Independent publisher and horror zine creators The Nottingham Horror Collective (TNHC) are proud to release Dead Pretty: Beauty in the Horror Genre, their first full-length book.
Made possible by its Crowdfunders and with a foreword by horror filmmakers Jen and Sylvia Soska (American Mary), the book traces how beauty shapes horror across film, literature, television, and culture. Its essays move through body horror, ageing, race, gender, desire, transformation, empowerment, violence, monstrosity and the societal pressures placed on our bodies.
Dead Pretty brings together 25 writers each with distinct perspectives on beauty, horror and the cultural forces that shape them. It's designed and illustrated by Ruth Skrytek, Edited by Emily Malone, and features written works from Emily Malone, Tori Potenza, Matt Rogerson, Mo Moshaty, Emily Smith, Dr Tracy Heather Johnson, Jill Vranken, Becky Darke, Rich Johnson, Nailah King, Joe Struvallo, Katie Evans, Dr Deepak Dev, Clelia McElroy, K Potter, Jenna Ham, Maya-Gawonii Shabazz-Saleh, Meg Mechelke, Macy Briggs, Jennifer Brough, Jodie Whitchurch, Allie Lembo, Pip McGough and Fletcher Durrant.
Spanning an extensive watchlist of landmark, cult, and contemporary horror, from films like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Exorcist to The Substance, M3GAN, Onibaba, The Ugly Stepsister and Starry Eyes, the collection explores beauty across the genre’s many forms. Its essays delve into possession, revenge, body horror, coming-of-age terror, performance, and even the cosmic sublime, tracing how horror turns beauty into spectacle, punishment, disguise, aspiration and threat.
“Dead Pretty: Beauty in the Horror Genre is for anyone who has ever found something grotesque in beauty, or something beautiful in the grotesque” says Emily Malone, Co-Founder and Editor of The Nottingham Horror Collective.
“Time and again in our work, Ruth and I have come back to horror as a mirror held up to the world around us, and especially to the rules women are expected to live by inside that world,” “Beauty is one of those ideas that keeps resurfacing in the genre, but not always with the kind of depth or range it deserves. So we wanted to try to make a book big enough to hold all of that.”
“Zines have allowed us to publish arguments that don’t fit neat academic boxes and approach horror without diluting its politics or complexity. They give us the freedom to bring diverse voices together without forcing them into the same shape. They let us make room for essays that might not slot neatly into academia, mainstream publishing or tidy critical trends. They let us follow the work that feels most alive. That zine spirit is very much alive in Dead Pretty.”
Co-founded in Nottingham in 2020 by writer Emily Malone and artist Ruth Skrytek, The Nottingham Horror Collective began as a DIY zine project: a way to make beautiful, thoughtful horror publications outside traditional publishing structures. Since then, TNHC has grown into an independent publisher creating more zines and books for horror fans, by horror fans. Their work combines sharp, engaging criticism with Ruth Skrytek's distinctive visual design, championing emerging voices and perspectives that don’t always find space in mainstream publishing.
That independent philosophy runs through Dead Pretty: a beautifully-designed, passionate, punk-spirited collection that makes room for political and personal responses to horror. The result is a book made to be held, read, engaged and argued with, passed around, and displayed proudly on a shelf.
The book is available now from thenottinghamhorrorcollective.co.uk, The BFI shop, and Waterstones Nottingham. If you'd like to stock the book, please get in touch!
For review e-book copies, interviews, podcast guest appearances, images or further information, please contact:
Emily Malone and Ruth Skrytek
Co-founders, The Nottingham Horror Collective
thenottinghamhorrorcollective@gmail.com
www.thenottinghamhorrorcollective.co.uk
Instagram @thenottinghamhorrorcollective
