Yes, it’s that time of year again– Women in Horror Month is here! It’s too bad that it takes a special month for horror lovers and makers who are women to be brought up into the light, but that really does seem to be what it takes. While there are a lot of great women writers of horror, very few of them are well known, so this month we’re going to spotlight some of them. I’ll be bringing up some of the older posts we’ve done on some of the great women we have interviewed or had as guest bloggers previously,  sharing some information about writers of the past, suggesting links on women writers that might be of interest, and publishing interviews with some of the wonderful women writers of horror out there who mainstream readers and librarians may not be familiar with. We are working on putting together an index of women horror writers, but that is a BIG project, so whether that will be done by the end of the month I don’t know.

So here’s the thing. Spotlighting women writers in horror doesn’t mean I think you should read or recommend a book JUST because it’s by a woman. But by not knowing about the work of these women writers, you miss out on some really, really good storytelling. The immediate name that comes up when someone says “women writers of horror” is almost always Mary Shelley, followed by Anne Rice and maybe Shirley Jackson. Even in the Reader’s Advisory Guide to Horror Fiction, Becky Spratford mentions very few women authors outside a short section identifiying five excellent contemporary women writers.(Lisa Morton, Alexandra Sokoloff, Sarah Langan, Sarah Pinborough, and Caitlin Kiernan, as I recall) But there are so many more great books out there that are just MISSED, and I hope that this month we’ll be able to bring some of those to your attention!

Here’s a link to the WiHM Facebook page, which is collecting together posts from a variety of participating sites. And here’s a link to their tumblr– they are collecting donations right now as well. Also check out Becky’s blog, RA for Horror, this month. I know she’s got some great things coming up!

Enjoy!