A Scare A Day Reading Challenge
Romancing the Gothic founder and organiser, Dr Sam Hirst, is back for another month of A Scare A Day. Dr Hirst curates a daily reading list, and the challenge is to read the story or poem for that day and post your thoughts on social media using the tag #AScareADay (not #ScareADay – don’t forget the ‘A’ at the start like I always do!)
Last year, I posted a creative response to each story or poem featured in the challenge, and turned them into Season 05 of Eldritch Girl, where I talked about the stories and poems, and read my fiction/non-fiction piece inspired by the daily read.
This year, I’m pairing the challenge with #100HorrorMoviesIn92Days so I’m going to be suggesting a film pairing to go with the story/poem, the way I do for my book reviews over on Divination Hollow.
The challenge list is posted on RomancingTheGothic.com, and below. To thank Sam for this service, you can leave them a tip on Ko-Fi!
The “A Scare A Day” Daily Reading List 2026
October 1st – Joanna Baillie – Night Tales of Other Times – 1790 – Read it here
October 2nd – Nikolai Karamzin – The Island of Bornholm – 1794 – Read it here
October 3rd – Anne Bannerman – The Black Knight of the Water – 1802 – Read it here
October 4th – William Harrison Ainsworth – The Spectre Bride – 1821 – Read it here
October 5th – Charles Pigault-Lebrun – ‘The Unholy Compact Abjured’ – 1825 – Read it here
October 6th – Mary Elizabeth Braddon – ‘The Cold Embrace’ (1860) – Read it here
October 7th – Amelia Edwards – ‘In the Confessional’ (1871) – Read it here
October 8th – Elizabeth Stuart Phelps – ‘Since I Died’ (1873) – Read it here
October 9th – Mary Elizabeth Coleridge – ‘The Witch’ (1893) – Read it here
October 10th – Arthur Machen – ‘The Novel of the White Powder’ (1895) – Read it here
October 11th – Gertrude Atherton – ‘The Striding Place’ (1896) – Read it here
October 12th – Elia W. Peattie – ‘From the Loom of the Dead’ (1898) – Read it here
October 13th – Mrs Wilson Woodrow – ‘Secret Chambers’ (1909) – Read it here
October 14th – W W Jacobs – The Well (1911) – Read it here
October 15th – Violet Hunt – ‘The Prayer’ (1911) – Read it here
October 16th – Rabindranath Tagore – ‘The Lost Jewels’ or Monihara (trans. 1917) – Read it here
October 17th – Ellen Glasgow – ‘The Past’ (1920) – Read it here
October 18th – Mikhail Bulgakov – ‘The Red Crown’ (1922) – Read it here
October 19th – John Masefield – ‘The Haunted’ (1923) – Read it here
October 20th – Elsa Morante – The Secret Game (1941) – Read it here
October 21st – Dorothy Quick – ‘After an Air Raid’ (1943) – Read it here
October 22nd – Mayra Montero – ‘Corinne, Amiable Girl’ (1994) – Read it here
October 23rd – Ahmed Khaled Tawfik – ‘The Wall’ – Read it here
October 24th – Mariana Enríquez – ‘The Little Angel’s Exhumation’ (2014) – Read it here
October 25th – A. C. Wise – ‘The Stories We Tell About Ghosts’ (2017) – Read it here
October 26th – Brandon O’Brien – ‘The Lagahoo Speaks For Itself’ (2017) – Read it here
October 27th – Darcie Little Badger – ‘Those Hitch-hiking Kids’ (2023) – Read it here
October 28th – Tyler Sookralli – ‘The Devil Wears Skin’ (2024) – Read it here
October 29th – Eleanna Castroianni – ‘They Return’ (2025) – Read it here
October 30th – Ash Vale – ‘consumed’ (2026) – Read it here
October 31st – Quincy Lee – ‘The Dark Follows Me’ (2026) – Read it here
A Scare A Day: Day 22
Day 22: “Corrine, Amiable Girl” by Mayra Montero, translated by Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert (1994). Read it here.
A Haitian tale of the living dead by Cuban-Puerto Rican writer, Mayra Montero.
Corrine doesn’t have a voice throughout the whole story, mirroring her mute fiancé, who acts on her behalf, just as the men speak and decide her future without her.
A Scare A Day: Plot Summary
Set in Haiti at a time of acute civil unrest, Apollinaire is in love with Corrine, who is due to be married to another man. Her fiancé is mute, and speaks in sign language.
Apollinaire seeks out a houngan to make Corrine into a living dead girl, so that she will be ‘amiable’ towards him and marry him instead. Unfortunately she is ‘killed’ at a time when the macoutes (the paramilitary force/secret police) begin shooting, and he cannot access the cemetary to dig Corrine up again. On his way to retrieve her he finds her fiancé, mortally wounded from a machete, and staggering around like a living dead man.
Apollinaire returns home, where he is told to find some spiders – when Corrine gets out of her grave, she will be hungry.
A Scare A Day: Film Pairing
I have not seen a lot of horror from the Caribbean, as much of it is indie and on YouTube, or produced in another country like the USA or France, so I’ve gone for a Nigerian Adult Fantasy/Horror, Ile Owo/House of Money (2022) dir. Dare Olaitan, written by Dare Olaitan.
In this, a man so rich he is called “Owo” or “Money” goes to a shaman and asks for eternal life for his sons. They each can live forever if they get a wife and sacrifice her at the right time every so often. This creates a shell of a woman they then do with as they please. If not, the House of Money (the man’s legacy & family) will be destroyed.
Nurse Busola has just broken up with the worst crypto-bro ever, and is looking for a husband. When she meets a handsome millionaire, she thinks she has met Mr Right… but he ends up giving her a cursed necklace that causes her to lose her free will, and draws her under his spell. Can she break free before it’s too late?
BONUS WATCHES
- Zombi Child (2019) dir. Bertrand Bonello, written by Bertrand Bonello – Haiti, 1962: A man is brought back from the dead only to be sent to the living hell of the sugarcane fields. In Paris, 55 years later, at the prestigious Légion d’honneur boarding school, a Haitian girl confesses an old family secret to a group of new friends – never imagining that this strange tale will convince a heartbroken classmate to do the unthinkable.
- The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988) dir. Wes Craven, written by Richard Maxwell and Adam Rodman, based on the work of Wade Davis. A Harvard anthropologist is sent to Haiti to retrieve a strange powder that is said to have the power to bring human beings back from the dead. In his quest to find the miracle drug, the cynical scientist enters the rarely seen netherworld of walking zombies, blood rites and ancient curses. Based on the true life experiences of Wade Davis and filmed on location in Haiti, it’s a frightening excursion into black magic and the supernatural.
- Possession, a 5-part Sky Original drama streaming on NOWTV and Sky. A supernatural thriller set in Bristol (England) and Jamaica, following the tale of a young bi-racial lawyer whose work takes her to Jamaica – and to a house that has haunted her dreams.
- The Croft dir. and written by Wayne Benjamin – Jamaican Horror, 44min. Watch on YouTube.
Leave a Reply