This post is part of a series on time travel and alternate history fiction — and why we reach for it when the present gets loud. Right now, these books are all available together in the Escape from 2026 Storybundle, through June 25, 2026.
What if the monsters aren’t the scariest thing on the road?
Amazing Monster Tales: Monster Road Trip is ten stories of monsters on the move: werewolves, goblins, tentacled things, a zombie plague in the Nevada desert, Medusa on a detour somewhere east of Turkey. Jamie Ferguson and I put this anthology together because we wanted to see more stories that were fun and had monsters, exploring the idea of modern pulp fiction. Editing the series has been a hoot. Contributors are always going in directions we never anticipated.
Something worth noticing: a lot of these stories are talking about something that would be really grim if you took the monsters away. The kinds of things High Literature writes about in deep, meaningful, and kind of depressing ways. With monsters, though? It’s easier to take a step back and laugh about the hard parts.
What Jamie and I and the rest of our authors ended up writing about for Monster Road Trip, for the most part, was a familiar world changing underneath us—and not necessarily because of the monsters.
Some stories are about people and monsters being preyed on by bigger, scarier monsters, and having to make weird alliances or take weird tactics to escape. Some are about negotiating through the changes. Others about protecting the most vulnerable. Some about hiding in plain sight. Others about finally just walking away.
None of those choices are right or wrong. But thinking about monsters and road trips brought us all to thoughts about how the world changes—and how one might respond to it.
Amazing Monster Tales: Monster Road Trip is in the Escape from 2026 Storybundle—available through June 25, 2026, starting at pay-what-you-want.
Why are we all reading time travel and alternate history fiction right now? Read the hub post here.
About the Editors
Jamie Ferguson writes stories where magic lives just beneath the surface—where ghosts haunt houses that no longer exist, selkies are stranded far from the sea, and witches discover their power one herb at a time. Her work blends folklore, emotional depth, and a deep empathy for characters navigating impossible choices. She lives in Colorado, where her two border collies are still waiting for her to get them a proper herd of sheep.
Find out more about Jamie at: jamieferguson.com
DeAnna Knippling writes atmospheric gothic horror, mystery, suspense, and twisted tales from the edge of space & time. Her hobbies are cooking, taking long walks on Florida beaches, digging into the realm of open-source intelligence, fangirling over history, science, and psychology—and reading lots of fiction, graphic novels, and web comics while her tea goes cold.
Find out more about DeAnna at: wonderlandpress.com
