Request stories about spiders, haunted houses and spooky messengers

For the past seven years, as Halloween approaches, we’ve asked you to scare us.

And you have that.

Some of your nightmare-inducing stories really kept us awake, while others made us laugh and others made us think.

Now we would like to ask you to do it again.

To stimulate your devilish creativity, we ask you to choose from the accompanying three images of strange and spooky nightmares – a giant spider on the hunt, a mysterious envelope in the hands of a hooded man, and a lonely chair in the middle of a run-down, abandoned room – and then let your imagination run wild.

From all the stories submitted, our guest judges – artist, author and poet Kary Hess and author and filmmaker Daedalus Howell, creator of the spooky-funny film “Werewolf Serenade” – will select the three or four that scare them the most most amuse or entertain. As usual, there will be an Editor’s Pick, and there will be opportunities for runners-up and special awards for children (who are welcome to attend).

The winning stories will be published in our annual Halloween issue on Friday, October 25th.

And for the second time, we’re celebrating the winners with a special community event, a live celebration of the winners’ stories, where each winner will be read by some of the best and scariest actors in Sonoma County. The Scary Story Celebration will be held at the Word Horde Emporium of the Weird and Fantastic in the Petaluma Outlet Mall on Sunday, October 27th at 6:30 p.m.

Stories can be a maximum of 500 words long. Email your fictional creation to Community Editor David Templeton at [email protected] by Friday, October 18th. Please mention the photo that inspired you if we can’t figure it out.

And have fun.

We look forward to being spooked by you.