Nightmare Magazine

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Fiction

Fiction

Wait, Our Lord the Flayed One Comes

by Tania Chen

This piece was one of my Clarion West Workshop stories, for one of the days we issued a challenge in the group to write something erotic for a particular week (shout out to Samit for being amazing during “Chaos week”) and this was the result of it.

In Dec. 2024 (Issue 147)

Fiction

Amelia’s Story

by Adam-Troy Castro

Author spotlight

Early Wednesday morning, after a long weekend devoted to the search for her, twelve-year-old Amelia is spotted wandering home on the main highway out of town. She has at that point been missing since the previous Friday.

In Dec. 2024 (Issue 147)

Fiction

A Guide for Your Journey to the Green Hills

by R. K. Duncan

It’s a little difficult for me to think about the initial process of this piece because I’ve continued to think about it quite a lot since initially writing it, to the point where it’s now the kernel of a someday novel project about occupation by a victorious fairyland.

In Nov. 2024 (Issue 146)

Fiction

Moon Rabbit Song

by Caroline Hung

Author spotlight

The skies are a pitch-black void—cold, empty, unforgiving. Far from home, the rivers of heaven have run dry, the starlight scarce in this part of Father’s empire. Passing comets die out with a pathetic fizzle, and the migrating flocks of magpies care not to bridge the gap between star-crossed lovers.

In Nov. 2024 (Issue 146)

Fiction

She Sheds Her Skin

by Raven Jakubowski

Author spotlight

Cora has left her skin lying out again. It’s the first thing I see when come in. Open the door, hang up my coat, kick off my heels, turn on the lamp, and there it is, slouched in the mid-century chair by the ratty sofa. Her empty skin, deflated, black sockets staring at me.

In Nov. 2024 (Issue 146)

Fiction

NotRob

by Isabel Cañas

When my daughter was a newborn, I found I only had the attention span to write micro and flash; I wrote a lot of it. I was also sleeping very little at night and crashed most afternoons, which for me is when the weirdest dreams happen. “NotRob” was one of them.

In Oct. 2024 (Issue 145)

Fiction

Perfect Water

by Simon Gilbert

Author spotlight

Something tells you this two-pump station isn’t a contactless kind of place. Google Maps gave up the ghost several miles ago. You go inside and pay in cash. Diolch, you add, your one word of Welsh; the cashier replies with something you don’t follow.

In Oct. 2024 (Issue 145)

Fiction

Little Horn

by Gemma Files

Author spotlight

This whole business, it all started right about when I burned my church down. Not one I went to, or ministered at—I mean the one built around me, raised by my very own personal worshippers, so they could do their sacrificial reverence to me in private.

In Oct. 2024 (Issue 145)

Fiction

House of the Hidden Moon

by Sam W. Pisciotta

Author spotlight

My mother sits at the kitchen table in the moonlight, gazing at her folded hands. “Has your father returned with Lilah?” “You know he hasn’t.” The tremor she had before she died is gone. A tube runs from the oxygen unit, through her laced fingers, and up into her nostrils.

In Sept. 2024 (Issue 144)

Fiction

What Happened to the Crooners

by Russell Nichols

Author spotlight

On an unmarked road somewhere in the Appalachians, a midnight blue Cadillac rolled to a stop, gravel popping under tires, headlights peering out into the discord of dusk. Outside the car, in the shadowy thicket, cicadas and crickets hollered.

In Sept. 2024 (Issue 144)

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