In some sense I do consider other horror audiocasts sites our "competition", but only in the sense that having more people out there doing what we do keeps each one honest about maintaining quality levels and defining their specific "house style" in comparison to others ("the best kind of friend is like iron sharpening iron" to quote Shriekback, who were probably quoting someone else...)
I've never heard of NO SLEEP - will have to check them out.
Aside from CAST MACABRE and TALES TO TERRIFY, BLACK STATIC runs occasional podcasts, there's DEAD AUDIO, DARK FICTION MAGAZINE, THE SHADOWCAST AUDIO ANTHOLOGY, H.P. LOVECRAFT LITERARY PODCAST and 19 NOCTURNE BOULEVARD. I have only had time to check out some of these.
There are also a number of people doing horror radio drama revivals - CAMPFIRE RADIO THEATER is an example - but that approach is a different kind of animal from what we do.
Those interested should check out the Horror Audio Casts page on Facebook.
I'm quite enjoying TALES TO TERRIFY - the format is different than ours - longer, with essay content and (like CAST MACABRE) embracing of horror poetry - which is great, because it gives me a place to send people who submit poetry to us. Larry is a good host in his own style - I can't help but smile at his sign off, as I grew up during the 1970's listening to E.G. Marshall give that same sign off to CBS RADIO MYSTERY THEATER (a show created by Himan Brown, who had worked on the original INNER SANCTUM radio show, whose host Raymond used to sign off that way as well).
It's interesting to hear different stories (and, yes, admittedly, some stories that we turned down, like the aforementioned "Flash Frame") show up and ponder on what my reaction is, removed from the weighing and balancing I do in considering stories for this podcast. Putting aside the Stoker Nominees for a moment - so far, I've quite liked "The Chair", "God of the Razor" (would love to run 2 specific Lansdale stories but haven't had luck contacting yet), "How Pappy Got Five Acres Back and Calvin Stayed on the Farm", "Innocent" and "Is There Anybody There?" (the central idea of this Kim Newman story is great - although hard to get across in audio - and completely trumps my related notion that texting/IMing is the modern equivalent of postcards).
Of the Stokers - well, that's kind of problematic because I'll admit that 3 of the stories seemed to reaaaaally stretch the definition of horror beyond what I'm comfortable with (which of course was a choice made by the HWA and not Larry). "All You Can Do Is Breath" was probably the most successful *horror* story in the traditional sense. I'm not sure "Hypergraphia" worked as an audio reading - although they gave it a valiant try! I really enjoyed listening to "Home" - the reading was quite possibly one of the best audio fiction readings I've ever heard (even with all the "he said", "she said" which obviously the reader could do nothing about) - while I just don't consider it a horror story, I did laugh out loud a number of times while listening to it ("the kid looked like an elf"). I thought "Her Husband's Hands" was interesting - I had some problems with the central thrust of it, regarding Symbolic simplicity versus Realistic justification, that aren't worth going into here - but I agree with the forum poster there who said it struck them more as a dark/humanistic sci-fi story.
King's piece (which Larry did a superior job reading) I liked quite a lot as well, but I'm torn whether labeling it horror above labeling it straight lit fiction doesn't cheapen the tragedy. And it is a tragedy, in its way, and some tragedies can be horror as well (TITUS ANDRONICUS for one). As one of my long-standing critical stances is that no creative work has to be any one "thing" and might fit into multiple definitions (although not having some parameters as to what you're trying to accomplish in the story, as a writer, is one of the most prevalent traps that amateur writers fall into - it's a hard line to walk between creative inspiration and lack of focus - but then, none of the people picking the Stokers or writing the winners are amateurs, either) I guess I shouldn't be belaboring it too much in my mind. Although another reason to perhaps question the story's primary identification as horror comes to mind - something along the lines of "brand dilution" - if the Stokers had published all 6 of these stories in a small book and sold it as a representative snapshot of the best that HORROR had to offer last year, I imagine a lot of the general public might feel disappointed at what they bought. This problem is one (but only one) of the problems that lead to the last big financial bust in horror short fiction in the 1990s.
Anyway, it's a nice addition and I hope it keeps going.
