Horrormania '79

My name is Kevin Doherty and I am a horrorholic.

My horrorholicism began back when I was a kid. Star Wars, actually, got me turned on to horror. That movie was like a drug to me and I couldn't get enough of it. I was addicted to it. I had to have everything and anything that was Star Wars. It was through the "Famous Monsters of Filmland" magazine that I discovered horror because they were constantly publishing Star Wars articles. By reading these magazines, I got exposed to the world of horror and gradually became captivated with the creepy films the magazine covered. The frightening black and white photographs of monstrosities, ghouls, and freaks contained within its pages fascinated me and I was hooked. Because there was such a long gap of time to pass between Star Wars 1 and the release of Star Wars 2, I found horror to fill the void.

My life as a young horror fanatic in 1979 was particularly interesting. I had one quest back then. OK, maybe two. One was to acquire a Pressman "Movie/T.V. Horror Make-Up" kit from the local novelty shop so that I could win a best-costume contest at a Halloween party where the first prize was a perm (yes, like in "permanent" - as in the hairstyle). Two, to win the affections of a really cute girl in my class who really dug guys with Afros. Well, buying something for twenty bucks when you're ten-years-old on an allowance of seventy-five cents every two weeks was an impossible task, so I needed to be inventive and had to come up with a bunch of different ways of raising that kind of cash in time for October, so I came up with all sorts of get-rich-quick schemes and what an adventure it was. So much so that I felt it was worth sharing by documenting my stories in a book.

Culled from the yellowed pages of the diaries I kept back then (dozens and dozens of Hilroy notebooks), I have assembled a novelization of my chronicles of the time when horror took over my life. I invite you to join me for a nostalgic look back to a time where Disco, roller skating, Star Wars, KISS and vampire movies ruled the cultural landscape.

WARNING: CONTAINS NUDITY