Paranormal Places

Do you search endlessly for a horrific pleasure?
Wanna be scared?

According to the article, 13 Scary-As-Hell Places in America, these are the top haunted places to make your twisted dreams come true.  This article has it all:  voodoo curses, insane asylums, prison poltergeists, haunted hotel rooms and battlefield apparitions.

Will you visit them?
Have you already been?

Pranksters

I remember seeing this years ago while watching TV with my dad.
Oh, my how we laughed.
We thought this was the best thing ever!
Still is.
       
Enjoy, Creepsters.

Protecting Your Soul

Find image here

Always cover up, Creepsters!
Don't be a hero  :-)

Sweet Dreams

All kinds of crazy here.
Sleep tight, my Creepsters!

Righteously Evil

"All things truly wicked start from an innocence."

~Ernest Hemingway~

Dark Quickies ;)

I stumbled upon this short story and it sent chills through me.
This is a prime example of flash fiction at its finest.
There are more of these unnerving clips to discover at imgur.com
Read 'em and sleep tight, my Creepsters.
If you can  :)

And the winner is...

The winner for our April Poetry Contest is:

Jason Bradstreet

Congrats, Jason!
Job, well done.

Here was his submission:

A Backwood Mother’s Teachings

Norman, is that you, my dear, 
Creeping around in the dark?
Your father- oh! if he were here-
Could show you a man’s heart.
So sorry- only me, my dear,
To guide your growing start.
I love you, boy. Never you fear.
Nothing can make us part.

Norman, is it you out there,
Burying deep your secrets?
Remember how I taught you now;
Cover the hole with leaf grits.
No one will ever know, my dear.
The skin will rot down to cream lips
While you and I, mother and son,
Make merry and taste tea sips.

Just Believe

B E L I E V E

In it all...

In faeries and unicorns and fire-breathing dragons;

In ghosts and goblins and demonic hangings;

In aliens and monsters and creatures from beyond;

In witches and warlocks and curses from a wand;

In worlds, cosmos and galaxies without end;

In spirits and lost souls and shadows that can bend;


In the wicked, the accused and all those tales of gore;

In myths and legends and stories of lore;

Believe in it all
Accept it as law
For those who acknowledge it
Will survive it's call.

~dpb~

And Nothing But The Truth...

I guess the question I get asked more than anything else is if this whole Night Lights Cast Shadows thing is for real.  And my answer is yes and no.

Yes, I have nightmares.
Not night terrors.
Not night sweats.
Not hallucinations.

Nightmares.
Good old-fashioned bad dreams.
I dream of horrible deaths to people I don't know;
Of strangers without faces and
Of children without a chance.
I dream of rituals, sacrifices, murder and suicide.
I dream of monstrosities that would make most horror fiction blush.
Various creatures stalk my mind and monsters grab tight my imagination.  They creep into my sleep and torture me, causing me a mental pain that is quite hard to even put down into words.
Sometimes, I feel that I am not fully conveying their influence and I hold quite a number of self-pity parties, cursing them on choosing me to haunt.  Then, in my next breath I feel a certain honor that I have been given this endless bounty of hell to deal with, to mold these nightmares into stories and to share them with others.
Is it a gift?  A curse?  A joke?

I've been trying to figure that out for years...

The first nightmare I can remember is from my youth and is one of the most vivid to my memory.
(  Read it here.  )

After that first nightmare, it was all downhill.
One minute I was imitating WWF with my brother and the next, I was struggling just to fall asleep at night.  Looking back, it was an awfully young age to begin such a journey, but hell, others have had rougher childhoods (check out Augusten Burroughs for that) and I tried to put it behind me.
It wasn't until years later that I really began to understand the abnormality of it all.  One day, I woke up and realized that other people weren't having these kinds of dreams and I might want to start taking account of it all.  So, I started writing them down.  And now, I have a collection of journals that reveal all kinds of crazy. This is what I use for my stories on Night Lights Cast Shadows.  This is what I share with you...   an awful truth and a false absurdity.

Yes, I really do have nightmares.
Yet, if you follow this blog closely, I'm sure you realize that most of what I post is up for debate.
Does Bigfoot really exist?  
Are there alien abductions?  
Could unicorns really spark a revolution?

So, I guess this Night Lights Cast Shadows operation is real, at least to me.  It's my outlet and my chance to share my writing and my voice and my crazy with all of you.
If you'd like to, you can feed your crazy by reading more of my nightmares.
Or bookmark my website to stay connected with all of the social networking sites I haunt.

:)

Stay Spooky, my Creepsters.
And thank you for listening.
Thank you for spending a bit of your time with me.

Creep On,
~dpb~

Wanna Play A Game?

I'm liking this idea and the format of it.
I find this thrilling and inspiring and the graphics are just the right kind of scary.
Your thoughts?
Would you play?

Poe-etic

Find out more about this beautiful tribute to Edgar Allan Poe in the following article:
Boston's New E.A.P. Statue Is Going To Be Epic

Imagine this...

Find image here

As a reader, your most valuable tool is imagination.

As a writer, your most valuable tool is imagination.

See how good we are together?

In my networks, I speak with a lot of writers who struggle with the creative process.  They get caught up in the procedure of things.  They have a set schedule to adhere to; a certain number of words/sentences/pages they must produce a day; a routine that includes cappuccino, social networking and book clubs.  They search for the perfect tools to use in their writing process, not realizing that all they need they have on their person.

Contrary to popular belief, it is not your laptop; your expensive pen collection; or even that sleek new keyboard.  It is your mind.  It is a treasure that has no price tag and you never leave home without it. (unless you're a part of some cool Matrix experiment, then, by all means, ignore this rant and carry on.)

Imagination is the key.
It is all you need to create or get lost into any story.
It is the secret ingredient to any successful book, but just like a car battery that might need a a jump after a long, cold winter ~ so too ~ our minds.
It must be recharged, refreshed and rebooted like any other device.

There are many days that I need to step away from what I'm working on or what I'm reading simply because I'm in overload.  It's easy to get caught up in a routine or lack of one.
The truth is we all need a break sometimes;
a distraction;
a getaway.

Next time you're stuck on a project, or mindlessly reading a book...step away.
Get lost in life.

I find inspiration in people; their conversation; their stories.
A lot of times it's music that can balance me out.  The right tune can conjure up some great ideas and evoke the enthusiasm I need to keep grounded and keep on.
Other times it's artwork; or photography; or an image like this:

Found image on this FB page

that can spark a fire in the darkness of my mind.

It's really about moderation~
It's about keeping
and staying true to yourself and your thoughts.

So, enough of my ramblings...

What drives you?
What balances you?
What can you imagine?

Swerve

Is that an angel or a devil who follows me home?

Find image at HD Wallpapers

What does your shadow reveal?

#follow

You can follow more of our darkness...
                                                        on Twitter

Lost

Found image on Pinterest

Maybe I already am.  

Creep us

Don't miss a creepy thing we do...

Bookmark our website:  Night Lights Cast Shadows
                                                                      and visit with our darkness for a little while.

Perspective

"Evil is a point of view."

~ Anne Rice ~

Write on.

Some great advice to all you writers out there. 

You have to live it and breathe it and, above all, want it bad enough to be an outcast ~

Or at least weird enough to be taken seriously.  

Found this image at Art&Literature
Such a great page!

La Lechuza

Fact or fiction?



Anyone familiar with this legend?
Any believers in La Lechuza?  Their power?  Their curse?

(I don't know about you, but this narrator's voice alone is enough to make me lose some sleep.)

April is Poetry

Show your skills.

In the United States and Canada, April has been hailed the National Poetry Month!
Here, at Night Lights, we love poetry, and dark poetry makes us swoon.
If you dabble in this creative process, we want to hear about it.
Send us your best poem and be entered into our first ever Poetry Contest.

You can post your poem on our Facebook page;
message it to us through Twitter, Facebook, or our email at: nightlightscastshadows@gmail.com (no attachments please~ they will be deleted automatically),
or simply add it on here in the comment section below.

The top three picks will be read by a small panel of judges and one will reign victorious...and will also win the following Shakespeare book of poems:

All poems must be received by April 20th;
Must include your name;
And you must reside in the United States or Canada.
Your poem can be about anything you chose it to be.
Here is a list of our Contest Rules.  Please keep them in mind as you participate in this and all future contests with us.

Good luck, Creepsters.

Happy April 1st

Be careful out there...

:)

Found image here