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he writer is not the infamous Stephen King antihero Mort Rainey, but the far more nefarious author of the novels Dark Shadows: Dreams of the Dark (with Elizabeth Massie), Balak, The Lebo Coven, The Nightmare Frontier, Blue Devil Island, The Monarchs, Young Blood (with Mat & Myron Smith), several novels in Elizabeth Massie's Ameri-Scares series for young readers; six short story collections; and around 200 published works of short fiction (for a complete bibliography, click the "Bibliography" button in the left-hand column and then run like hell).
Those with long memories may recall that I edited Deathrealm magazine, from 1987 to 1997. In its decade-long history, Deathrealm won a bunch of nice awards and featured hundreds of short stories, poems, and essays by authors ranging from the most established professionals to young, aspiring first-timers, many of whom proceeded to carve out names for themselves in the horror/dark fantasy field. Note: Deathrealm has been dead, bereft of life, and pushing up daisies for a quarter century now, so please don't send me your submissions anymore. Really. Please. |
After Deathrealm's passing, I edited an anthology for Delirium Books, titled Deathrealms, which features a selection of short stories from the magazine. I've edited a couple of other anthologies as well. The Song of Cthulhu (Chaosium, 2001) features 20 stories of Lovecraftian horror, and Evermore (Arkham House, 2006), which I co-edited with James Robert Smith, is a volume of short stories about Edgar Allan Poe, many featuring him as a character. And, most recently, Deathrealm experienced its own resurgence, with a new anthology called Deathrealm: Spirits, which I edited in 2023 for Shortwave Publishing.
Dark Regions Press has published two collections of my short fiction: Other Gods (2008), which features 16 of my tales, including one never-before-published story ("Antidotes"), and The Gaki & Other Hungry Spirits (2011), with 17 stories, including six that were previously unpublished. In 2022, Black Raven Books published Fugue Devil: Resurgence, a new collection featuring several of my older works as well as a few new tales.
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It goes without saying that I have a number of new dark and delightful tales coming down the pike, for which I'll post details when they're available. Be ready...and be afeared.
"So what's this 'Damned Rodan' business plastered all over everything?" Well, I'll tell you. My one gaming vice was playing the World War II online combat flight simulator Aces High. I belonged to the oldest organized (and arguably most respected) squadron of flight simmers: "The Damned." And being a diehard fan of giant Japanese monsters, my flight sim handle is Rodan—thus "Damned Rodan."
I live in Martinsville, Virginia, with my Damned wife, Kimberly, and a passel of Damned housecats, and over the past few years have become an avid Damned geocacher— as Damned Rodan, naturally. For updates on what's happening currently, visit
The Blog Where Horror Dwells. |
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High school days.
I did too have hair. |
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