E.J. V'Kanty

  I wrote this story based on a couple I knew in real life many years ago. They were the perfect personification of the “Ken and Barbie power couple” of the 90s. Whatever image comes to mind when you hear that phrase is exactly who they were. When I knew them, there came a time when they were on the outs, constantly fighting even in my presence. When I was alone with “Ken,” he would confide in me that he was absolutely certain “Barbie” was cheating on him. Even though he was sure of her infidelity, he couldn’t provide any justification. Just like the protagonist in Borrowed Time , “Ken” said it was just a feeling, or a sense that something was off. I don’t know if Ken & Barbie ever split up. Who knows? They may have gotten married eventually. I like to think that’s what happened. As for Borrowed Time , I can’t guarantee such a happy ending.        Brent had never had much faith in the supernatural. He’d scoffed at self-proclaimed psychics more...

  This was another story that I had written years ago and lost when an earlier computer crashed. I’ve rewritten the story and I’m still amazed by how much of it I remembered. The plot and characters all seemed to flow from my fingertips just as though they would have if I’d had the first copy as a reference. Night Terrors is more of an urban horror, dealing with the consequences of moving people in and out of tract housing as though there’s never anything left behind. Lydia and her neighbors quickly discover that some things do get left behind. When that happens in Night Terrors , Lydia quickly finds that it’s the new occupant who is left to deal with the ethereal fallout. Get a glimpse of that which gets left behind in Night Terrors here:         Her first glance told her that everything seemed normal. Jacob was sleeping soundly and everything else in the room appeared still and silent. Releasing a sigh of relief and silently chiding herself for ...

  Does anyone remember MSN Groups? The good old days of the internet! One of the groups I belonged to back in the day offered a little bit of everything. I remember there were threads for PSP tutorials, kink talk, horror movie discussions, and paranormal topics. One year, there was a contest for the best Halloween short story. That’s how this horror story was born. I didn’t even give it much planning or outlining. I just sat down with pen in hand (I used to write everything out and type it up later in Word until I realized how much unnecessary work was involved in that process.) So, I wrote Princesses out in an afternoon. I won the contest. Since that first draft, I have revised and added to the story until it became the polished story that I included in Whispers From Hell: An Anthology of Horror and the Supernatural . Here’s a taste of Princesses :        I find myself reminiscing about our first meeting and their consecutive visits. I imagine...

  There was a place where my family used to go camping. A few yards from the place where we would always set up camp, there was a path that descended down to a large creek. The path was shrouded in trees and it really felt like you were descending down into a hidden realm. This path and the daydreams I had of this path served as the basis for A Requiem for the Damned . From those minimal beginnings, I became fascinated by the idea of discovering a secret village far removed from the rest of civilization. I imagine that such a place would be part paradisaical  but with evil horrors unlike anything we see in the modern world. As for Princesa Moreno, I can’t say what inspired her creation. I do like to see women cast as villains in horror. There are so few examples of female villains specifically in the horror genre and that was starting to change until recently. Today, casting a woman as an unredeemable villain is a no-no, but I have a habit of defying the rules. Here’s a ...

  This was one of the first short stories I wrote and it’s not difficult to see that I was inspired to write it after watching Tremors (1990) for the first time. In creating my own story about creatures that arise to threaten all of mankind, I wanted something less obvious. I thought creatures that would have survived for who-knows-how-long would have to be small and less intrusive yet deadly. I also wanted to make a final girl the focus of the story, picking up her experience in the middle. Brette’s journey prior to arriving on the Lighthouse Point public park bench remains largely unknown. We can only imagine the horrors she endured before making her way back into town. Take a brief look into Brette’s Discovery :      Perhaps it was this familial instinct that caused him to take a second look at the girl sitting alone on the park bench not far from the bus stop. Or maybe he glanced back out of simple curiosity. Whatever the reason, he was the only one t...

I can’t say where each element of Kylie’s Reality came from or what inspired me to write this story. I do remember that Julia’s part of the story was inspired by a local urban legend in my WNY state hometown. Briefly, the legend involves a couple of 20-something men who pick up a hitchhiking coed. She asks them to drop her off just outside of a cemetery and, as she flees from their vehicle, she leaves her purse behind. Seeking to return the girl’s purse, the driver looks for her driver’s license and returns the purse to the address on the license. Upon knocking on the door, an elderly woman answers the door and claims the purse as belonging to her daughter who was killed in a hit and run accident on that very highway 25 years earlier. Otherwise, I would have to say the rest of the story is entirely a figment of my imagination. I will say that Kylie’s part of the story was challenging to write. While I can usually throw myself into any character, I found it difficult to form the dial...

  This story was based on actual experiences I had once upon a time. The more fantastic happenings in this story are obviously fictitious, but the unusual sounds, sense of being watched, and nightmares were all real experiences for me in a house I once owned. Looking back, I’m not sure how much of that was my own overactive imagination. Probably most of it. But it did inspire me to write this story. What is it About? Melvin Andrews becomes the sole owner and resident of a house  that had unnerved him from the first moment he'd laid eyes upon  it. As he tries to identify the malevolent spirit haunting him, he realizes  that his is not the first soul this entity has preyed upon. Can he defeat this  ancient evil, or will he succumb to the Whispers From Hell? A Brief Excerpt:      Just dip your fingers into it, Melvin. That’s the only way you’ll really know what it is , that evil voice whispers.      I can hear that ...