Horror & Sci-Fi Chronicles
Vol 1 Issue No. 16: June 2025
Quick Hits
New Book Releases:
“Portraits of Decay” by Carson Winter - A chilling collection of supernatural horror stories.
“The Farm House” by Chelsea Conradt - When Emily Hauk's mother dies, it's time for her and her husband, Josh, to finally leave San Francisco. A farm in rural Nebraska is everything they want for a fresh start, but the deeper Emily digs, the more stories she finds of women with a connection to her new home who've met their own dark ends.
“House of Harrow” by Cassandra Celia - Witch‑focused horror story, with cursed rituals and dark magic
“The Witch Roads” by Kate Elliott - A fantasy journey through haunted towns, royalty, and political intrigue
New Movie Releases:
28 Years Later - Danny Boyle brings back the pulse-pounding infected apocalypse—with new cast (Jodie Comer, Ralph Fiennes) and deeper themes of survival, memory, and social decay
Man Finds Tape - An Austin-shot mockumentary from filmmakers Paul Gandersman & Peter Hall about a mysterious viral tape disrupting a sleepy Texas town.
Dangerous Animals - Shark‑obsessed serial killer? You read that right. A creepy mash‑up of creature feature and thriller.
Top 10 List: Sci-Fi Horror Novels
In-depth exploration of a specific theme, trope, or topic:
Cosmic Isolation — The Horror of a Silent Universe
Overview
The Fermi Paradox poses a chilling question: if the universe is so vast and ancient, where are all the aliens?
In sci-fi, this mystery is more than academic—it becomes existential dread. What if the silence isn't accidental? What if we’re alone for a reason… or being kept alone?
This topic blends cosmic horror, astrobiology, and existential philosophy. It's where sci-fi stops being about spaceships and starts becoming about meaning, fear, and isolation on a galactic scale.
Notable Sci-Fi Explorations
“Contact” by Carl Sagan - Explores the hope and tension of first contact—then flips it to ask: what if we’re not ready?
“The Three-Body Problem” by Liu Cixin - Offers the “Dark Forest Theory”: all civilizations remain silent because broadcasting your existence risks total annihilation.
“Annihilation” by Jeff VanderMeer - An alien presence lands… but says nothing. It mutates, mimics, and absorbs. Is it communication, or indifference?
“2001: A Space Odyssey” by Arthur C. Clarke - A mysterious alien monolith suggests we were visited long ago—but it remains silent, inert, and judgmental.
Core Themes
Cosmic Horror: The universe doesn’t care if we live or die. That’s scarier than an invasion.
Isolation as Punishment: Maybe we’re quarantined. Maybe we’re the threat.
The Risk of Contact: Should we scream into the void—or be grateful no one answered?
Final Thought
Cosmic isolation in sci-fi strips away the fantasy of interstellar community and leaves us with a cold mirror. It forces us to confront a possibility more terrifying than invasion: that we are absolutely, utterly alone.
Industry Analysis & Insights on New Trends:
Tech Controversy
AI encroachment: Industry backlash is growing over creative roles being replaced—or “in the pipeline.” Debate is intensifying about maintaining artistic integrity as studios adopt AI solutions.
On‑set virtual production boom: LED-volume tech is expanding rapidly, offering streamlined effects and location flexibility—now a staple in sci‑fi/horror shoots.
Techno‑horror 2.0: The resurgence of fear rooted in AI, VR, smart tech gone awry—M3GAN 2.0 is emblematic of this new wave.
Tech as a creative double-edged sword: LED volumes and AI tools are boosting production but also threatening artistic roles and creative authenticity.
Weekly Quiz: What Kind of Ghost Are You?
Choose the answer that best fits you for each question.
1. How did you die?
A) Betrayed by a lover
B) In battle or while protecting someone
C) Unknown—no one even noticed
D) A ritual gone wrong
E) You’re not sure… maybe you’re still alive?
2. Where would your spirit linger?
A) An old Victorian manor
B) A war-torn battlefield
C) A crumbling insane asylum
D) A hidden forest or ancient ruin
E) Inside someone else’s mind
3. What emotion dominates your afterlife?
A) Sorrow
B) Rage
C) Despair
D) Vengeance
E) Curiosity
4. Pick a sound that matches your haunting:
A) Weeping
B) Screams
C) Silence
D) Chanting
E) Static
5. Someone enters your domain. What do you do?
A) Watch from the shadows
B) Throw something across the room
C) Whisper to them until they question reality
D) Possess them
E) Feed them a vision of their own death
6. What item would bind your soul to the Earth?
A) A love letter
B) A bloodstained weapon
C) A broken mirror
D) A spellbook or cursed object
E) A VHS tape or a corrupted file
7. Which ghost from fiction do you relate to most?
A) The Woman in Black
B) Samara from The Ring
C) The twins from The Shining
D) The Nun from The Conjuring
E) The ghosts from Black Mirror’s “White Christmas”
8. What's your haunting style?
A) Melancholy and poetic
B) Brutal and loud
C) Subtle and disturbing
D) Supernatural and ritualistic
E) Surreal and metaphysical
Tally Your Results
Mostly A’s – The Weeping Spirit
A tragic figure bound by sorrow. You haunt with subtle signs: music boxes, phantom touches, cold winds through broken windows.
Mostly B’s – The Vengeful Wraith
You died with rage, and you’re not done screaming. Objects fly, lights explode, and your name is whispered before disaster strikes.
Mostly C’s – The Lost Soul
You are a whisper trapped between realities, forgotten even by death. People see you in their dreams—or their psych evals.
Mostly D’s – The Occult Entity
Summoned by blood or accident, you’re tethered by ancient rites. You warp time, defy physics, and demand sacrifice.
Mostly E’s – The Digital Haunt
You’ve transcended the veil. A glitch in the code of reality. You infect devices, twist minds, and leave cursed data trails.
Historical Tidbit:
The CIA, Mind Control, and the Sci-Fi Writer Who Predicted Everything
In the 1950s, as Cold War paranoia peaked, the U.S. government quietly launched Project MK-Ultra—a top-secret CIA mind control program involving LSD, hypnosis, sensory deprivation, and psychological torture. It sounds like dystopian sci-fi. That’s because... it kind of was.
While the program stayed hidden until the 1970s, sci-fi authors had been predicting it with eerie precision decades earlier. Most notably:
Philip K. Dick, author of Ubik, A Scanner Darkly, and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, began writing about government surveillance, memory erasure, and synthetic identities in the early 1960s. His protagonists often grapple with the exact themes MK-Ultra would later reveal:
Paranoia about altered reality
Invasive tech controlling behavior
Pharmaceutical manipulation of the mind
In fact, by the late 70’s, Dick became convinced that many of his stories weren’t fiction at all—but premonitions of hidden truth. He even claimed that a “transcendent intelligence” (which he dubbed VALIS) had downloaded knowledge into his brain—knowledge that matched later-revealed MK-Ultra documents.
Was he crazy? Paranoid? Or simply a writer so tapped into the cultural subconscious he pulled classified nightmares out of the ether?
Impact on Sci-Fi
The fallout of MK-Ultra inspired an entire generation of science fiction:
The Manchurian Candidate (book & film)
Firestarter by Stephen King
Fringe, Stranger Things, The X-Files, and countless others
Science fiction didn’t just predict mind control—it may have influenced how we discovered it. The line between reality and speculative fiction blurred, and Philip K. Dick was standing right at the edge, staring into the void… and taking notes.
We are accepting for submissions for the second issue of Terrors and Tales, dropping this July from PD’s Alternative Fiction. We’re looking for bold, bizarre, blood-stained voices—short stories that crackle with pulp energy, menace, mystery, or mayhem. Horror, sci-fi, fantasy—we want it all. Keep your stories lean and mean (3,000 words or less), but don’t hold back on style, suspense, or strangeness.
We’re also accepting poetry of any length. No theme restrictions. If it haunts, hypnotizes, or hits like a spell—send it.
Whether you’re a seasoned author or a first-time scribbler of the weird and uncanny, this is your invitation to step into the shadows with us.
Deadline: July 1, 2025
Genres: Horror, Sci-Fi, Fantasy
Word Limit: Up to 3,000 words for short stories (no limit for poems)
Submit To: Email your submission to PD Alleva. In the subject line write: Terrors and Tales Submission and include the title of your work and the word count. Paste your submission into the body of your email. No word documents or pdfs please and no attachments.
Dare to write something unforgettable. Let’s make this summer one hell of a page-turner.
Thank you for reading. If you are an independent publisher, author, or film maker and have a new release please feel free to send your information to pd@pdalleva.com so that we can include you in our newsletter.
