October Screams: A Halloween Anthology (2023) edited by Kenneth W. Cain

An indispensable horror anthology

Readers unfamiliar with October Screams may prefer to read these notes only after reading the anthology.

October Screams is a strong collection of Halloween-related horror stories. The writing and narrative ingenuity are at a consistently high level. Below are notes, excerpts, and keywords prompted by the stories.

---

"Sweetmeat" by Clay McLeod Chapman

• Plot: Sweetmeat, addiction, Halloween, transformation, craving, father-son, overdose, neighbors, rejection, obsession

• Setting: Halloween night, suburban neighborhood, family home

• Character: Jasper, father, neighbors

• Location: House, neighborhood, street

• Coming of Age? What else?

If the theory of the death drive was expressed in a short story.

---

"The Magic Trick" by Gregory L. Norris

• Plot: Magic trick, childhood friendship, parental abuse, escape, disappearance, Halloween, grief, ghosts

• Setting: 1960s, rural town, bungalow, abandoned farmhouse, woods

• Character: Narrator, Warren, Warren's father, mother, policeman

• Location: Narrator's house, Warren's house, abandoned farmhouse, woods, bus stop

• Tone: Wistful, elegiac, Straubian

---

"The Treat-or-Tricker" by Evans Light

• Plot: Halloween, trick-or-treat, late-night visitor, costume, candy, death, topsy-turvy

• Setting: Halloween night, suburban neighborhood, man's house

• Character: Man, boy

• Location: Porch, house

Parents yearly warn their trick-or-treaters about booby-trapped or poisoned candy. And about child predators. In the superb story "The Treat-or-Tricker" by Evans Light, no one warns grownups about… 

You'll just have to read it.