Eventually I'll write a novella about why The Event: Carnival of Souls was unpublished and re-published as The Event: Sarah's Keep, but for now, let's keep things civil. 

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The weird part of the story right now is that it took just about two years for this seventh collection of The Event story anthology to finally see the light of day. We had the idea for this type of collection in December of 2023 ... and planned on having it come out around Halloween 2024. Well, clearly we missed that target. We were not deterred. I did my best to keep the project alive in my mind as well as the writers who had signed on. For my part, I kept working through other creative writing projects that popped up while slowly chipping away at "Paper Town." Bob Miller had turned in a draft of his story and then J.C. Skala delivered the final version of his. Now, it was just up to me and Liz to finish and get publish-ready.

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And ... here we are. No one really took the bait and went full horror on the collection, but I guess that happens when you give a group of writers carte blanche with a straightforward premise. Everyone's muse speaks differently.

 

The Event: Sarah's Keep.

 

It was gone. And then it was there.

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A small circus pops up overnight in an abandoned cornfield just outside the tight-knit farming community of Sarah's Keep, Nebraska. The circus had the hand-painted banner "World Carnival" stretched across the front of the big top tent. Clowns, a funhouse, a carousel, jugglers, musicians, carnies and "sights to amaze" thundered along for an entire week before, once again, disappearing without a warning. Without a trace. Except for the faint hint of calliope music carried in upon the wind from parts unknown.

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DETAILS

Published: 12/04/2025

Total Volume: 225 pages, 59,763 words

 

CONTRIBUTORS

​Steve Metcalf - Paper Town (20,368)

J.C. Skala - Just War (8,881)

Robert S. Miller - The Circus Arrives in Sarah's Keep (15,970)

Elizabeth Indra - Carnival of Spores (11,348)

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