Welcome to the 6th Annual Halloween Extravaganza. Where each year it gets bigger and bigger.
I realized the other day that I’ve never actually written a post talking about the Halloween Extravaganza, just started posting on October 1st. That means that the authors participating know what’s going on… and I sometimes know what’s going on haha… but no one else does. I mean, I love leaving y’all in the dark a little bit, letting y’all be surprised by who is coming next (which is why I never post a schedule), but I think it’s time to discuss a little bit of the history behind this whole shebang.
The History
Six years ago, my Halloween Extravaganza began with seven men and was only a six day celebration. I was still new to this whole thing, but knew that I wanted to not just celebrate Halloween and horror, but my blog’s birthday, which was the month before (it actually began on September 2nd, with an introduction post, but I never really considered that the birthday; as far as I was concerned, it was the 30th, when I posted my first review). I asked a few of the horror authors that I had met along the way to participate and they all agreed. It was all interviews – two of them, brothers, did a group one – because I knew, as horror authors, October was a busy month for them and wanted to be easy on them.
The next year, I decided that it needed to be… a little bigger. That year, it became a 31 day celebration. A few of the people that were part of the original celebration came back to take part again, and since I was no longer “new,” I was able to add a whole lot more people to it. The month was full of author interviews and guest posts they had written me about Halloween. Some even surprised me with short stories, which was amazing.
That November, when the shenanigans were over, I wrote a half-joking post on Facebook about how, since Christmas (decorations) take over Halloween every year, it was time for us to take over Christmas (with scary holiday-themed stories). I was surprised by the reaction I got to this post. People were not just excited to read this, but excited to take part, and the next year, before I had even sent out invitations, I had received ten short story submissions.
In 2016, Christmas Takeover (which is part of the Halloween Extravaganza) became a thing. I had thirty authors submit stories, quite a few of them originals that they had written specifically for my blog.
Last year, I changed it from 31 days to three months of shenanigans – and when all was said and done, I had eighty days of posts last year. Eighty days.
I never thought that I could beat that, but here we are this year, 2019, and as of today, 140 people have signed up to be a part of my Halloween Extravaganza.
I have to say that again. 140 people.
And quite a few of them have signed up for more than one option.
The Plan
From October 1st to November 30th, I will be posting author interviews and guest posts. The theme for these posts was “Halloween,” and I can’t tell you how excited it makes me to see how authors interpret that. I have some who took the theme quite literally, and others who were quite abstract in their thinking. I even have a few that came up with the “perfect” idea that isn’t necessarily Halloween, but they were so good I couldn’t turn them down.
From December 1st to the end of the year… or until I run out of them… I will be posting Christmas Takeover stories because it is back and back with a vengeance. (Some of these are quite excellent.)
Throughout, there will be some reviews of books that are already out and some that are coming out between now and the end of the year.
Make sure that you check back every day for the next installment.
Follow me on Twitter – @Raiyine and @megHanHblogs – and keep an eye out for the hashtag #meghanshouseofbooks – to help you not miss a thing.
Meghan's House of Books 