Another year has passed us by, and we live to face a new one. I know the world has seen a lot of problems in 2025 and in previous years, but this has been the best one of my life.
I’ve always existed in my isolated little world. I went out into society to make money, but for the most part I’ve cocooned myself in my safe realm of books and movies.
I’m more content than I’ve ever been. My fears are diminishing. I’m sleeping better. I’m at peace with myself and with those around me.
I retired on January 1, 2025. I wanted it more than anything, but it was still hard. Decades of imprisonment in the employment rat race is hard to shake. It’s far from unusual to feel out of sorts, worthless, and depressed. No matter how badly you wanted out.
I’m learning to appreciate the little things. I’m taking the time to not only notice, but to contemplate the sky, trees, the earth. I’m learning to slow down and simply breathe.
2025 was a year of movies for me. I watched a grand total of three hundred and ninety-four of them.
My favorite movie was actually a tie: The Life of Chuck and Eddington. I also loved Jay Kelly, Marty Supreme, Keeper, Weapons, Bring Her Back, The Baltimorons, Friendship, and Secret Mall Apartment.
I watched a lot of older movies, but I watched thirty-nine 2025 releases. I’m trying to lose the stuffy old guy mindset I was falling into. I still won’t see any Marvel or DC movies.
Movie theaters seem to be in danger. Two in my area closed down this year. I’m doing my part to keep them afloat. I went to the theater twenty-seven times in 2025.
I thought I would read more this year, but my total is ninety-two books. Not a bad number, and as I always say, it’s more about quality than quantity. I don’t want to blow through dozens of little independent novellas just to claim I’ve read a lot of books.
I read some damned good titles. I thought Joe Hill’s magnificent King Sorrow would take the top spot in my list, but Dan Chaon’s One of Us usurped it in the last hour. If you haven’t read Chaon, I implore you to do so. Either One of Us or Ill Will would be a great place to start.
Runners up include Chevy Stevens’ The Hitchhikers, Ronald Malfi’s Senseless, Grady Hendrix’s Witchcraft for Wayward Girls, Chris Pavone’s The Doorman, Richard Chizmar’s Memorials, and Ken Jaworowski’s What About the Bodies.
On the nonfiction front I loved Jonathan Gould’s Burning Down the House: Talking Heads and the New York Scene That Transformed Rock, Clark Collis’ Screaming and Conjuring: The Resurrection and Unstoppable Rise of the Modern Horror Movie, Orty Ortwein’s The First Geeks, and Jason Cavallaro’s Cracking Spines: Three Decades of Horror.
Re-reading will always be important to me. This year I revisited my favorite book of all time: Robert McCammon’s Boy’s Life. It gets better with age. I also loved going back to Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House, Poppy Z. Brite’s Lost Souls, Richard Laymon’s The Traveling Vampire Show, and Robert A. Heinlein’s Methuselah’s Children.
Next year looks like another good one. I’m looking forward to a lot of books: Catriona Ward’s Nowhere Burning, Martin Mull’s Life Sentences, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child’s Pendergast, W. H. Chizmar’s Them, Ronald Malfi’s The Hive, Paul Theroux’s True North, Don Winslow’s The Final Score, and Poppy Z. Brite’s Water if God Wills It.
Those are just the tip of the iceberg. I’m sure I’ll read a lot more. It makes me feel excited, but thinking about upcoming books and my life, I get a little sad.
I remember it like yesterday. Looking forward to books by beloved favorites. Most had titles out every year or so. Writers whose work I cherished, but are now lost to mortality. Peter Straub. Charles L. Grant. Ray Garton. Richard Laymon. Robert Cormier. Ed Gorman. T.M. Wright. James Herbert.
Others are still with us, but are seemingly retired. Bill Pronzini. David Morrell. Norman Partridge. F. Paul Wilson. John Farris. Thomas Tessier. Chet Williamson. Douglas E. Winter. Clive Barker.
All those names are writers I grew up with. I read them, I learned from them, loved them. There are empty places in my heart where I wish new books lived. I miss them, badly, but they live on in my soul and in the words I write. As long as I am able to I will sing their praises and preach their work.
They all aren’t gone. Stephen King, the man who made horror a viable fiction genre, is still very much here and still doing great work. Ronald Kelly made a hell of a comeback. Ramsey Campbell is still the greatest horror writer on the planet. Joe R. Lansdale still packs a mean punch. Bentley Little continues to freak me out.
There are new writers coming along all the time, though it’s hard to find them. The field has become so cluttered. It’s difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff. Especially when everything is praised in the name of genre support.
I largely avoid independent writers, because I have to pay for their books. It’s not that I don’t think each and every writer deserved to be paid for their work, but I am subsisting on social security now. My time is free but my money is tight. I can get mass market books from the library at no charge. I’m sure I could get an avalanche of free books for review purposes, but for reasons I’d outlined in the past, I don’t like to accept free books.
Here’s to another year of books and movies. I raise my mug of Irish Breakfast Tea in honor of horrors past, present, and future. I turn sixty-five in June. Horror Drive-In celebrates its twentieth anniversary in February. I haven’t grown out of this stuff yet and I don’t expect I ever will.
Written by Mark Sieber
I’ve always existed in my isolated little world. I went out into society to make money, but for the most part I’ve cocooned myself in my safe realm of books and movies.I’m more content than I’ve ever been. My fears are diminishing. I’m sleeping better. I’m at peace with myself and with those around me.
I retired on January 1, 2025. I wanted it more than anything, but it was still hard. Decades of imprisonment in the employment rat race is hard to shake. It’s far from unusual to feel out of sorts, worthless, and depressed. No matter how badly you wanted out.
I’m learning to appreciate the little things. I’m taking the time to not only notice, but to contemplate the sky, trees, the earth. I’m learning to slow down and simply breathe.
2025 was a year of movies for me. I watched a grand total of three hundred and ninety-four of them.
My favorite movie was actually a tie: The Life of Chuck and Eddington. I also loved Jay Kelly, Marty Supreme, Keeper, Weapons, Bring Her Back, The Baltimorons, Friendship, and Secret Mall Apartment.
I watched a lot of older movies, but I watched thirty-nine 2025 releases. I’m trying to lose the stuffy old guy mindset I was falling into. I still won’t see any Marvel or DC movies.
Movie theaters seem to be in danger. Two in my area closed down this year. I’m doing my part to keep them afloat. I went to the theater twenty-seven times in 2025.
I thought I would read more this year, but my total is ninety-two books. Not a bad number, and as I always say, it’s more about quality than quantity. I don’t want to blow through dozens of little independent novellas just to claim I’ve read a lot of books.
I read some damned good titles. I thought Joe Hill’s magnificent King Sorrow would take the top spot in my list, but Dan Chaon’s One of Us usurped it in the last hour. If you haven’t read Chaon, I implore you to do so. Either One of Us or Ill Will would be a great place to start.
Runners up include Chevy Stevens’ The Hitchhikers, Ronald Malfi’s Senseless, Grady Hendrix’s Witchcraft for Wayward Girls, Chris Pavone’s The Doorman, Richard Chizmar’s Memorials, and Ken Jaworowski’s What About the Bodies.On the nonfiction front I loved Jonathan Gould’s Burning Down the House: Talking Heads and the New York Scene That Transformed Rock, Clark Collis’ Screaming and Conjuring: The Resurrection and Unstoppable Rise of the Modern Horror Movie, Orty Ortwein’s The First Geeks, and Jason Cavallaro’s Cracking Spines: Three Decades of Horror.
Re-reading will always be important to me. This year I revisited my favorite book of all time: Robert McCammon’s Boy’s Life. It gets better with age. I also loved going back to Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House, Poppy Z. Brite’s Lost Souls, Richard Laymon’s The Traveling Vampire Show, and Robert A. Heinlein’s Methuselah’s Children.
Next year looks like another good one. I’m looking forward to a lot of books: Catriona Ward’s Nowhere Burning, Martin Mull’s Life Sentences, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child’s Pendergast, W. H. Chizmar’s Them, Ronald Malfi’s The Hive, Paul Theroux’s True North, Don Winslow’s The Final Score, and Poppy Z. Brite’s Water if God Wills It.
Those are just the tip of the iceberg. I’m sure I’ll read a lot more. It makes me feel excited, but thinking about upcoming books and my life, I get a little sad.
I remember it like yesterday. Looking forward to books by beloved favorites. Most had titles out every year or so. Writers whose work I cherished, but are now lost to mortality. Peter Straub. Charles L. Grant. Ray Garton. Richard Laymon. Robert Cormier. Ed Gorman. T.M. Wright. James Herbert.
Others are still with us, but are seemingly retired. Bill Pronzini. David Morrell. Norman Partridge. F. Paul Wilson. John Farris. Thomas Tessier. Chet Williamson. Douglas E. Winter. Clive Barker.
All those names are writers I grew up with. I read them, I learned from them, loved them. There are empty places in my heart where I wish new books lived. I miss them, badly, but they live on in my soul and in the words I write. As long as I am able to I will sing their praises and preach their work.
They all aren’t gone. Stephen King, the man who made horror a viable fiction genre, is still very much here and still doing great work. Ronald Kelly made a hell of a comeback. Ramsey Campbell is still the greatest horror writer on the planet. Joe R. Lansdale still packs a mean punch. Bentley Little continues to freak me out.
There are new writers coming along all the time, though it’s hard to find them. The field has become so cluttered. It’s difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff. Especially when everything is praised in the name of genre support.
I largely avoid independent writers, because I have to pay for their books. It’s not that I don’t think each and every writer deserved to be paid for their work, but I am subsisting on social security now. My time is free but my money is tight. I can get mass market books from the library at no charge. I’m sure I could get an avalanche of free books for review purposes, but for reasons I’d outlined in the past, I don’t like to accept free books.Here’s to another year of books and movies. I raise my mug of Irish Breakfast Tea in honor of horrors past, present, and future. I turn sixty-five in June. Horror Drive-In celebrates its twentieth anniversary in February. I haven’t grown out of this stuff yet and I don’t expect I ever will.
Written by Mark Sieber
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