It’s October, which means spooky season is officially upon us. From Scream to Candyman, horror has long offered a home for queer audiences who see themselves in both the Final Girl and the misunderstood monster. Dom&Ink, creator of the graphic novel Queens of the Crypt, reflects on the rise of queer horror and how the genre inspired a story about a non-binary teen and a crypt full of iconic queens.

Guest post by Dom&Ink, creator of Queens of the Crypt. 

I remember, when I was younger, in 1997, eagerly watching classics like I Know What You Did Last Summer and Scream and being totally entranced by the jump scares, the kills, the high camp of Gale Weather’s shoulder padded neon suits (let’s not speak about the controversial bangs in Scream 3) and Sarah Michelle Gellar screaming and running through one of the greatest high camp chase scenes in horror film history (IFYKYK). Horror as a genre, for me has always been a space I’ve often felt comfort,
familiarity and inspiration. Other teens would watch Gilmore Girls before they went to sleep, I’d re-watch the iconic yet glamorous killer reveal from Urban Legend (spoiler – how did she fit all that hair under that hood though?).

As I grew older, I connected with so many other LGBTQIA+ people who loved horror. Many of us had found something in it. I truly do believe that when it feels like the real world is too much, people turn to horror for escapism to soothe their anxieties and I think as a queer person, I still do that. I would actively seek it out in television shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Willow and Tara yay), books, comics and graphic novels. I can relate to the Final Girl, with her Y2k vest, arched brows, flowing hair and block heels evading a killer atop a climatic-post-high-school-house-party-chase scene, but I can also relate to the monsters of the genre – the outcasts that were shunned by their society, the ones who were misunderstood. When I saw the late Tony Todd slowly strut onto my screen in Candyman, a hook for a hand and a long fur lined coat that flowed behind him? HOW FABULOUS. Don’t get even get me
started on the sass of The Babadook.

Currently, the genre is having a grotesquely glorious moment across all forms of media. It’s taking up space on screens with Teenage Sex & Death at Camp Miasma and winning at the Oscars with films like Sinners, The Substance and Weapons and most likely a huge contender for next year, Obsession. Widow’s Bay is winning Emmys and yes, even though you didn’t ask, I would 100% go to Patricia’s Sunset Cocktails. In publishing, it’s a continually growing genre. The Bookseller reported that between 2022 and 2023, sales of horror and ghost stories rose by 54%. Within this, there’s also a rise of trending sub genres across books and graphic novels such as Sporror (Spore Horror), Fem-gore and…Queer Horror.

In 2018, after finishing my shift at my part-time retail job, I sat on the 38 Clapton Pond bus on Halloween Eve having my 3pm Kinder Bueno (I get cranky without a sweet treat ok diva), it was then that I first thought of the characters for my graphic novel, QUEENS OF THE CRYPT. I knew that I wanted a female character ensemble and a queer main character that hadn’t really been a main character before. I worked on a story around a non-binary teen called Barnaby Jones who, finds their closet is a door to a crypt housing unspeakable evils and…iconic queens. For years, the proposal was pitched and passed on, until January 2023 when Penguin Workshop (Penguin Teen US) took a meeting with myself and my literary agent and enthusiastically loved the pitch, the story and the queerness. They understood that the female monsters in this weren’t to be feared, but to be understood. I really do believe that things are meant happen when they happen, and I truly think Queens would not have worked being published in 2020 or 2021 because horror, especially queer horror was not having the moment it rightfully deserved yet. 

If there is anything, I would want a reader to take from QUEENS OF THE CRYPT, it would be to always be authentically you, whether you’re of the living or a monster living in the darkness of a crypt.

‘You will always be a Queen’ – The Opera Phantom, QUEENS OF THE CRYPT