Announcing the BRAVE NEW WEIRD Shortlist!

Tenebrous Press will release Brave New Weird: The Best New Weird Horror of 2022, on February 6, 2023.

Without further ado, we hereby announce the first annual Brave New Weird Award shortlist!

Authors, please note!

Being on this list entitles you to say you are “a BNW-nominated author” or “the author of BNW-nominated (STORY TITLE)” or “an award-nominated author”.

Being on this list DOES NOT entitle you to say you or your story have won the BNW award, which will be the next phase of selection.

Only the winning stories will be reprinted in the Brave New Weird anthology. The nominated stories that don’t win, along with their authors and venues, will still be honorably mentioned in the book. We don’t need any rights in order to mention stories, so we will only be reaching out to confirm reprint rights availability to our potential winners.

How we determined this list:

We define New Weird Horror as a Horror subgenre focused on progress, creatively capturing themes and questions that bleed into fiction straight from the modern reader's life and future. It acts as a challenge to break new ground in terms of form and content and to engage with the unknown. Beyond that, New Weird Horror will be defined by the winning pieces themselves.

List is as follows: AUTHOR - ORIGINAL PUBLICATION - STORY TITLE

A. P. Howell - Dread Space - Used Armor Smell

Alex Kingsley - Radon Journal - This Is Not A Place of Honor

Bitter Karella - Seize the Press magazine - Low Tide Jenny

Brian Evenson and Chris Kelso - 3-Lobed Burning Eye - Jenny Longlegs

Briar Ripley Page - The Book Of Queer Saints - Therianthrope

Cadwell Turnbull - Many Worlds- Notes on the Forum of the Simulacra

Caitlin Marceau - Phantasmagoria Magazine Issue 20 - Tabula Rasa

Carson Winter - Apex Magazine -In Haskins

Charlotte Ariel Finn - Radon Journal - User Warning

Christi Nogle - Vastarien - She Ain't Stoppin'

Colleen Anderson - Radon Journal #2 - Machine (r)Evolution

Emily Rigole - Pseudopod - The Bear Across the Way

Ephiny Gale - The Dread Machine - Rewind

Erin Brown - FIYAH Magazine #22 - A Brief and Hideous Scrawl

Eugenia Triantafyllou - khōréō - Tomatoes

H.V. Patterson - Monstroddities anthology from Sliced up Press - Mother; Microbes

Hailey Piper - Cosmic Horror Monthly - Parasites of Silver and Gold

Isha Karki - khōréō - Skin

J. C. Changmore - khōréō - The Scumbling

J.A.W. McCarthy - Shredded: A Sports & Fitness Body Horror Anthology - Our Perpetual Intention

James Bennett - The Dark magazine - Ídolo

Jennifer Jeanne McArdle - Bear Creek Gazette Issue 10 - The Mules

Jennifer Lee Rossman - The Arcanist - Darken The Corners Of My Mind

Joe Koch - Convulsive - Blood Calumny

Jolie Toomajan - Death in the Mouth - Water Goes, Sand Remains

jonah wu - Los Suelos Anthology - There Is No Easy Way Towards Earth

Karlo Yeager Rodriguez - Pseudopod - Got Your Nose

Kirstyn McDermott - Weird Horror 5 - Lemmings

K.W. Colyard - Seize The Press Magazine - Those Who Forget and Those Who Perish

K. J. Shepherd - 206 Word Stories by Bag of Bones Press - The Horror of Oz

L. Marie Wood - Something Scary Podcast - Hypnopompia

LC von Hessen - Vastarien Volume 4, Issue 2 - The Accursed Manor of the Mirrorlands

Luciano Marano - Nightscript: Volume 8 - The Mythologization of Tymber Prescott in Five Selected Photos

M. A. Blanchard - PseudoPod - The Bleak Communion of Abandoned Things

M. E. Bronstein - khōréō magazine - Banhus

M. Shaw - Apex Magazine - The Cure for Loneliness

Mae Murray - Shortwave Publishing - The Imperfection

Maggie Nerz Iribarne - Halloween Frights and 100 Word Fiction - The Neighborhood Picnic

Maura Yzmore - Wyldblood Press: Wyld Flash - Barry

Michael Bettendorf - Ghost Orchid Press - Hummingbird Whispers

Morgan Melhuish - Annus Horribilis - Bag of Bones Press Ignition

Nikki R. Leigh - The Book of Queer Saints - Stage Five Clinger

Perry Ruhland - Baffling - Brighter Than Stars

Riley Tao - Seize The Press Magazine - What It's Like

RJ Joseph - Dark Dispatch, Winter 2022 - Suffer the Little Children

Sam Richard - Grief Rituals - Strømtatt

Samir Sirk Morató - The Dark Sire Literary Journal - Stand Not At Your Grave

Saoirse Ní Chiaragáin - Tales to Terrify podcast - Murmuration

Sergey Gerasimov - Apex Magazine - The Day When the Last War Is Over

Sloane Leong - Death in the Mouth: Original Horror from People of Color - Paradise

Sofia Ajram - Lost Contact - The Arborglyph

Sonia Sulaiman - Seize The Press Magazine - What the Ghouleh Said on Thursday of the Dead

Sonora Taylor - Chromophobia: A Strangehouse Anthology of Women in Horror - Eat Your Colors

Stésh - Wrongdoing Magazine - Eater

Tania Chen - Baffling Magazine - En el Patio de la Casa del Callejón

Tehnuka - Hennepin Review - I Welcome the Ant Colonies in Our House

Teika Marija Smits - ParSec - Umbilical

Warren Benedetto - The Dread Machine - Blame

Wendy N. Wagner - Vastarien - Halogen Sky

Zoe Kaplan - Horror Library Volume 7 - The Test

The final Table of Contents for Brave New Weird will be released December 1, 2022.

Edited by Alex Woodroe, Brave New Weird is out February 6, 2023.

***Update; Submissions Now Closed*** The BRAVE NEW WEIRD Awards are coming; Anthology submissions open Oct. 1, 2022!

PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED WORKS ONLY.

art by Matt Blairstone

Tenebrous Press presents the inaugural Brave New Weird Awards—to reward and further this unique blend of genres—and its accompanying Brave New Weird: the Best New Weird Horror of the Year anthology series, showcasing the winners of each year, care of editor Alex Woodroe.

We define New Weird Horror as a Horror subgenre focused on progress, creatively capturing themes and questions that bleed into fiction straight from the modern reader's life and future. It acts as a challenge to break new ground in terms of form and content and to engage with the unknown. Beyond that, New Weird Horror will be defined by the winning pieces themselves.

Buzzwords: speculative; eclectic; horror-centric but genre-blended; progressive and innovative in terms of content, social themes, form, or voice; concept-driven.

Does this sound like your writing? Submit your previously published work to the New Weird Horror Awards today!

Disclaimer: 

Tenebrous is a young press looking to have fun in the world of Horror and build a community of like-minded peers. We’re not claiming this award will wow your dream agent or single-handedly sell your book. It’s a way to showcase reprints that we love in a genre that we care about, and get them into the hands of more readers—no fuss, no lobbying, no hidden costs.

Eligibility: 

Any previously published piece of short fiction under 7.499 words originally published in the English language within the eligibility period.

You may submit NARRATIVE poems only; poems will be judged on their storytelling.

Stories published in other languages are welcome if there is an English translation available.

Reprints of stories originally published before the eligibility period are not eligible.

Any work published through Tenebrous Press, or independently edited by Alex Woodroe or Matt Blairstone, is not eligible. We already think you're awesome, regardless.

If you are unsure of the genre of your story, as long as it’s dark, speculative, and eligible, send it in.

Eligibility period: 

Works published between the 1st of November 2021 and the 31st of October 2022 will be considered for the Best New Weird Horror of 2022. 

Simply: If it's published before Halloween, it competes for this year's award. If it's published after Halloween, it competes for next year's award.

Final submission deadline for this year's award: November 1st, 2022. Send ARCS if necessary to get the submission in on time.

Response: 

We will not send out rejections for this project. 

Instead, if we want to award & feature your story, we will reach out to you. There will be a published shortlist, and the shortlisted works that don’t end up being featured will still be mentioned & advertised in the anthology. Final decisions will be made before the end of the year.

Results:

Selected authors will be asked to sign a non-exclusive contract allowing their reprint to be featured. 

A reprint payment of $25 + two paperback copies + one award certificate will be given to the selected authors.

How to submit: 

Submit individual short stories as a .doc or .docx

Each author may submit up to five of their short stories. Each publisher may submit up to five of their published short stories. Electronic submissions only. Submit your work via our handy form here, using a new form for each story (FORM WILL OPEN OCTOBER 1st).  

Authors: Be sure your contract stipulates you are allowed to participate in Best Of anthologies, or ask permission from your publisher BEFORE submitting. 

Publishers/editors: Be sure your authors give you permission to submit their work before submitting.

Other rules: 

You may speak about this award, submitting to this award, and being shortlisted for this award, in any way you like. 

You may have multiple submissions of the same author/publisher; up to five (see above).

If we missed anything, drop us a line or DM!

***submissions are now closed. thank you***

CROM CRUACH preorder bundles now on sale, for a limited time only!

Note: If you would like to order the standard book, those preorders will open on Monday, August 29. This update is for the preorder bundle offer only.

Tenebrous Press’ next—and final—release of 2022, CROM CRUACH, a New Weird Horror novella-in-verse, is out 9/22! To celebrate, we’ve put together a special package that will only be available for two weeks: Monday August 15-Sunday August 28.

Package includes:

• CROM CRUACH novella featuring exclusive "naked" cover art (no press markings, insignia, etc)

• T-shirt featuring Jonathan LaMantia's stunning cover art (multiple color/size/style options available)

• official CROM CRUACH digital soundtrack, a dark ambient album composed by author Valkyrie Loughcrewe and collaborators Blood and Dust (soundtrack to be delivered in both MP3 and FLAC formats). Sample 1 Sample 2

• high quality vinyl 3"x4" sticker

• Each preorder package will also include a unique, hand-drawn, hand-cut bookmark by cover artist LaMantia *while supplies last*.

CROM CRUACH limited-time bundles available here to order now!

About CROM CRUACH:

A family is found slaughtered in their home, yet their corpses still move; committed to the routine of their daily lives, heedless of their own grisly deaths. A local occultist commune is suspected of the crime. The bloody legacy of Catholicism and the dark roots of ancient paganism intertwine in the aftermath of a recent national revolution. Welcome to the Ireland of tomorrow. 

Two ex-Gardai officers, a former Franciscan monk and a young trans woman race to determine the cause of the slayings before tensions in the community boil over and kick off a new Satanic Panic, driving the tenuous fledgling nation back into the arms of the Church.

CROM CRUACH is a distinctly Irish anxiety piece about the reluctant future and repressed past of a country trying to shrug off the shackles of colonialism, wrapped in the shiny black leather of Giallo and written in a poetic style fit for the fog-shrouded mysticism of the emerald isle.

Featuring interior illustrations by Echo Echo, plus additional supplementary material designed by Dewi Hargreaves, Matt Blairstone and Val Loughcrewe.

Praise for CROM CRUACH:

"Loughcrewe plunges their readers head first into a skillful mix of folkloric, speculative and human horror. CROM CRUACH left me breathless at every turn, afraid to turn the page, afraid not to. It's not hyperbole to say I finished this novella with my mouth hanging open, my heart alight with horror and my mind afire with possibility. An incredible read, not to be missed."

• Laurel Hightower, author of Crossroads and Below

“Loughcrewe's CROM CRUACH startled me. We might need to invent a new genre for them, like Anarcho-Folk Splatter or Lyrical Black-Metal Horror. If you don't want to read a novella-length poem mixing ancient occult horror with modern communal politics that's efficiently and viscerally detailed in glorious lines like, ‘Lynda was missing her head, Cora, and she was singing,’ well then, I really don't know how to help you.”

• Joe Koch, author of The Wingspan of Severed Hands

RIYL:

The films of Lucio Fulci & Dario Argento

Occult/Supernatural

Alternate History

Folk Horror

Irish Mythology

LGBTQA+

About the Author:

Valkyrie Loughcrewe lives in a bog, and is currently working on something gory and crawling with nightmare creatures. Whatever you do, don't look them up on Twitter—in fact, don't look anyone up on Twitter. Start raising homing pigeons! 

Val also makes diabolical industrial electro music under the name Surgeryhead and gnarly death thrash metal as Argento!

Order the CROM CRUACH preorder bundle here; only available until 28 August.

Tenebrous Press is open for Novella Submissions (and artists!)

Well, like the headline says:

Tenebrous Press is open for novella submissions August 1st- August 31st, 2022.

Nuts and Bolts

Word Count: 20,000-50,000

Submissions Deadline: Wednesday, August 31st, where the final bell tolls

Payment: Modest advance + Industry standard royalties

Reprints: No

Simultaneous Submissions: Yes

Target Age Group: Mature Audiences

Tenebrous Press embraces the notion of New Weird Horror (what does that mean? We’re so glad you asked!) 

Things That Give Us the Creeps…in all the best ways:

• Concept-forward stories that nod to the past but embrace progress.

• Weird Cosmic, Folk Horror, Cult Creeps, Escape Rooms, Body Horror, Eco Horror, Sci-Horror, Horromance, Gothics in space, and any other genre splice you can think of that's fresh and sufficiently Weird. In fact, if it’s something we hadn’t thought of at all, that’s even better.

• New voices, experimental storytelling, rich characterization, buried secrets, drama, ethical and moral dilemmas, philosophy and theology, crisis and identity.

Make certain your work has been critiqued, edited, and proofed to the best of your ability. If it isn't quite ready: please don’t submit now (and don't panic! We do this regularly.)

We aim to reply to each submission within four weeks of the window closing.

Submit your work here.

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In addition to opening for novella submissions:

We’re looking to increase our stable of visual artists as well! If you’re familiar with Tenebrous releases, then you’ve seen that we put a lot of thought into their design, cover art, and interior illustrations. We work methodically to pair the right visuals with each story, and we have some exceptional creators we adore working with. 

And now, we’d like to find some more. We’re looking for both potential cover artists as well as interior illustrators, so we’re keen to see both color and B&W art. 

If this is you—and you dig what Tenebrous is all about—email the following info to tenebrouspress@gmail.com:

• Links to your online portfolio(s), as well as your dominant social media link(s). 

• Specify whether you’re interested in interior art, cover art, or both.

• Give us at least a loose window of your price range. We understand that specifics are negotiated on a per-project basis, but without even a vague price range, we won’t be able to find the right fit & reach out to you.

• Do you do sequential art as well? Let us know, we’re always interested in that info for potential projects down the road!