Five Killer Reasons to Enter the Twisted50 Writing Initiative

I had never entered Twisted50 before and didn’t even like horror, but some writing friends advised me it was a great opportunity, so I thought I’d try it.

These are the happy, unexpected benefits of my Twisted50 journey.

Great Opportunity to Improve Your Writing and to Get Published
Twisted50 is a chance to get published as one of 50 short stories in a horror anthology. Built-in to the process is feedback. Writers enter an initial draft and a final draft. Only those signed up for the Twisted50 Community can read and review the stories. My second draft incorporated the readers’ feedback and was a vastly improved story.

Discovering the Horror Genre
Before my Twisted50 journey, I thought horror fiction wasn’t for me; too violent and dark. Once I started reading horror, I realised I was already familiar with and loved many stories that are considered horror.

An example is Shirley Jackson’s short story, ‘The Lottery’, which inspired ‘The Hunger Games’.

Great Names in Literature Write Horror
As part of my Twisted50 horror education, I discovered that some of the most acclaimed writers of all time specialised in horror, such as Clive Barker, Shirley Jackson, Edgar Allan Poe, Stephen King, H.P. Lovecraft, Mary Shelley, Joe Hill and Ray Bradbury. Reading these acclaimed writers is a masterclass in good writing.

Horror is Good for Our Mental Health
After diving into the horror genre, I noticed that reading and writing about the most terrible things I could imagine made me feel good. And it’s not only me!

The 2022 study by Coltan Scrivner (from Aarhus University in Denmark) proved that exposure to frightening fiction allows audiences to practice effective coping strategies beneficial in real-world situations. Horror fans were found to be more resilient during the COVID-19 pandemic.

I finally got something Finished!
My nightmare was not finishing stories, adding to the unseen and unsent documents littering my hard drive. The Twisted50 competition gave me a concrete deadline. And because the first version isn’t judged, my perfectionist streak meant I could upload it, knowing it wasn’t perfect.

Guess what?                           

I finished not just one but three stories…

And this blog post…

I’m now a horror fan, too!

Many thanks to Chris Jones and his Twisted50 team for supporting emerging writers.