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HAPPY NEW YEAR FROM STITCHED SMILE PUBLICATIONS

Rumor Control

This is Rumor Control. There have been some rumors floating around, as rumors do, that Stitched Smile Publications is closing down and all titles are going out of print. That is not true. The truth is Stitched Smile Publications is restructuring in 2023, but existing titles are not going out of print. Rights for many …

KRAMPUS

Happy Monday! It’s time for Did You Know. With the arrival of December and the approaching Christmas holiday, many people begin to talk about Krampus, the evil twin/opposite of Santa Claus. Horror fans especially enjoy legendary and modern stories about Krampus. But did you Krampus has his own day? Well, night, actually. It’s true. December …

Into the void episode 2: Demonic possession

Welcome back to another episode of Into the Void, where I interview and have discussions with people about real life experiences with the psychic and paranormal. In today's post, I have an excerpt of an interview I did with a couple who went through an encounter with the demonic. The full interview is included in …

Haunted Location: Devil’s Hollow, Indiana

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Today’s location takes us to Devil’s Hollow, located in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Deep in the woods, on Cedar Canon Road, there exists a house. This house belonged to an old lady whom many believe was a …

House of Stitched Magazine

The new issue of House of Stitched Magazine ebook version is live on Amazon! Interviews, reviews, stories, poetry, art, and more! Get it now! For those who want the full physical experience, the physical magazine will be released very soon. Thank you again for your patience.

Haunted Object: The Terracotta Army

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Today’s haunted objects are the “Terracotta Army” located in the Xi’an Shaanxi province of China. Discovered in 1974, this staggering array of funeral art/afterlife army contains a collection of life-sized clay figures, a mausoleum, tombs, weaponry, …

Samhain

Happy Monday. It’s time for Did You Know. Halloween is almost upon us, and many of us are decorating and preparing to celebrate. But did you know many modern Halloween traditions are based on the festival of Samhain? Samhain is pronounced “SOW-in” or “SAH-win,” and though that looks strange, remember it is a modern English …

Haunted Objects: Aunt Pratt

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Today’s haunted object is the painting known as “Aunt Pratt” from Southern Virginia. The story starts in the 18th century with a girl named Martha who left her family to go study, commissioned a portrait of …

Drabbles

Happy Tuesday! Let’s look at more anthologies. Today we are discussing anthologies with a special type of short story: the drabble. What’s a drabble? I’m glad you asked. A drabble is a story of exactly one hundred words, not including the title. Writing such as story is more complex than one might think. Imagine writing …

True Crime Sunday: The Red Barn Murder

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! This week, we’re going to look at murder that took place in nineteenth century England at the Red Barn, a local landmark in Polstead. In 1826, Maria Marten began a relationship with William Corder, a man known for being somewhat of a ladies’ man and a liar. He wanted …

Haunted Objects: chair of death

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Today’s haunted object is known as the “Chair of Death” or “The Killing Chair of Thomas Busby.” This 300-year-old chair is currently displayed in a museum, hung from the ceiling, high above sitting position so that …

Cover Reveal!

We are very excited to present the cover reveal for the House of Stitched Magazine 2022 Halloween Issue! The cover art for this issue is by the talented J. K. Pevahouse. This issue will also feature an exclusive interview with Pevahouse, conducted by Thomas R Clark, and some flash fiction stories inspired by specific pieces …

Haunted Objects: Tallman Bunk Beds

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Today’s search takes us to Horicon, WI and the Tallman Bunk Beds. 1987 was a good year for a lot of people, but not for everyone. Enter the Tallman family: dad, Alan, a supervisor in a …

The Bones of Amoret

Happy Tuesday. Today we celebrate author Arthur Herbert and his award-winning novel, published by Stitched Smile Publications in February of this year. The Bones of Amoret by Arthur Herbert has won the NYC Big Book Award for Best Overall Western Fiction Novel. Join us in congratulating Arthur and check out this fantastic novel. Amoret, Texas, …

True Crime Sunday: Dr. Hawley Harvey Crippen (Part 1)

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! This week we’re going to take a look at the first suspect to be caught with the aid of wireless telegraphy, Dr. Crippen. In 1905, Dr. Hawley Harvey Crippin, a homeopath, and his wife Cora, and aspiring singer, moved into their home and began taking lodgers. It is reported …

Haunted OBject: The Ghost Ship Lady Lovibond

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Our search this week turns up the Ghost Ship Lady Lovibond, a triple-masted schooner, and todays haunted object. The 1700’s weren’t kind to women. There was a superstition that any woman aboard a sea vessel would …

True Crime Sunday: The Death of Jeannette DePalma

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! This week we’re looking at an unsolved case in which the “why” and “how” are just as mysterious as the “who.” On August 7, 1972, sixteen-year-old Jeanette DePalma left her New Jersey home to visit a friend, but she never made it. When she failed to return home, her …

Haunted Locations: The Dark Mirror from Columbus, Ohio

Welcome back to weird Wednesday where we like to scour the internet for the scary and the strange, the mysterious and the macabre, today our search takes us the Traveling Museum of the Paranormal and Occult, owned and curated by Dana and Greg Newkirk. Today’s object is known as The Dark Mirror, originally obtained from …

True Crime Sunday: The Murder of Teresita Basa

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! This week we’re going to take a look at a murder case where the victim may have seen to it that justice was served. Teresita Basa was born in the Philippines in 1929. She later moved to Chicago and worked as a respiratory therapist at Edgewater Hospital. On February …

Haunted Locations: The Palace and The Majestic Theaters in Bridgeport, CT.

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Today’s location takes us to one of the oldest and most paranormally active places in the entire United States: CT.One spot has captured my nomadic heart. The Majestic and Palace are historic theater and film venues …

Haunted Locations: Bridgewater Triangle, MASS.

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Today’s location plunges deep into Massachusetts lore via a place known as The Bridgewater Triangle. A place that has a little something for everyone. Renowned cryptozoologist and folklorist Loren Coleman first coined the term “Bridgewater Triangle” …

True Crime Sunday: The Cape Intruder

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! This week we’re going to take a look at the strange case of someone with a peculiar habit. Imagine living in one of those perfect seaside towns you’d see on a postcard… beaches, lighthouses, and tranquility. Now imagine waking up to a stranger watching you sleep in your house …

Haunted Locations: Chestnut Hill Cemetery, Rhode Island.

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Today’s location takes us to the Ocean State otherwise known as the land of ‘Morbid Tourism.’ When talking about Rhode Island and its haunted history many people will immediately jump to such locations as The Perron …

True Crime Sunday: The Wineville Chicken Coop Murders

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! This week’s case was so shocking that a town changed its name after all was said and done. Gordon Northcott was born in Canada in 1906. In 1924, he moved to Los Angeles with his parents and eleven-year-old nephew, Sanford.  After the move Northcott asked his father to help …

Haunted Locations: Route 2A, Haynesville Wood, Maine

Welcome to weird Wednesday where we explore the darkest corners of the globe, searching for the mysterious and unknown. Today’s location takes us to the land of lighthouses and lobsters, the state of Maine. If the frigid waters, dangerous weather conditions, and upwards of 11 haunted locations aren’t enough to frighten, and terrify you into …

True Crime Sunday: The Legend of Lavinia Fisher

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! Last week we talked about Jane Toppan, the murderous nurse who may have been America’s first female serial killer. This week we’re going to talk about the intriguing story of another woman who may hold that title. However, there may be more… or less to the story. Historians seem …

True Crime Sunday: Jane Toppan

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! This week we're taking a look at a murderous nurse. Jane Toppan was born Honora Kelley in 1854. After her mother's death, she was abandoned by her father and sent to an orphanage with her sister. After two years, she was released as an indentured servant to a wealthy …

Haunted Locations: Hoia Baciu forest, Romania

Welcome back to weird Wednesday, where we like to roam far and near, looking for excitement and fear. Today’s search brings us to Romania, the land of wine, salt mines, and more haunted castles than should be allowed in a single country. There are many reasons to tour this country from haunted fortresses to ancient …

True Crime Sunday: Tony Marino and the Murder of the Unkillable Man

Welcome back to another True Crime Sunday! Today we’re going to look at the case of someone who had a simple scheme planned in order to collect on life insurance money. The only problem was that an intended victim just wouldn’t die. In 1932, speakeasy owner Tony Marino and some buddies came up with the …

Haunted Locations: Aradale Asylum, Victoria, Australia

Welcome back to weird Wednesday, where we like to roam far and near, looking for excitement and fear. Today’s search brings us to a land down under, Australia’s Aradale Asylum. The Aradale Asylum was once known as the Ararat Lunatic Asylum and is in Ararat, Victoria, Australia. For me, anything that had once been called …

True CRime Sunday: The Chocolate Cream Poisoner

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! This week, we’re going to take a look at someone who liked to add a little something extra to sweet treats, Christiana Edmunds, aka the Chocolate Cream Poisoner. In the late 1860s, Christiana, then in her late thirties or early forties, lived with her widowed mother and had begun …

Haunted Location: KiMo Theater in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Welcome back to weird Wednesday, home of the most haunted and horrific places on the internet. Here we travel to seek spirits, to learn the history, to immerse ourselves in the reasons as to why they cannot move on. Is there a purpose to this search?  Maybe for many, it's to learn if there is …

True Crime Sunday: Hex Hollow and the Murder of NElson RehMeyer

Welcome to another True Crime Sunday! This week, we’re going to take a look at a case involving witches, curses, and murder. Am I talking about Salem in the 1600s? Nope. This case happened in Pennsylvania in 1928 in Rehmeyer’s Hollow, also known as Hex Hollow. For some time prior to the murder, John Blymire …

Haunted Locations: Philmont Scout Ranch, New Mexico

Welcome back to weird Wednesday where we like to roam the land for lost spirit and wayward wraiths.  This week's haunt takes us to Philmont Scout Ranch, New Mexico.The ranch is located near Colfax, NM and was once the hideout spot of Black Jack Ketchum and his gang of outlaws. Born Thomas Edward Ketchum in …

True Crime Sunday: The Fox Sisters

Welcome back to True Crime Sunday! For the last week of June’s focus on con artists, we’re going to take a look at the Fox sisters, whose prank on their mother led to a lasting legacy in the world of spiritualism and parapsychology. In New York in 1848, 14-year-old Maggie and 11-year-old Kate discovered they …

Haunted Locations: Hotel de Haro, Washington STate.

Welcome back to Weird Wednesday, where we love to wander on the wild side. Today, we roam Washington State, home of Hotel De Haro on San Juan Island, one of the state’s most haunted hotels.  Hotel de Haro, located on San Juan Island, in Washington state is the longest running hotel on the island and …

True Crime Sunday: Victor Lustig

(This post was originally seen on the House of Stitched blog back in December. I had to bring Victor Lustig back for my look at great con artists this month. He is one of my favorites I’ve written about for True Crime Sunday… the Eiffel Tower and Al Capone, what’s not to love?) In a …

Haunted Locations: Utica State Hospital, Utica, NY

Welcome back to weird Wednesday, where we like to explore the most haunted locations we can find on the internet, some near, some far, but all with rich history, disturbing legends, and ghostly residents.  Today, we explore the Utica State Hospital, the first state run lunatic asylum. In 1843, when it opened, it was considered …

BIRTHRIGHT

The weekend is almost upon us! What are you reading? Let’s look at Birthright by Christine Morgan. We love genre and subgenre diversity in an author. In additions to writing superior extreme horror, Christine Morgan has a singular talent for creating less graphic folklore, supernatural, and cosmic horror. If you have not yet had the …

Haunted Locations: Sallie House, Kansas

Welcome back to another Weird Wednesday where we like to go on short jaunts through historically haunted places. Today's trip is short but not very sweet. The location featured today has been hailed as one of the country's most haunted locations. Read on to find out why. Located in Atchinson, Kansas, the Sallie House is …

True Crime Sunday: Barbara Erni and Her Mysterious Trunk

Summer isn’t far away. You know what’s a fun way to welcome the warm weather? Talking about great cons for True Crime Sunday! That’s right, we’ll spend the month looking at hoaxes and frauds and grifts– oh my! This week, we’ll be looking at a woman who sounds like something out of myth. She had …

True Crime Sunday: Big Bertha Heyman

We’ve spent the last three weeks talking about Jack the Ripper, so I thought we’d do something a little different this week. Today we’re taking a look at a charismatic lady who gave zero hoots, who turned lemons into lemon merengue pie, and who may or may not have been somewhat of a Robin Hood. …

Haunted Locations:The Bell Witch Cave, TN

Welcome back to Weird Wednesday when we explore the haunted and horrifying houses of the dead,  the demons, and the dreadful.  Today’s trip takes us to Robertson County, TN, home of the Bell Witch.  The legend of the Bell Witch dates back to 1804 and has been known as one of the most famous haunted …

True Crime Sunday: George chapman (Jack the Ripper, part 3)

Welcome to part three of our look at the infamous Jack the Ripper case. Last week, we took a look at the murder of Carrie Brown, a New York prostitute who was killed in 1891 under circumstances not entirely unlike those of the canonical five killed by Jack the Ripper in Whitechapel. This week we’re …

True Crime Sunday: Carrie Brown (Jack the Ripper, part 2)

Last week, we looked at one of the most infamous unsolved cases in history— Jack the Ripper. It is agreed his reign of terror took place in Whitechapel in 1888 and that Mary Anne Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary Jane Kelly are all Ripper’s canonical victims. Was 1888 the beginning and …

Haunted Locations: Stull Cemetery- Lecompton, Kansas.

Welcome back to Weird Wednesday where we explore the frightening, the fearful, and the freaky! Hope all of you friendly fiends are ready for today’s edition! Stull Cemetery in Lecompton Kansas has one of the most colorful back stories of this series, so far. Rumored to contain the actual Highway to Hell and has been …

True Crime Sunday: Jack the Ripper (part 1)

I’ve been holding off on talking about Jack the Ripper because I feel like everyone talks about him. Even people who don’t have an interest in true crime know at least the nuts and bolts about the case. However, I came upon a possible connection as I was doing some research for today’s post. So …

True Crime Sunday: Burke & Hare, resurrectionists

For this week, I had robbery on the brain. No, not like that. I had thought about piracy or highway robbery. Then I remembered another kind: grave robbery. Today’s story is about a couple of grave robbers and murderers and a new industry created by a new law. In 19th century Scotland, medical students used …

Haunted Locations: Mansfield Reformatory, Ohio

Welcome back to Weird Wednesday where we like to take a walk on the wild side!Today, we visit Mansfield Reformatory, home of the Shawshank Redemption film location! The Ohio State Reformatory began construction in 1886, right on top of a former Civil War Camp site and admitted its first inmate in 1896. The goal of …

Did You Know …?

Happy Monday! It’s time for Did You Know. Yesterday marked the beginning of the Chinese New Year celebrations. This is the Year of the Rabbit. But did you know Chinese New Year and Lunar New Year are the same celebration? It’s true. The holiday is referred to as the Lunar New Year because it follows …

Audiobooks

Happy Monday. It’s time for Did You Know. There are a lot of differing opinions about listening to audiobooks vs visually reading a book, but did you know listening to audiobooks can be therapeutic? It’s true. For many, the first experience of books is not reading to ourselves but being read to by others: parents, …

January

Happy Monday and Happy New Year. It’s time for Did You Know. January was named for the Roman god Janus, known as the protector of gates and doorways, who symbolized beginnings and endings. Janus is depicted with two faces, one looking into the past, the other with the ability to see into the future. The …

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from everyone at Stiched Smile Publications  

Merry Yule

Merry Yule! Happy Winter Solstice! May the light of the sun shine on you and yours this Yuletide Season.  

Yuletide Season

Happy Monday! It’s time for Did You Know. You are probably familiar with the seasonal tradition of the Yule log and have likely heard the Christmas carol “Deck the Halls” lyric  “troll the ancient yuletide carol.” Today, “Yule” and “Yuletide” are largely associated with Christmas, but did you know the meaning behind Yule is quite …

Happy Hanukkah

Hanukkah Sameach! May this festival bring blessings upon you and your family.  

TBT: TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE YULETIDE

Happy Throwback Thursday! Today we have a throwback to December 2016, a seasonal poem from the Darque Bard, Matthew Byers. Twas the Night Before Yuletideor Santa vs. the Reindeer Twas the night before Yuletide, and all through the landSanta Claus was preparing to make Christmas grand.He went out to his stables, his heart full of …