What Do You Fear Lies Under the Bed?

Confession time:  Visitors for IWSG (bless you, Alex, for starting this group) I had a bit of an early breakdown.  You can check that out here.  You can stick around for this additional confession - as a kid, I watched A Nightmare on Elm Street (I shouldn't have, I know, but I couldn't help myself lol!!!) and would have sworn on a stack of bibles that Freddy Krueger was under my bed.  I know, he attacked in your dream but I refused to let any part of my body dangle from the bed during the night.  Silly now.  Creepy back then.

Call it a thrill on my part to share in the announcement of the release of this new anthology.

Sirens Call Publications has recently released their first Anthology titled

“Childhood Nightmares: Under the Bed”

Twelve of the hottest names in Independent Horror have crafted tales that will ensure you leave the lights on the next time you crawl between the sheets. Remember your Childhood Nightmares? Ever wonder if you were the only one with the crushing fear you couldn’t talk about? Peel back the layers of self-imposed silence on forgotten fears and discover if there really was strength in numbers all along…

Those whispered tales of monsters hiding under the bed, or of the demons lurking in the shadowy corner where we dare not glance for fear that seeing them will make them all too real. Oh, how the innocent landscape of a child’s imagination lends fertile soil to horrors ready to be sown on the slightest of sounds; the tales and the terror they wreak on our youthful minds never quite leaves us.

We asked the authors in this collection to reach into the forgotten recesses of their twisted minds and share with us the tales of nightmares that can only thrive in the hidden corners of a child’s imaginings; the bogeyman under the bed, the outlandishly fiendish creature lurking in the dark, the slight murmur of sound coming from the hall… did you close the door completely?

Explore the myriad terrors that only a child can twist from nothing into some ‘thing’ in the span of a single rapid breath. Do you dare delve into your own memories? Perhaps you’ll start sleeping with the lights on again...

Tell us, who is Under the Bed?

Contributing Authors:  Colin F. Barnes, Nina D'Arcangela, Phil Hickes, Amber Keller,

Kim Krodel, Lisamarie Lamb, John McIlveen, Kate Monroe, Brandon Scott,

Joshua Skye, Julianne Snow, and Jack Wallen

Conquer your fears and pick up a copy of Childhood Nightmares: Under the Bed from:

eBook:  Amazon.com, Amazon.uk, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.es, Amazon.it

                Samshwords.com (Kindle, Nook, Kobo, Sony, PDF)

Print:     Amazon.com, CreatSpace.com

Read selected excerpts from what has been keeping us up at night, wondering what is Under the Bed?

 ‘Telling Tales’ - Phil Hickes

“She’s here for yet another visit with her cat, Demdike. None of which sounds too bad, you say? Lots of young boys have stuffy old grandmothers and aunties that they have to put up with. And cats are cute and fluffy.

But Peter’s Aunt Alice scares him. In fact, she frightens him to death. And her cat is just as bad, with fur as black as its soul.

That’s why he’s reluctant to go upstairs; because soon, Aunt Alice will be up to tell him a bedtime story. It’s become something of a custom. Peter was delighted when she first offered to come and tuck him in. Despite feeling a little nervous in her presence, and a tiny bit afraid of her pinched, lined face, white hair and bony limbs, she was a welcome female presence. For the first few minutes it had been enjoyable too. She wrapped the sheets tightly around him, clicked off the overhead light and turned on the lamp. He felt warm and snug…”

But then she began to tell him the stories…”

‘The Confession of a Confirmed Has-Been’ - John McIlveen

“I behaved for the first three months. I simply observed the Hansons’ way of life, as I had with the two previous families. In my condition I witness traits and habits often unnoticed by people in a more physical state, like Scott's insistent nose picking and compulsion to wipe his findings on my fireplace, or Bruce’s fixation with himself. If he spent any more time flexing in front of a mirror, I fear he'd get himself pregnant.

I do grant people the privacy of their bedrooms and the facilities, I’m not immoral - though discovering that Karen roams the house in nature's garb when alone was pleasing. I may be dead, but I’m still a man.

My condition is also what allows me to view Kimberly with utmost anonymity. In my spectral cloak, I track Kimberly about the house, watching as she involved herself in childhood fantasies, oblivious to all else. I walked with her through the garden, rejoiced with her, celebrating each discovery with open-eyed wonder. I wallowed in that beautiful youthfulness that fades as we become involved in the trivialities of adulthood…”

‘Bent Metal’ - Nina D’Arcangela

“I’m now in full blown panic mode racing down the stairs to the echoing sound of the police dispatcher screaming into the phone “stay in the house - don’t go near the corner!”

I hit the front hall and see that the door is wide open… oh, God please, oh please, oh  no… don’t let Alan be out there, please let the door be open for some other reason – maybe mom or dad went out to help, please let that be it.

I’m only three houses from the corner; three houses from the wreckage in the street; three houses from my own sanity shattering…. The second my bare foot leaves the safety of the house and hits the front porch I know something is horribly wrong. Somehow I know its Alan, and he’s in trouble.

The dread that overcomes me is suffocating. I can hardly breathe as I try to run towards the street… but my legs feel like I’m running in quick sand. I’m moving as hard and as fast as I can, but the corner may as well be a mile away in my distorted perception.

Oh God! My head is spinning as fast as my legs are churning, someone is screaming – I think it might be me! Finally I make it to the corner and see what an unholy mess of tangled metal the two vehicles that couldn’t avoid each other have become…”

Please visit the Sirens Call Publications web site for an extended preview available for download.