Barry Hoffman is a veteran author who isn’t afraid to speak or write his mind when it comes to the darker, more troubled side of society’s core. Founder of the Bram Stoker award-winning specialty press, Gauntlet Press, Barry is well known for his Eyes series and several outstanding stand-alone novels such as Track of My Eyes and, most recently, Silent Scream. Never one to shy from controversy, Hoffman often pushes the envelope on the personal turmoil of his characters while navigating them through the streets of Philadelphia, whether it’s to track down human monsters or fight to survive a force that’s not quite human at all.Continue Reading
After decades of cranking out high-caliber, genre-smashing literature, and with a badass martial arts pedigree to boot, it’s remarkable that no one tackled a documentary about East Texas’ reigning champion of mojo storytelling, Joe R. Lansdale. Along came intrepid New York City filmmaker Hansi Oppenheimer, a self-described fangrrrl who grabbed her camera and jetted to the source, joining Lansdale in his hometown Nacogdoches, Texas, to film All Hail the Popcorn King. It was a journey — what Lansdale’s rabid fans might call a pilgrimage — to East Texas, the site where the local color echoes through Lansdale’s masterful tales of blue-collar anti-heroes, two-bit criminals, and voracious monsters lurking in raucous honky-tonks, musty movie houses, and swampy bottom lands frequented by their fictionalized counterparts. Through her lens, Oppenheimer grants us an intimate visit with our favorite raconteur, inviting us into the oldest town in Texas, and the place Lansdale calls home.
