Let's Get Grim: Seeking Short Horror & Thriller Stories for October

We are at the brink of October, that time of wandering souls, Samhain and otherworldly vibes. Here at Ink & Oak, that means we are sending out a call to all you tortured souls and twisted Triangle-based writers to hit us with your finest flash fiction, micro-fiction, and short stories that bring out the dead, the undead, and all that occupies the liminal space between.

What We're Looking For

For this themed submission call, we want to read the horror and thriller pieces you’ve been shaping in anticipation of the spooky season. Send us your most unhinged narratives that are ready to walk around in the world. What thoughts keep you up at night? What unsolved mysteries have you in their grip? Take us on a trip to the deranged dark forest of your imagination, immerse us in the sensory details of the world you have so painstakingly built, and haunt us with characters bound to star in our nightmares for years to come. 

Search the recesses of your Google Drive, dust off your Desktop, or comb the cloud for your most chilling creations and send them our way. Immerse us in a foreboding landscape reeking of rot and subject us to ear-splitting screams that send our blood straight to our feet. Make us feel the texture of the torture meted out by your protagonist, every jut of the knife, each lash of the licorice black whip, all the vibrations of a power drill boring through bone. Do your worst and send us your strongest piece.

Don't Know Where to Start? Here Are 5 Horror Writing Prompts to Get You Going

1. Unidentified remains are found floating in the lake. How did they get there and who did they belong to?

2. Situate us on a first date gone gravely wrong. Think, I never should have swiped right. 

3. Give us a dystopian AI of your choice gone on a murder spree. Against whom or what does it have a personal vendetta and how has it chosen to eradicate its victims?

4. What secrets could these walls tell? Go beyond the obvious crematorium, morgue, or dungeon and give us a jump scare in a living room or a scullery maid haunting a pantry, wherever we least expect it. 

5. A funeral director is preparing the deceased’s body when something goes horribly sideways.

   
   

We welcome your strangest close encounters with extra-terrestrial life, all manifestations of monsters, and the harrowing haunts you devise for your victims, the readers.

Horror Stories That Will Spark Your Creativity

If you need more inspiration, check out these authors and stories:

1. Laird Barron, “The Beautiful Thing That Awaits Us All”

2. Nadia Bulkin, “Intertropical Convergence Zone”

3. Thomas Ligotti, “Gas Station Carnivals”

4. Caitlin Kiernan, “Agents of Dreamland”

5. John Langan, “Mother of Stone”

Submit Your Most Hair-Raising Short Story Today

If you enjoyed these stories or you have more recommendations to add, share them with us on Instagram at @inkoaklitmag. When you're ready to share your writing, visit our submissions page. We look forward to reading your sinister short stories.