BEACON- – Stanza Books of Beacon, NY, will host horror writers Sam Rebelein and Clay McLeod Chapman at the store’s Saturday Salon on March 9, 2024. Rebelein and Chapman will read from recent works and discuss horror as literature and cultural bellwether. They will then stay for an evening of socializing with horror fans from around the Hudson Valley.
Chapman’s latest novel, What Kind of Mother is an instant folk horror classic, as were previous novels, like Ghosteaters. Chapman is a fixture in the horror community, known for his generosity and boosting of other writers.
Rebelein’s novel Edenville(Harper Collins, 2023) is set in the Hudson Valley, a location ripe for horror.
Rebelein said, “I moved to the Hudson Valley when I was eight, and ever since, I’ve been captivated by how beautiful and mysterious this land is. It is FULL of history. Half-built houses hiding in the woods,
abandoned by homesteaders hundreds of years ago. Sprawling estates along the river, populated by the ghosts of the Vanderbilts, Roosevelts, Edith Wharton, etc. Entire towns erased by reservoirs and forgotten. Too many stories to count. As an eight-year-old die-hard Goosebumps fan, I found magic and the macabre hiding under every bush on Vassar’s campus, waiting around every twisting bend in Route 9, lurking in the alleyways of Rhinebeck and Hudson. All the way back to Washington Irving, writers have embraced the ghosts here. So Renfield County is my love letter to our home. Sure, that love letter is soaked in blood and charred at the edges. But in its pages, you’ll find echoes of the Hudson Art School, downtown Red Hook, Amenia, and more.”
Rebelein is part of a flourishing Hudson Valley horror scene, which includes horror legend John Langan and Troy, NY indie publisher CLASH BOOKS. Stanza hosted both Langan and CLASH at January’s salon. Some of the other Hudson Valley horror writers in attendance were Megan Arcuri and Carol Gyzander, who was nominated for one of horror’s most prestigious awards, The Stoker. Thomas Olde Heuvelt famously set his book HEX in the mythical Hudson Valley town of Black Spring, just across the Hudson river from West Point. Many horror writers from the Hudson Valley and beyond will gather at Christine Harrold’s first Horror Reader Weekend, at the Overlook Lodge in November. Stanza will collaborate with Horror Reader Weekend to supply books for purchase and author signing.
Stanza is thrilled to continue building one more home for this exciting and robust horror scene, where authors and fans can come together and share their love of the genre.
