, I feel the need to use this months as an opportunity to explore that in roleplaying games a little more than I usually do (which is actually a lot, come to think of it).

Now, I should be clear: I don’t have it in me to devote every post this month to horror in the way I did with The Shadow over August, when I spent the entire month examining Lovecraft and his legacy. That was an intense endeavor and, while that exercise was both fruitful and well-received, it also took a lot of work on my part. I'm simply not up to that so soon afterwards, especially with Gamehole Con coming up in two weeks (more on that later). 

So, this month, my approach will be lighter and more flexible. Horror will appear more frequently in my writing here, but it will coexist with discussions of all the usual topics I care about. That's in addition to my other ongoing work on both Patreon and Substack (which I recommend you check out if you like what I do here). 

One concrete way this will manifest is that the next four installments of Pulp Fantasy Library, starting next Monday, October 7, will turn to classic horror stories. These are tales I think worthy of attention, whether because they are historically significant, influential on later writers, or simply brilliantly unsettling. Some of them are well-known, others less so, but all have something to teach about fear, suspense, and the strange pleasures of the macabre – topics I think worthy of discussion during this month.

After these four horror-focused posts, I’ll return to looking at Lovecraft’s Dream Cycle stories in November, continuing a thread I hope some of you have been following since I restarted the feature after a long quiescence. In the meantime, consider this a kind of gentle “horror season." It won't be a deluge of posts on the topic, but there will be enough to remind us why the weird and the scary have long been a vital part of our games and our imaginations.