DREADPOP MAGAZINE

It’s finally here! Yesterday, I dropped the first note from the editor, and tonight we are having a watch party for our segment “Tag Team Tales of Terror.”

DreadPop Magazine delivers a new horror story every single week from one of today’s best horror authors!

On top of that, there’s news, reviews, articles, videos, and even fake ads like you’d see in the old school horror mags.

Join us tonight for the live watch party of Tag Team Tales of Terror, where Viggy Parr Hampton challenges author Nick Botic to create a story with her on the spot, using only a prompt she draws from a hat.

Tomorrow, I’ll drop some hints on the inaugural author for our weekly short story, and let me tell you, you’re not going to want to miss this one!

FROM THE EDITOR:

I promised myself I wouldn't do this.

Years ago, as a newbie stand-up comedian, I drove each night to any nearby dive bar hosting an open mic to get some time on stage. Wherever I could find a spot, I signed up and practiced my material. Eager, stupid, and impatient, I eventually decided the scene needed new spots, new shows, new stages. So, I went to work. I organized with bar owners, talked to comedians, planned how much I could afford to pay talent, and weaseled my way into interviews with any small town newspaper I could get my hands on. It was completely grassroots. Friends made fliers with no graphic design talent or marketing skills. People spread the word. And I posted a shit ton on social media.

I learned very quickly, I was pretty good at putting together quality shows. I also learned I despised doing it. It took time away from the part of comedy I enjoyed most: crafting jokes and telling them on stage. It cost a fortune. Any dimes I made while performing went right to another comedian I had booked for a different show. In fact more dimes were pouring from my palms than were coming into them. Some bars stiffed me, so I ended up paying out of pocket. The process was grueling, and the reward was minimal.

At the start of my indie publishing career, I typed a list of every goal I had for my writing journey. When I started the list, I promised myself not to hold back. Dream big. Write it all out.

The end result was a list a mile long, covering everything from New York Times bestsellers to Emmy Award-winning television shows based on my stories. When I completed the list, I copied every single goal except the first one, pasted them all into a different file, and titled it Someday. Then I went back to the first file, and deleted every single thing I'd just copied, leaving me with a new file I titled The Important Thing. The one and only sentence in that file reads "Write good stories and find readers who like them."

I have never left that goal. I'm still standing firmly within its realm. Yet, here I am starting my own magazine, promising to deliver a story a week from different authors. The process to make this function will be costly, time consuming, stressful, costly, and, of course, costly. Oh, and really fucking costly.

So, why do it?

Why not just focus on that first important step? Write good stories and find readers who like them. Running a magazine with a YouTube channel will only take away time and resources to succeed at that one important thing.

I'm writing this on a Monday, just after coming back from the Dark Drafts Fest in Mt. Joy, PA. It was a weekend-long event in an historic brewery, where authors from all over came to sign books, hang out, and enjoy conversations with horror's dedicated and passionate readers. It was a beautiful event, fun from start to finish. When I left, I realized that I love the people. Truly, I love the horror community.

Back when I put together those comedy shows, I did it because I wanted to love the community. I wanted to be invested in it. I wanted to make some kind of mark on its soul.

But here, I already love the horror community, and I want to let it know it has left a mark on my soul.

Look, I'm not reinventing the wheel here. Horror magazines have always been around, and there's more than a few that continue to kick ass. Cemetery Dance, Nightmare Magazine, Monstrous, just to name a few off the top of my head.

So, what makes this magazine different? One, the way in which it's delivered. A story a week delivered to your inbox, coupled with a badass YouTube channel, highlighting all things horror. Two, it's not just spotlighting the community, but it's community run. The YouTube channel is led by indie authors, diehard readers, and people from all aspects of the horror world. I'm going to them for advice. Their voice will echo through every page of this magazine, and every video we publish.

DreadPop Magazine IS the horror community. It's all the passion. It's all the heart. It's all the folks who carry the torch for us. At the aforementioned Dark Drafts Fest, a few authors stuffed their books with QR codes leading to the magazine. A reader handed those QR codes out to folks entering the festival and ran around giving them to people she'd missed at the door. One of the YouTube hosts begged me to make t-shirts, stating, and I quote, "I'm ready to make DreadPop my entire personality."

This channel, and this magazine, it's all passion. It's all love.

And that's why I'm doing this. Yes, the commitment will be challenging. My hamster wheel will be spinning at max. My bank account will have lower numbers than a soccer game. I'll probably cry once in a while.

But I love horror. I love the people, the authors, the readers, the editors, the artists, the fans, the filmmakers, the game designers, the event organizers. They are the blood of the genre, and they bust their asses to keep the heart beating.

That is DreadPop Magazine.

We are here.

Welcome.

• Gage Greenwood