Shrunken heads and preserved human flesh: mixing travel and horror

I've realized that I've been overlooking the horror genre on this blog. My Civil War novel A Fine Likeness is technically historical horror, although it's also been called paranormal, action/adventure, even mystery. It being between genres is one of the reasons I decided to self-publish with Kindle Direct Publishing. Now that we're in the final days leading up to its release, I'll be mixing horror in with my history posts.

As most of you know, part of my writing career is travel writing. I've seen some things that wouldn't look out of place in a horror novel, and so of course I've written about them. For example, I did an article on Five Places to See Shrunken Heads. More recently I examined the Preserved Human Flesh at Amsterdam's Tattoo Museum. When I was conducted historical research in Rome earlier this year, I took time out to write a whole series titled Vacation with the Dead: Exploring Rome's Sinister Side.

So there you go, some horror along with the history! There will be more to come. If you're more into the days of black powder and pistoleros, check out the news about my latest book project over on my personal/writing blog.


Photo courtesy Joe Mabel.