BIO: In addition to creating strategies and video series for media outlets, ranging from Complex Media to TIDAL, Jonathan Lees has spent decades championing independent cinema and filmmakers through his work with the New York Underground Film Festival, Troma, Tribeca Film, Anthology Film Archives, and now with the Final Frame Horror Short Film Competition at StokerCon. After twenty-five years working in NYC, he has apparated to the Hudson Valley to explore more personal rituals by inscribing arcane texts for grimoires such as Long Division [Bad Hand Books], Fear of Clowns [Kangas Kahn Publishing], Even In The Grave [eSpec Books], The Hideous Book of Hidden Horrors [Bad Hand Books],and Other Terrors [Harper Collins].
BIO: Lila Denning is the acquisitions coordinator for the seven libraries of the St. Petersburg (FL) Library System. Lila has worked in circulation and reference and has done programming for children, teens, and adults. Beyond her current role in her library, she trains librarians nationwide on passive reader advisory. Her long, rambling road to the library included stops as a manager of a comic book store, a manager at Barnes and Noble, and a stint at a brokerage firm, among other adventures. In addition to her MLIS, Lila has an MA in Religious Studies with a focus on Holocaust Studies.
The HORROR WRITERS ASSOCIATION is delighted to announce the immediate renaming of the Silver Hammer award to the Karen Lansdale Silver Hammer award in honor of the tremendous amount of work Karen did starting the HWA. This information will now be a part of the HWA’s permanent archives at Horror.org and elsewhere.
Our physical award will also be updated. Instead of a hammer, a new stylized sculpture is being designed and will be cast by the same company that mints our Bram Stoker Award statues. We look forward to sharing the new design as soon as it’s finalized.
Karen Lansdale will be the first recipient of the renamed award, to be presented to Karen in October 2022. From Joe R. Lansdale:
“HOW THE HORROR WRITERS’ ASSOCIATION CAME TO BE.
Once upon a time dear hearts, there wasn’t a Horror Writers Association, and the writers who specialized in horror fiction existed random of one another, like stars, and they were lost in a dark void.
And then Karen Lansdale came along, and the void was filled.
Let me explain how that happened. Let me try and put a continuous misunderstanding aside so that it might die in a field alone, and let true credit be given where credit is due.
Robert R. McCammon, who was very much involved in the horror field back when it was in its boom, along with his then wife, Sally, met Karen and me in an elevator at a World Fantasy Convention. Hearing me speak to Karen, Rick said, “I bet you’re Joe R. Lansdale. I can tell by the accent.”
Took one Southerner to recognize another. The elevator was slow, but the McCammons and Lansdales hit up an immediate friendship, right then and there.
The elevator stopped, and we sat and visited, and Rick, as McCammon preferred to be called, said he had an idea that since horror was growing, and had become a recognized commercial genre, it should have an organization. He called the idea HOWL. Horror Occult Writer’s League, which to this day I prefer to the soberer Horror Writers Association. He was talking about something along the lines of The Mystery Writers of America, Science Fiction Writers of America, Western Writers of America, and so on.
But there was a problem. He didn’t have the time.
Karen immediately said, “I’ll do it.”
It would be easy to say the rest was history, but it didn’t quite work out that way.
It went like this.
Karen, at that convention, began to make a list of names and addresses of writers who might be interested in such an organization. Rick had come up with the idea, but was too busy to pursue. He had the seed, but Karen planted and water and fertilized it until it grew into a tree.
She went home with names and addresses, and pretty soon we began to receive mail (the old-fashioned kind, as there was no Email) and phone calls from people who wanted to be members.
A plan for what it took to become a member was put into place, ideas coming from me and Rick, and many others, and once that was done, Karen began to put together newsletters. This took time, and it was made up of letters and articles from the new members and Karen ghosted articles and plums of interest for those in the horror field, and soon the newsletters were born.
This was done by using Xerox machines in town at nickel a page, paid by her. Tedious, and ultimately, expensive work. And keep in mind, at that time she held a full time and demanding job,
Karen wrote a few articles for Mystery Scene Magazine about the horror writers’ organization, which by this time had become The Horror Writers of America. Many felt it sounded more professional than HOWL.
Karen was not among them. Me either. I still like HOWL. Sometimes written as H.O.W.L.
But this went on for months, Karen receiving an avalanche of letters, phone calls, and when we went to World Fantasy Conventions, we would set aside time to have members and would-be members, group up and talk up new ideas, and so on.
Karen made notes. When she got home, they went into the newsletter. Members began to contribute more. The organization was real now, still wet from the womb, but kicking its little legs.
The association continued for a time as part of the World Fantasy Convention, eventually morphing into the World Horror Convention, so as to have its own platform.
At some point, Dean Koontz suggested to us that he put some money into the newsletters, take it over, make it more professional. He did and it did.
Karen, by this time, long overwhelmed with Xeroxing and organizing, was ready to let it go. Fly little organization, fly out into the world, your mama lets you go.
So, let it be known, it was she, not Rick, not me, not Dean, who created the organization which continued to grow and became the Horror Writers Association. It leaped from our kitchen table, where Karen operated, and flew out into the ether to eventually become world-wide. That’s impressive.
Karen is proud of that.
I am proud of her.
Alas, her modesty has led to her not receiving the credit she deserves, to be set aside in favor of bigger names, all male, mind you, and she is not even mentioned in the history of the Horror Writers Association. This is a travesty.
She proudly received, many years later, a Richard Laymon award for her contributions, but that is not enough. She didn’t just Xerox and staple, she created.
Her efforts were soon forgotten, pushed aside even. The history is still improperly written. It needs to be revised to reflect the truth. Rick and Dean, and many others contributed, but the mojo that caused it to come into being, was the mojo Karen Lansdale put into it.
I love Karen for her humility all these years, but it frustrates me as well.
Rick had the idea, Dean had the money to broaden the newsletter and the organization’s appeal, but Karen Lansdale founded the Horror Writers Association.
That’s the in and the out of it, the alpha and the omega.
Joe R. Lansdale
Her proud husband and fan.
“Karen Lansdale performed an invaluable service for HWA at the organization’s birth, and every HWA member around the world should be appreciative of the great work she did.”
––Robert McCammon
The Horror Writers Association (HWA) periodically gives the Karen LansdaleSilver Hammer Award to an HWA volunteer who has done a truly massive amount of work for the organization, often unsung and behind the scenes. It was instituted in 1996, and is decided by a vote of HWA’s Board of Trustees.
The award is so named because it represents the careful, steady, continuous work of building HWA’s “house” — the many institutional systems that keep the organization functioning on a day-to-day basis.
The Horror Writers Association is a worldwide organization promoting dark literature and its creators. It has over 700 members who write, edit and publish professionally in fiction, nonfiction, video games, films, comics, and other media.
The HWA is pleased to announce the winner of the Richard Laymon President’s Award for Service: Sumiko Saulson.
The Richard Laymon President’s Award for Service was instituted in 2001 and is named in honor of Richard Laymon, who died in 2001 while serving as HWA’s President. As its name implies, it is given by HWA’s sitting President.
The award is presented to a volunteer who has served HWA in an especially exemplary manner and has shown extraordinary dedication to the organization.
Congratulations to Sumiko!
Sumiko Saulson
Sumiko Saulson (they/them), Social Media Manager for the Horror Writers Association, is an award-winning author of Afrosurrealist and multicultural sci-fi and horror whose latest novel Happiness and Other Diseases (book one of the Metamorphoses of Flynn Keahi) is available on Mocha Memoirs Press. Other works include the non-fiction title 100+ Black Women in Horror Fiction, novels Solitude, Warmth, and Moon Cried Blood. Their short stories have appeared in numerous anthologies including Tales For The Campfire, Clockwork Wonderland, Tales From the Lake Vol 3, Beasts and Babes, Scierogenous 2, Colors In Darkness: Forever Vacancy, and Slay: Tales of the Vampire Noire. Their poetry has appeared in Infectious Hope, Siren’s Call Magazine, and HWA Poetry Showcase VII and VIII. They are the editor of the anthologies Black Magic Women (2018), Scry of Lust (2019), Wickedly Abled (2020) and Scry of Lust 2 (2021), and the collection Black Celebration. They are a comic zine maker and author/illustrator of the graphic novels/comic books Agrippa (2013), Dreamworlds (2016), and The Complete Mauskaveli (2020). They are the illustrator of Living a Lie (2015).
Winner of the Afrosurrealist Writers Award (2018), Grand Prize 2017 BCC Voice “Reframing the Other” contest, 2nd Place Carry The Light Sci-fi/Fantasy Award (2016), 2017 Mixy Award, 6th Place in the Next Great Horror Writers Contest (2017). They are the recipient of the 2002 STAND Grant for First Time Directors, 2016 HWA StokerCon “Scholarship from Hell”, 2018 Ara Joe Grant for Zinemakers, 2020 HWA Diversity Grant recipient, and 2021 Ladies in Horror Fiction grant.
Sumiko has an AA in English from Berkeley City College, writes a column called “Writing While Black” for a national Black Newspaper, the San Francisco BayView, writes for Search Magazine, is the host of the SOMA Leather and LGBT Cultural District’s “Erotic Storytelling Hour,” and teaches courses at the Speculative Fiction Academy.
THE SILVER HAMMER AWARD
The HWA is pleased to announce the winner of the Silver Hammer Award: Kevin J. Wetmore.
The HWA periodically gives the Silver Hammer Award to an HWA volunteer who has done a truly massive amount of work for the organization, often unsung and behind the scenes. It was instituted in 1996, and is decided by a vote of HWA’s Board of Trustees.
The award is so named because it represents the careful, steady, continuous work of building HWA’s “house” — the many institutional systems that keep the organization functioning on a day-to-day basis. The award itself is a chrome-plated hammer with an engraved plaque on the handle. The chrome hammer is also a satisfying allusion to The Beatles’ song, “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer”, a miniature horror story in itself.
Congratulations to Kevin!
Kevin J. Wetmore
Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr. is the author, editor or co-editor of twenty-seven books, including Bram Stoker Award nominees Uncovering Stranger Things, The Streaming of Hill House, Devil’s Advocates: The Conjuring, and Eaters of the Dead: Myths and Realities of Cannibal Monsters. He is also the author of over a hundred articles and three dozen short stories found in magazines and anthologies such as Cemetery Dance, Mothership Zeta, Nonbinary Review, Midian Unmade and The Cackle of Cthulhu. He is the co-chair of HWA’s Los Angeles Chapter, has twice co- chaired StokerCon and served as StokerCon’s volunteer coordinator, in addition to serving as curator for the HWA blog Halloween Haunts and chair of the Lifetime Achievement Award committee. In his other life he is a professor of Theatre Arts at Loyola Marymount University where he teaches horror theatre, horror cinema, Japanese theatre, African theatre, Shakespeare and stage combat.
MENTOR OF THE YEAR
The HWA is pleased to announce the winner of the Mentor of the Year Award: Michael Knost.
The HWA’s Mentor Program is available to all members of the organization. This popular program pairs a newer writer with an established professional for an intensive four-month long partnership. For new writers, the Program offers mentees a personal, one-on-one experience with a professional writer, tailor-made to help them grow in their writing and teach them how to better market their work. For experienced writers, the Program allows mentors a chance to pay forward the experience and encouragement other writers gave them when they were starting out. In addition, there is the added benefit of growing as a writer oneself through the act of teaching others. In short, the Program benefits all who participate, regardless of their roles.
Inaugurated in 2014, the Mentor of the Year Award recognizes one mentor in the Mentor Program who has done an outstanding job of helping newer writers. The award is chosen by the current chair of the Mentor Program.
Congratulations to Michael!
Michael Knost
“Michael Knost epitomizes what a mentor should be. He is always willing to help writers improve their craft, as both an HWA mentor and outside of the program, as both a teacher and an editor. Writers who have worked with him, or trained under him, universally praise Michael for his honesty, knowledge, and encouragement. This is probably recognition that is long overdue, but Michael’s contributions to the HWA, and the horror genre’s up-and-coming writers, has always been recognized and appreciated.” – JG Faherty, HWA Mentorship Program Manager.
Michael Knost is a Bram Stoker Award®-winning editor and author of science fiction, fantasy, horror, and supernatural thrillers. He has written in various genres and helmed multiple anthologies. He received the Horror Writers Association’s Silver Hammer Award in 2015 for his work as the organization’s mentorship chair. He also received the prestigious J.U.G. (Just Uncommonly Good) Award from West Virginia Writer’s Inc. His Return of the Mothman is currently being filmed as a movie adaption. He has taught writing classes and workshops at several colleges, conventions, online, and currently resides in Chapmanville, West Virginia with his wife, daughter, and a zombie goldfish.
BIO:Brian W. Matthews is the author of several books, including the popular Forever Man series. He’s also authored numerous short stories, the most recent of which have appeared in Weird Tales and Space & Time magazines. He has been a member of the Horror Writers Association since 2012 and has served as a trustee of the organization since 2020. Among his duties as a trustee, Brian has co-chaired three StokerCon® conventions, acts as the Bram Stoker Award® Show Coordinator, and organizes the Pitch Sessions for StokerCon. He has previously been awarded the Silver Hammer Award, now renamed the Karen Lansdale Silver Hammer Award.
Brian holds a graduate degree in clinical psychology and worked for twenty years as a therapist, primarily for children and adolescents. He currently works as a financial planner. He lives with his wife, Sue, in southeast Michigan.
“Words Wielded by Women” (Apex Magazine), Short Non-fiction, 2023
BIO: Carina Bissett is a writer, poet, and educator working primarily in the fields of dark fiction and fabulism. Her short fiction and poetry have been published in multiple journals and anthologies including Upon a Twice Time, Bitter Distillations: An Anthology of Poisonous Tales, Arterial Bloom, Gorgon: Stories of Emergence, Weird Dream Society, Hath No Fury, and the HWA Poetry Showcase Vol. V, VI, and VIII. She has also written stories set in shared worlds for RPGs at Green Ronin Publishing and Onyx Path Publishing. In addition to writing, she has edited several projects; the most recent is in the role as co-editor for Shadow Atlas: Dark Landscapes of the Americas. Bissett also teaches generative writing workshops at The Storied Imaginarium and works as a volunteer for the Horror Writers Association (HWA). In 2016, she won the HWA Scholarship, and in 2021, she was awarded the prestigious Silver Hammer Award. Her work has been nominated for several awards including the Pushcart Prize and the Sundress Publications Best of the Net. She can be found online at http://carinabissett.com.
