Happy Halloween everyone! My excitement for this holiday is due mostly to the excuse it affords to be very morose, and the fact that its Friday and the work week is finally over. I’ve never been particularly partial to trick-or-treating (I had a traumatic experience in my youth that made me question why anyone would let their kids go door to door begging for things), and horror movies these days are much less about scaring people than they are about the shock factor. I don’t mean to preach, Silas in Hell has some truly horrible imagery, and the other Halloween Special Serials may have no scare-value at all to the average reader, but I can tell you that the development of the Serials for the Halloween Issues were designed to explore different aspects of the horror genre. Silas is more visceral and relies on conventional definitions of good and evil. The Golem aspires to the tone and mood of a fairy tale, and Illuminatos wants to unsettle and confuse and make the things we find innocuous and commonplace into devices of evil. Whether any of the stories achieved their goals is open to interpretation. Nevertheless, we hope you enjoyed the work. There’s a new story this week from Ladoga; Max tells the short and tragic story of the Catawba Chief, and be sure to check out Issue 2 ½ for the poems that were inspired by this very story. Leave comments, email the editor, share with your friends. But most importantly, stay safe tonight, wherever you find yourself. There’s aliens out there after all (Area 51 Scientist’s Deathbed Video)…
Look for a post in the coming weeks that will detail the schedule for Volume I Outtakes and Remixes. And don’t forget that you too can be a PRL Contributor, just email me at rdc2104@gmail.com. The perks of being a PRL Contributor are boundless (many of which are currently to be determined and sadly does not include monetary compensation, but here are a couple of the definite perks: a reason to write if you want the practice and the opportunity to workshop and develop elaborate stories with other writers and maybe even artists).
But I digress. Get ready ladies and gentleman, it’s the PRL Halloween Special Issue 4.
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This week:
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Yea, he went from a head injury, to hell, then into a charred and crazy man’s flashback. Get ready for the bizarre conclusion.
Silas in Hell (Over-Sized Issue 4 – Crazed and Confused Part 2): “‘You got me into this. You were there then?’ Fletcher is almost laughing but it is a grotesque sound coming from the horror of his burned body with ashes where skin should be and falling off when Fletcher moves an inch to expose his flesh underneath; Silas winces away from it. ‘I’m not crazy,’ Fletcher continues.”
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Its the morose conclusion. It was bound to end this way.
Illuminatos: “I trust her with my life, so I don’t question her when she shoves pills down my throat when we have sex these days. She says it helps her give me what I need so that I stay loyal and true, not to her, but to the Angled One of course, because I could prove to be his best follower yet.”
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Sarah heads into darkness, whether she’s ready for it or not.
The Golem: “Crone did her best to prepare Sarah for the conditions she would encounter once she stepped into the darkness. Sarah spent a lot of time with the lights off, and Crone had her work with the garbage men so that she could learn to ignore smells that most people found unbearable. ”
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And finally, the Ladoga, NC urban legend that has creeped Max out for years.
The Catawba Chief’s Tree: “According to legend, the indian chief was over seven feet tall and ruled a tribe of Catawbas who had lived in what is now known as Ladoga, NC. The Chief commanded respect, even from settlers who mostly avoided his people, who the settlers feared as murderous giants.”
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PRL Serials 