45 Black Men in Horror – Part 1
As you probably know, 60 Black Women in Horror and 100+ Black Women in Horror started out as a series on this very blog back in 2013. It was a series of three blogs, 20 Black Women in Horror, 20 More Black Women in Horror, and 20 Black Women in Horror 3. It just kept getting bigger and bigger until it eventually became the book 60 Black Women in Horror. Then, 80 Black Women in Horror. And finally, 100+ Black Women in Horror. Linda D Addison has been saying since 2018 that someone needs to do a list of black men in horror. A couple nights ago when we were recording a panel on curating diverse anthologies, she brought it up again. And I committed to putting together a list. Currently, I have 45 men on the list, which I will be publishing as a series on this blog for February – Black Heritage Month. Each post will list 15 writers. Find them all here: List 1, List 2, and List 3.
- Steven Van Patten
Co-authored the short story collection Hell At The Way Station with Marc Abbott (Laughing Black Vampire Productions) (2018) and has short stories in the horror anthologies Hell’s Kitties, Shopping List 4, and the Stoker Award nominated New York State of Fright. Winner of the African-African-American Literary Awards (2019) for Hell At The Way Station (Best Anthology and Best In Science Fiction) and for Best Independent Publisher. He’s also written episodes of the YouTube series’, Extra Credit/Extra Mythology, and is a contributor for the Viral Vignettes, a charity-driven YouTube comedy series benefitting The Actor’s Fund. He uses his full name on Facebook but goes by @svpthinks on Twitter and Instagram and can be found online at https://brookwaterscurse.com/
- Maurice Carlos Ruffin
Maurice Carlos Ruffin is the author of We Cast a Shadow, which was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award, the PEN/Open Book Award, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and International Dublin Literary Award. A recipient of an Iowa Review Award in fiction, he has been published in the Virginia Quarterly Review, AGNI, the Kenyon Review, The Massachusetts Review, and Unfathomable City: A New Orleans Atlas. A native of New Orleans, he is a graduate of the University of New Orleans Creative Writing Workshop and a member of the Peauxdunque Writers Alliance and can be found online at https://mauricecarlosruffin.com/
- Victor LaValle
Victor LaValle is the author of the short story collection Slapboxing with Jesus, four novels, The Ecstatic, Big Machine, The Devil in Silver, and The Changeling and two novellas, Lucretia and the Kroons and The Ballad of Black Tom. He is also the creator and writer of two comic books Victor LaValle’s Destroyer and Eve. His fantasy-horror novella The Ballad of Black Tom won the 2016 Shirley Jackson Award for best novella and was nominated for a Bram Stoker Award that year. He won a Stoker for Long Fiction for Up from Slavery (Weird Tales Magazine#363) (Weird Tales Inc.) in 2019 and a Stoker in the Graphic Novel category in 2018 for Victor LaValle’s Destroyer (BOOM! Studios). He can be found online at http://www.victorlavalle.com/
- Marc Abbott
The author of the novel A Gamble of Faith (2004), YA fiction novel The Hooky Party (2007) children’s book Etienne and the Star Dust Express (2012), speculative fiction author began writing horror in 2013. He has numerous published short stories in the genre, including “Welcome to Brooklyn, Gabe” in the Bram Stoker nominated anthology New York State of Fright and “A Marked Man” in the Hell’s Heart horror anthology. He co-authored Hell at the Way Station (2019) with Steven Van Patten. It won two African American Literary Awards (Best Anthology/Best Science Fiction). A sequel Hell at Brooklyn Tea“ was released in 2021. He is a Moth Story Slam and Grand Slam winner and curator of a monthly storytelling open mic called Maaan, You’ve Got To Hear This! He can be found online at https://whoismarclabbott.com/
- Nzondi (Ace Antonio Hall)
Ace Antonio Hall a.k.a. Nzondi, is a Bram Stoker Awards-winning urban fantasy and horror writer best known for his post-apocalyptic novel, Oware Mosaic (2019), a Bram Stoker Winner for Best Young Adult Novel. He is the first African American to have won a Stoker in any novel category. Ace’s novel, Confessions of Sylva Slasher (2013) was published by Montag Press, and a non-fiction book, Lord of the Flies: Fitness for Writers was published by Omnium Gatherum / OG Writer’s Guides. Hisnovel Lipstick Asylum (2021) was published by Omnium Gatherum. Hall is a two-time Honorable Mention winner of the Writers and Illustrators of the Future Award. Among his many short stories published in anthologies and print magazines, Hall’s short story, “Raising Mary: Frankenstein,” was nominated for 2016 horror story of the year for the 19th Annual Editors and Preditors Readers Poll. Follow Nzondi on his social media platforms @Nzondi3 on Twitter or as Ace Antonio Hall on Instagram and Facebook. He can be found online at https://www.aantoniohall.com/
- P. Djèlí Clark
Phenderson Djéli Clark is the award winning and Hugo, Nebula, Sturgeon, and World Fantasy nominated author of the novel A Master of Djinn, and the novellas Ring Shout, The Black God’s Drums and The Haunting of Tram Car 015. His stories have appeared in online venues such as Tor.com, Daily Science Fiction, Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, Apex, Lightspeed, Fireside Fiction, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, and in print anthologies including, Griots, Hidden Youth, and Clockwork Cairo. He is a founding member of FIYAH Literary Magazine and an infrequent reviewer at Strange Horizons. He is a well-rounded speculative fiction author, and horror is firmly within his wheelhouse. Ring Shout is a work of historical horror that pits monster hunter Maryse against a thoroughly demonic filter Klu Klux Klan. Even more traditionally fantasy works like A Master of Djinn frequently cross over into the realm of the supernatural. He can be found online at https://pdjeliclark.com/
- Samuel R. Delany
Samuel Delany is best known for his science fiction novels, and the first African American writer to achieve commercial success in the genre. He also writes fantasy, and horror. Delaney’s dark apocalyptic landscape in the often eerie and unnerving Dhalgren incorporates elements of dark fantasy and the sci-fi horror genre. His controversial horror novel Hogg was once banned due to its over-the-top depiction of gut-wrenching violence, and disturbing sexual content, but some consider it a pointed critique of hypermasculinity and violence in America culture. He won his first Nebula award for Babel-17 in 1996, and went on to win another three Nebula awards and two Hugo Awards in his lifetime. Delany, who is gay, has also won the Stonewall Book Award and the Lambda Literary Award, two awards for excellence in LGBTQ Fiction. He can be found online at https://www.samueldelany.com/
- Walter R Mosley
Walter Mosley is the author of the bestselling mystery series featuring Easy Rawlins, as well as numerous other works, from literary fiction and science fiction to a young adult novel and political monographs. His sci-fi horror novel Blue Light (1998), and there are notes of horror in the mystery/thriller The Man in My Basement. His short fiction has been widely published, and his nonfiction has appeared in the New York Times Magazine and the Nation, among other publications. Mosley is the winner of numerous awards, including an O. Henry Award, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, a Grammy, and PEN America’s Lifetime Achievement Award. He can be found online at https://www.waltermosley.com/
- Jordan Peele
Screenwriter Jordan Peele was the first African American to win an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, for Get Out (2017). He’s won two Bram Stoker Awards for screenwriting, for Get Out (2017) and Us (2019), and was the first African American to win in that category, as well as the first African American man to win a Stoker in any category.The groundbreaking screenplay for Get Out also won the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Original Screenplay, and was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Original Screenplay. Peele co-produced and co-wrote the 2021 sequel to Candyman. He wrote the screenplay for Nope (2022), and Wendell and Wild (2022). He also wrote the episode “Downtime” (2019) for the new Twilight Zone television series. He can be found online at https://www.monkeypawproductions.com/
- Jamal James Hodge
Jamal James Hodge is the award-winning horror screenwriter and poet. Among his screenplays are Licker, winner ScreenPlay.com Contest, finalist Boobs and Blood festival, semifinalist New York Horror Film Festival; All The Children Are Inside, winner of the 13Horror.com screenplay and film contest, Mourning Meal, winner of the Los Angeles Film Awards for Best Screenplay. New York Film Festival Best Unproduced Screenplay, and 13Horror.com screenplay and film contest. His poem “Loving Venus” appeared in the 2022 Rhysling Anthology. His poetry appears in Chiral Mad 5, the historical all-black issue of Star*line Magazine (issue 43.4), Space And Time Magazine, Penumbric Speculative Fiction Magazine, and the 2021 Horror Writer Association Poetry Showcase. He can be found online at https://www.writerhodge.com/
- Steven Barnes
Steven Barnes is a New York Times bestselling author, screenwriter and educator who has written more than thirty science fiction, fantasy, and horror novels. He is an NAACP Image Award winner and is also a pioneering television writer who has written for The Outer Limits (Showtime), The New Twilight Zone (Showtime), Stargate SG-1, Andromeda, and Ben 10: Alien Force. He has been nominated for Hugo, Nebula and Cable Ace Awards. Barnes has lectured at UCLA, Mensa, Pasadena JPL, taught at Seattle University, hosted the “Hour 25” radio show on KPFK, been Kung Fu columnist for Black Belt Magazine, and been a “Starred Speaker” at the L.A. Screenwriting Expo. An avid yogi and martial artist with three black belts, Steven is also a pioneer in the human potential movement, creating the groundbreaking “Lifewriting” creativity system, making writers the heroes of their own stories. He can be found online at https://stevenbarneslife.com/
- Michael Boatman
Michael Boatman is a screenwriter and novelist who writes in the splatterpunk horror genre, among others. His books include God Laughs When You Die (2007), Last God Standing (2014), Revenant Road (2009), Who Wants to be The Prince of Darkness? (2016), Her Daughter In Darkness (2008), The Pleasure of Pain (2009), The Sisterhood of Shadows (2011), and Lords of Justice. His short stories have appeared in Sick Things: An Anthology of Extreme Creature Horror, Until Someone Loses an Eye, Sages and Swords, Badass Horror, Christmas in Hell and Dominion: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction From Africa and the African Diaspora. He has been published in Weird Tales, Horror Garage and Red Scream. He introduced Cyber-Pulp Halloween 3.0 which was published by Cyber-pulp Books. “His Born Again” from Eulogies II: Tales From the Cellar received an Honorable Mention from Ellen Datlow in The Best Horror of the Year: Volume Six. His first collection of short stories, God Laughs When You Die, was published by Dybbuk Press on October 23, 2007. His humorous horror novel, The Revenant Road, was published by Drollerie Press in 2009. Find him online at https://www.fantasticfiction.com/b/michael-boatman/
- Maurice Broaddus
Speculative fiction author Maurice Broaddus edited (with Jerry Gordon) the horror anthology Dark Faith. He also coedited the “People of Colo(u)r Destroy Horror” special issue of Nightmare magazine. He is a community organizer and teacher, his work has appeared in places like Lightspeed Magazine, Black Panther: Tales from Wakanda, Weird Tales, Magazine of F&SF, and Uncanny Magazine, with some of his stories having been collected in The Voices of Martyrs. His books include the sci-fi novel Sweep of Stars; the steampunk works, Buffalo Soldier and Pimp My Airship; and the middle grade detective novels, The Usual Suspects and Unfadeable. His project, Sorcerers, is being adapted as a television show for AMC. He’s an editor at Apex Magazine. Find him online at http://mauricebroaddus.com/
- Jeff Carroll
Jeff Carroll writes hip-hop horror, sci/fi and fantasy stories with action and a social edge. His novels include Rasheeda The Zombie Killer, Thug Angel: Rebirth of a Gargoyle, It Happened On Negro Mountain, The Harlem Shake: Escape from Everyworld, The Harlem Shake: Survivor’s Work, The Harlem Shake: Nowhere to Run, Welcome to Boss Lady’s Planet, WtBLP2: What People Will Quietly Submit To, and Gold Digger Killer. His short stories have appeared in the anthologies Missippippi Zombie, Scierogenous, Rococoa, The Black Science Fiction Society Anthology and The City: A Cyberfunk Anthology. He also wrote a short story collection, Sci-fi Streetz: The Book of Hip Hop Sci-fi Stories. aJeff produces The Monster Panel, a traveling sci-fi panel which features writers of color in a lively discussion of comic books, movies and Black people. Find him online at https://twitter.com/coachyojeff
- Zig Zag Claybourne
Sci-fi author Zig Zag Claybourne often injects a bit of whimsy and humor into his writing. The same holds true when he writes horror. For example, his short story collection Historical Inaccuracies includes stories about dream factories afraid of the dark, charlatans, inquisitors, barbarian Smurfs, the reincarnation of lazy Americans, and British devil babies. His books include The Brothers Jetstream: Leviathan, TBJ 2: Afro Puffs Are the Antennae of the Universe, Conversations With Idras: A Satire, His works have appeared in the anthologies Alt.History 101, Cult Classics for the Modern Cult, UnCommon Origins: A Collection of Gods, Monsters, Nature, and Science; Rococoa, and Cyberfunk. His stories and essays on sci fi, fandom, and life have appeared in Apex, Galaxy’s Edge, GigaNotosaurus, Strange Horizons and more. Follow him on Twitter @ZZClaybourne. Find him online at http://writeonrighton.com/index.html
Sumiko Saulson 