Nightmare Magazine, Issue 165 (June 2026)

We’re biting into summer with original short fiction from Aishatu Ado (“What Grows Back”) and Izzy Wasserstein (“Patterns of Dentition in Transgender Adults”). Our Horror Lab originals include a flash piece (“NoMouth”) from Marianne Kirby and a poem (“Good Morning, Wolf—”) from Stephanie M. Wytovich. We also have the latest installment of our column on horror, “The H Word,” plus author spotlights with our authors, and a media review from Adam-Troy Castro.

Cover art by Joe Therasakdhi / Adobe Stock

Nightmare Magazine, Issue 165 (June 2026)

Editorial

Editorial: June 2026

by Wendy N. Wagner

Remember the first time you ever saw the Xenomorph’s mouth? Those silver, almost human-shaped teeth? The pooling saliva as the maw slowly opened, revealing not a tongue, but a projectile mouth-within-a-mouth? What kind of monster is so hungry it needs a mouth inside its mouth?

Publishes Online on 6/3

Fiction

What Grows Back

by Aishatu Ado

I have told this story before, and I will tell it again, and each telling grows more teeth. Sometimes thirty-four, thirty-six. Sometimes they multiply faster than your science allows, like every word you made me swallow coming back to bite you.

Publishes Online on 6/3

Author Spotlight

Author Spotlight: Aishatu Ado

by Clay Vermulm

It was absolutely intentional to not just critique the “traditional” three-act structure but to expose its inherent violence through the story’s very bones. For women like Mirlande, who is undocumented, Black, and Haitian, that very structure gaslights on a narrative level.

Publishes Online on 6/3

Fiction

NoMouth

by Marianne Kirby

The videos show people kissing. They press their mouths together and open their lips. Their tongues move, wet and intrusive, less like they are tasting each other than like they want to lay eggs in the protected throats of their lovers.

Publishes Online on 6/10

Nonfiction

The H Word: Horror Is the Metal of Books

by Chris Panatier

As I write from within the sidelined shadows where the horror genre lurks, I am reminded of the four hours I spent in that busted-ass, stinking shack. The people, the music. The communion. I think about the exploration we do as writers of horror.

Publishes Online on 6/10

Fiction

Patterns of Dentition in Transgender Adults

by Izzy Wasserstein

The dryer groans to life, then begins thumping ominously. Maddie, already halfway out of her building’s laundry room, swears under her breath. The machine grinds and shakes. She slams the stop button, trying not to think about what the landlord might charge.

Publishes Online on 6/17

Author Spotlight

Author Spotlight: Izzy Wasserstein

by Kevin Figueroa Quiñones

Many of the attacks aimed at trans people are aimed at removing us from public life. Banning us from restrooms (or forcing us into restrooms where we know we’ll be unsafe), taking away our drivers licenses, forcing us into the closet if we need passports . . .

Publishes Online on 6/17

Poetry

Good Morning, Wolf—

by Stephanie M. Wytovich

Your mouth is a red door of blossoming velvet. I knock three times, your belly skinned, an open tender thing. I peel back fur; your insides flower wet against my touch.

Publishes Online on 6/24

Nonfiction

Media Reviews: June 2026

by Adam-Troy Castro

Adam-Troy Castro compares and contrasts two March releases featuring sister protagonists and uber-wealthy Satanist villain: Ready or Not 2 and They Will Kill You. Find out which one has teeth!

Publishes Online on 6/24