In Six O’Clock House & Other Strange Tales, meet a struggling bartender who swears the frogs outside are calling her name. A greenhouse worker lulled by an unlikely psychopomp. A twenty-something screw up who turns to his widowed neighbor–and a ghost–for redemption.

Some of these characters deserve rough justice; others, a second chance. Open these pages to curse them, to cheer them on, to cry with them at what they’ve lost–or gained. Just be careful… the waters of these stories run deep and the path through is both treacherous and dark.

Self-Made Monsters is a hybrid collection of feminist horror stories and poems. Its introduction was written by Stoker Award-nominated horror author Laurel Hightower.

Some titles in the collection have earned accolades, like “I Won’t Call It a Monster,” nominated for a 2025 Pushcart Prize by Alien Buddha Press; “Falling to Pieces,” originally published in Defunkt Magazine and selected by Neon Hemlock Press for its We’re Here: Best Queer Speculative Fiction 2022 anthology (2023); and the poem “No Rest Nor Relief For You With Me Dead,” published in the Shakespeare Unleased anthology by Crystal Lake Publishing and Monstrous Books, which was nominated for a 2024 Bram Stoker Award from the Horror Writers Association.