Grab your sweaty and settle in for this wild ride of a minisode! Allie and Emmy do an in-depth analysis of the satirical creepypasta, "Man Door Hand Hook Car Door." This piece was posted anonymously to a supernatural web-forum in 2012, and it has been in Allie's heart and mind ever since. It recounts the urban legend of the hook-man, as he terrorizes local honeys and steals stereos. In this riveting discussion, the pals explore internet culture, trollpasta, satire, the world of publication, and more! Check it out - you'll be hooked ;)

Our next episode will be over "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (text of 1834) by… | Poetry Foundation

For updates, feel free to follow us on Instagram @booksarescary

If you have any comments or story recommendations, please email us at [email protected]

(A quick note: we apologize for the audio issues in this episode. There was background noise coming from kids playing outside, and at certain parts of the episode our microphone was acting up, causing the recording to sound slightly muffled. We hope that this doesn't affect your enjoyment of this episode, as it was a very fun one to record!)

Links for this week's episode:

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/man-door-hand-hook-car-door

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/trollpasta/

Ellis, Bill. “‘The Hook’ Reconsidered: Problems in Classifying and Interpreting Adolescent Horror Legends.” Folklore, vol. 105, 1994, pp. 61–75. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/1260630. Accessed 26 Apr. 2021.

On tonights episode, Allie and Em tackle "The Machine Stops" by E.M. Forster, one of the first science fiction novels to date! A story about a utopia turned dystopia where all your needs are met in a room of isolation (a pandemic dream). They talk politics, sociology, and the TAKS test throughout the episode because the story focuses on one large factor: relationships and the things that relate us to one another. Kuno and Vashti's relationship is consistently at odds and the machine is what stands between them. So join us as we throw some sand at some cogs and ask questions in relation to spatial identity, Human vs Nature, and what we owe each other. 

Our next episode will be over "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Link found here: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43997/the-rime-of-the-ancient-mariner-text-of-1834

For updates, feel free to follow us on Instagram @booksarescary

If you have any comments or story recommendations, please email at [email protected]

See yah next time!

Hope you're ready for some secrets and drama, cause this episode of the Books Are Scary Pod is spilling piping hot tea on the Ockram family! Today the BAS buds are discussing F. Marion Crawford's "The Dead Smile". This short story from the early 1900s follows a pair of engaged cousins, Gabriel and Evelyn, as they prepare for the death of Sir Hugh, the patriarch of the family. However, there's a secret lurking in the walls of the Ockram house, and it's paired with a chilling, eerie smile that seems to haunt the family. Tune in to hear Emmy and Allie talk about sassy 100 year old ladies, local lore, problematic dads, foreshadowing and tone, and good old fashion scary stories. What are you waiting for?! Open wide and say AAAHHHH!

Our next episode will be over "The Machine Stops" by E.M. Forster: The-Machine-Stops.dvi (ucdavis.edu)

For updates, feel free to follow us on Instagram @booksarescary

If you have any comments or story recommendations, please email us at [email protected]

Link for this week's text: The Dead Smile by F. Marion Crawford (digital-eel.com)

See ya next time!

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Today Allie and Emmy share some Irish history by exploring the folk tale of the Banshee! So come back in time and space as we talk about oral tradition, folk tales, and Allie's lumberjack dreams. Also, if you ever hear a woman crying, it could be a Banshee but it's probably us after an episode of The Good Place. 

For updates, feel free to follow us on Instagram @booksarescary

If you have any comments or would like to request a story for us to cover, email us at [email protected]

Ready to peel back the skin and really get to the brains of a zombie poem? Yah know cause Zombies are like onions (I think that's how that one goes). Emmy and Allie take on Burlee Vang's "To Live in The Zombie Apocalypse" by exploring Zombie tropes in the media and how the poem works on multiple levels to adapt the reader for the situation. Through thoughtful word choice, poetic technique, and addressing the duality of human nature, we really dig into the guts of what makes a Zombie literature and media piece and how it affects readers. Yah hungry?

Next week's episode "The Dead Smile": http://www.digital-eel.com/blog/library/smile.htm

For updates, feel free to follow us on instagram @booksarescary

If you have any comments or story recommendations please emails us at [email protected]

Link for this week's text: To Live in the Zombie Apocalypse by Burlee Vang - Poems | poets.org

Splish splash, we're takin' a bath on this episode of the Books Are Scary Pod! On today's special episode, Allie and Emmy are joined by their first guest, Briana Gonzalez, to talk about her short horror fiction piece, "Drain." The story follows the estranged relationship of Grace and Nicky, who invest in a nifty evil bathtub. Chock-full of empathetic characters, unsettling scares, and sweet, sweet tension, "Drain" leads the gang to discuss childhood fears, gender roles, unhealthy relationships, and more! How did Gonzalez use form to build her characters? What juicy Easter eggs did we miss? Can inanimate objects still be stand-alone characters? How will Emmy fit a Disney reference in this one? Come and see! Just remember to lather, rinse, and repeat!

Our next episode will cover "To Live in the Zombie Apocalypse" by Burlee Vang, which can be found here: https://poets.org/poem/live-zombie-apocalypse

Follow us on Instagram for updates: @booksarescary

Email us for story requests or business inquiries: [email protected]

Be sure to follow Briana Gonzales on Instagram (@brimgonzalez) and twitter (@brimothee). Also, check out her other writing in Ample Remains Literary Magazine and (https://www.ampleremains.com/issue2.html) and stay tuned for an upcoming poem being published in Southchild Lit!

You can find Drain at https://coffinbell.com/drain/

Thanks for listening! See you next episode!

Join Allie and Emmy as they crash the party at Prospero's abbey! They will go in-depth on the tension, power, and snazzy words Poe infuses in his story about an avant garde masquerade decorated in denial of the outside world that is momentarily antagonized by a mysterious stranger. Get ready for some theories of how color plays into the story, what defines a character and a symbol, and maybe a tangent or two! 

Next Week's Story is "Drain" by Briana Gonzalez found in Coffin Bell Literary Magazine, or here: https://coffinbell.com/drain/

For updates, feel free to follow us on Instagram @booksarescary

If you have any comments or would like to request a story for us to cover, email us at [email protected]

Read today's story here: The Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe (poestories.com)

Grab a shovel and get ready to dig into episode three of the Books Are Scary podcast! This episode, Emmy and Allie get down and dirty with the horror short story, "Caring for Plants" by Hye-young Pyun. This eerie story follows Oghi, a man who is left severely injured after a car wreck that killed his wife. But what really happened? What's the deal with that mother-in-law? What's the real horror in losing control? How many times can we name-drop Kathy Bates in one episode? Emm and Al get to the bottom of all of these pressing questions while also talking about the unreliable narrator, moral justice, slow-burns, and misogyny, of course. 

Stay tuned for our next episode, where we will be covering Edgar Allen Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death," which can be found here: The Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe (poestories.com) 

!!! Important note !!! As of next episode, we will begin posting every other Sunday! See you then!!

As always, thank you all for listening! If you'd like to stay updated, check out our Instagram: @booksarescary

If there are any stories you'd like to see us cover, email us at [email protected]

Links for this episode:

Caring for Plants | The New Yorker

This Week in Fiction: Hye-young Pyun on the Role of Suspense in Storytelling | The New Yorker

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a UFO! No, it's a new episode of the Books Are Scary podcast! This week, the earthlings known as Emmy and Allie discuss Robert Hayden's "Unidentified Flying Object", a poem about aliens, creepy drunk guys, town gossip, and the mysterious disappearance of a woman named Mattie Lee. The gals talk Modernism, aged Victorian ideals, unreliable narrators, and more! Grab your tin-foil hats and tune in!

In our next episode, we will cover "Caring for Plants" by Hye-young Pyun, which can be found here: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/07/10/caring-for-plants

For updates, feel free to follow us on Instagram @booksarescary

If you have any comments or story recommendations, please email us at [email protected]

Find the reading for today's episode here: https://www.everseradio.com/unidentified-flying-object-by-robert-hayden/

WINNER WINNER CHICKEN DINNER! Today’s prize is criticizing Karens, putting a few notches in the pillar of tradition, and talking about child murderers (kinda). In episode one, Allie and Emmy take on Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”, a 1948 piece taking place in a village where the occupants are taking practice in the ominous “Lottery”. What is the lottery? Why do they do it? Emmy and Allie tackle these open questions through analyzing the practice of tradition, the foreshadowing cleverly placed by Jackson, and tying it together with history. You ready to draw?

In our next episode, we will discuss "Unidentified Flying Object" by Robert Hayden, which can be found here: "Unidentified Flying Object" by Robert Hayden - E-Verse RadioE-Verse Radio

For updates, feel free to follow us on Instagram @booksarescary

If you have any comments or would like to request a story for us to cover, email us at [email protected]

Here are links to the articles mentioned in this episode:

"The Lottery" - https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1948/06/26/the-lottery

"The Haunted Mind of Shirley Jackson" - https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/17/the-haunted-mind-of-shirley-jackson

"'The Lottery' Letters" - https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-lottery-letters