Test Patterns (Volume 1)

For your approval; an outré collection of short speculative fictions written with classic Television SF/F anthology programming in mind. These are the nightmares you wake from after staying up too late to watch that eerie midnight movie, only to find yourself bathed in the gray glow of the test pattern from the screen. Richly varied stories designed to impart a moral, inspire thought, give meaning, offer hope, or instill dread. Tales told in unique ways, employing provocative twists and revelations, while exploring the universal themes of humanity and self-discovery through the lenses of horror, fantasy, science fiction, the strange, and the weird. Our Table of Contents: Summoning Spirits by Michael Adams / The Stars are Black by D.L. Myers / The Woman in the Forge of Saturday Night by Joseph S. Pulver, Sr. / Evidence of Absence by H.S. Graves / I Am Become Death by William Tea & Ron Gelsleichter / The Judge by Philip Fracassi / The Snake Beneath My Skin by Sarah Walker / The Hands of Chaos by Ashley Dioses / The Nomenclature of Unnamable Horrors by Peter Rawlik / Golden Girl by S.L. Edwards / Scenes From a Forgotten Diorama by Brian O’Connell / You Can’t Go Wrong With Grass-Fed Beef by Jill Hand / Abettor by Ruth Asch / Work Group by Pete J. Carter / The Cliffside Tavern by Sean M. Thompson / One Evening in Whitbridge by Scott Thomas / The Velveteen Volvo by Nathan Carson / Outre Non-limitations &The Kumiho Question by Frederick J. Mayer / I’ve Lived in This Place a Long Time by Can Wiggins / The White Terror by Frank Coffman / Symptom of the Universe by John Claude Smith / Sustenance of the Stars by Scott J. Couturier / Alien Shore by Rob F. Martin / Ye Hermit’s Lay by Adam Bolivar / Bridge by Don Webb / Balls by Russell Smeaton / Call Me Corey by Matthew M. Bartlett / Hero Mother by Cody Goodfellow / Red-Eye by Stephen Mark Rainey / Séance by K.A. Opperman / Looking for Ghosts & Prosaic by Duane Pesice

Mr. Pesice makes lines on blank pieces of paper and wields a piece of wood with wires on it. As a mostly self-taught college graduate, he doesn't know half of what he should, and that's still more than most. He has a rubber hose up his nose. His work has been featured in venues as varied as Cthulhu Cultus magazine and the chain-restaurant Friendly's. He is jointly owned by four felines and lives in delightful squalor in southern Arizona, amid the cacti.