In 2017 I published an enthusiastic review of Jerry L. Martin’s God: An Autobiography here at The Teeming Brain, and also at Amazon. The book presents Martin’s account of being an atheist who was hit with an unexpected experience of what presented itself as divine communication. Over the course of about a year, he found…
Tag: Sleep Paralysis
Teeming Links – March 8, 2019
Has it really been more than a year since I published a Teeming Links post? It would seem so. The last one is dated October 2017. Chalk it up to the fact that I’m deep into a Ph.D. and now buried in my dissertation. And also the fact that 2018 was the most insane race-to-the-finish-line…
This Is Horror, Episode 193: Jon Padgett and Matt Cardin on “Vastarien” and More
In this just-published episode of the This Is Horror Podcast, Jon Padgett and I talk with hosts Michael David Wilson and Bob Pastorella about our new project Vastarien: A Literary Journal, along with other matters of interest. Click to listen or download. Note that at the time of this writing, our Vastarien Kickstarter campaign, to…
Teeming Links – June 27, 2014
Beware the man who has more influence on the future of reading than anybody else in the world: Jeff Bezos is simultaneously a visionary, an innovator, and a destroyer. Pro Publica explains why online tracking is getting creepier. (Hint: It has to do with the merging of all the mountains of online and offline data…
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, and the dark-mythic summer of 1816
I’m presently teaching a sophomore college course about horror and science fiction in literature and film. (You can view the syllabus online.) Yesterday’s class meeting was devoted to introducing Mary Shelley and Frankenstein by giving background on Mary’s life and describing the epic, shadowy, amazing, uncanny, utterly mythic summer of 1816, when Mary stayed with…
Lucid dreams, sleep paralysis, and altered states: Ryan Hurd interviewed
Teem member Ryan Hurd was interviewed yesterday on the Internet radio program Paranormal Review in connection with his new book, Dream Like a Boss (which will soon be available for pre-order): Have you ever wondered if you can control your dreams? Do you want to know how to take more control over them? Is there…
Teeming Links – August 16, 2013
Image courtesy of Salvatore Vuono / FreeDigitalPhotos.net Today’s (rather extended) opening word goes to Morris Berman, who was recently interviewed for The Atlantic online in connection with his new book Spinning Straw into Gold: Straight Talk for Troubled Times. Morris first rose to prominence as the author of several books about the evolution of human…
Real Succubus Tales: Sleep Paralysis and the Genesis of Erotic Horror
I was struck by Richard Gavin’s recent commentary in which he observed that most horror fiction is rarely horrifying, but rather tends to focus on peripheral unpleasantness, such as nausea, gore, or bloodlust. As I read this, spontaneous images immediately welled up in my mind from some of the most horrifying moments of my life…
Fuseli, Sleep Paralysis, and Horror’s Master Image
Just in time for the Halloween holiday, Ryan Hurd has published a horror-fied guest post by me at Dream Studies, his thoroughly excellent Website about dream science, nightmares, and related altered states of consciousness. The article describes my long-in-coming recognition about a very famous painting (you know the one; see above) and the way it…
Horror, religion, Lovecraft, sleep paralysis, creativity, reality: Matt Cardin interviewed
Horror, religion, Lovecraft, sleep paralysis, fantasy, science fiction, consciousness, creativity, reality, the dystopian hazards of an uber-online lifestyle — these are all topics broached in an extensive new interview with Teeming Brain founder and editor Matt Cardin by fellow idea-driven horror writer Ted E. Grau at The Cosmicomicon. (Ted is also, of course, the author…