Editors Justine Geoffrey and Scott R Jones, along with everyone else at MMP HQ, are very pleased to announce the authors who’ll be gracing the pages of the premiere issue of NECRONOMICUM: The Magazine of Weird Erotica! But before we get to those names, we’d like to also present the amazing cover art we’ve commissioned from Vancouver-based artist and illustrator Michael “Alchemichael” Lee Macdonald!

Our intention with NECRONOMICUM is to showcase transgressive weird-erotic stories that go beyond the usual expectations, stories that aren’t simply “monster sex” or be-tentacled parodies of erotica. We want the magazine to push the boundaries of weird-erotica while still honouring the traditions that have built this very specific genre, and to do it all with a certain class. If you think you’ve seen enough hentai to know where we’re going, we’d like to ask you to think again. We also wanted to pay homage to the mythical book of Cthulhu Mythos magic and madness that the magazine’s name puns on. So: sex, horror, and contact with divine (if unholy) beings… the ecstasy of encountering the wholly Other… how to pull that off, and do it in a classy way?

Enter Gian Lorenzo Bernini and his The Ecstasy of St Teresa…

Bernini's "The Ecstasy of St Teresa"

Thanks, you naughty Christians saints, you! It’s that kind of transcendent confrontation with another realm of Being that we want to highlight in NECRONOMICUM (with the occasional break for funny bits!) and so we turned to Macdonald (who provided the interior illustrations for Jones’ When The Stars Are Right: Towards An Authentic R’lyehian Spirituality earlier this year) and asked him if he could, y’know, give Teresa of Avila a splendidly squamous dose of Lovecraft.

As it turns out, he could. Boy, could he ever.

"Sweetness of This Excessive Pain" by Michael Lee Macdonald

Sure, sure… the angel and the arrow are gone. But do you really miss them? Nah!

And now, below, the pretty-much-final cover for NECRONOMICUM #1! You’ll notice we have some authors listed here, and we’re very proud to see their names on this fantastic piece of art and design. The magazine will have stories by Christine Morgan, Sean Hoade (with the funny bit mentioned above!), Jessica McHugh, Konstantine Paradias, and the legendary Ramsey Campbell! There will also be steamy poetry selections from Portland’s own Pattie Palmer-Baker and Richard King Perkins II, as well as an illuminating short essay by Bobby Derie (author of Sex & the Cthulhu Mythos) on our literary-smut mag predecessor, the short-lived but memorable CthulhuSex magazine. And of course, a brief letter of introduction from our editrix Justine Geoffrey.

NECRONOMICUM: The Magazine of Weird Erotica Issue #1 will be online and available for pre-order purchase as an e-magazine (in multiple formats) from the MMP Bookstore and Amazon by the first week of October, and officially drops THURSDAY OCTOBER 23, just in time for Halloween. The magazine will be released electronically three times a year, with a planned best-of collection each autumn. We hope you’ll join us for the ride!

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