In the 1980s, it seemed impossible to escape Satan’s supposed influence. Everywhere you turned, there were warnings about a widespread evil conspiracy to indoctrinate the vulnerable through the media they consumed. This percolating cultural hysteria, now known as the “Satanic Panic,” not only sought to convince us of devils lurking behind the dials of our TVs and radios and the hellfire that awaited on book and video store shelves, it also created its own fascinating cultural legacy of Satan-battling VHS tapes, audio cassettes and literature. The second book by Canadian micro-publisher Spectacular Optical, Satanic Panic: Pop-Cultural Paranoia in the 1980s, offers an unprecedented and in-depth exploration of how a controversial culture war played out during the decade, from the publication of the memoir Michelle Remembers in 1980 to the end of the McMartin “Satanic Ritual Abuse” Trial in 1990. This new anthology, expected to be released in summer 2015, follows on the success of KID POWER!, Spectacular Optical’s inaugural book about cool, tough and sassy kids in cult film and television.

Satanic Panic: Pop-Cultural Paranoia in the 1980s features new essays and interviews by 20 emerging and established writers who address the ways the widespread fear of a Satanic conspiracy was both illuminated and propagated through almost every pop culture pathway in the 1980s, from heavy metal music to Dungeons & Dragons role playing games, Christian comics, direct-to-VHS scare films, pulp paperbacks, Saturday morning cartoons, TV talk shows and even home computers. The book also features case studies on McMartin, Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth and Long Island “acid king” killer Ricky Kasso. From con artists to pranksters and moralists to martyrs, the book aims to capture the untold story of the how the Satanic Panic was fought on the pop culture frontlines and the serious consequences it had for many involved.

Satanic Panic features essays and interviews by authors and media critics including Gavin Baddeley (Lucifer Rising: Sin, Devil Worship and Rock n’ Roll), Liisa Ladouceur (Encyclopedia Gothica), David Flint (Sheer Filth!), Alexandra Heller-Nicholas (Rape Revenge Films: A Critical Study), Adrian Mack (The Georgia Straight), Forrest Jackson (Cosmic Suicide: The Tragedy and Transcendence of Heaven’s Gate), Alison Nastasi (Flavorwire), Leslie Hatton (Popshifter), David Canfield (Twitch), David Bertrand (Fangoria; Spectacular Optical), Alison Lang (Rue Morgue, Broken Pencil), Kevin L. Ferguson (Eighties People), Wm Conley (Deathwound), Kurt Halfyard (Twitch), Samm Deighan (Satanic Pandemonium), Stacey Rusnak (The Postnational Fantasy: Essays on Postcolonialism, Cosmopolitics and Science Fiction), Ralph Elawani (C’est complet au royaume des morts), Gil Nault (Liturgie apocryphe) and Joshua Graham, alongside co-editors Kier-La Janisse (House of Psychotic Women: An Autobiographical Topography of Female Neurosis in Horror and Exploitation Films) and Paul Corupe (Canuxploitation). The book will also feature comic art by Rick Trembles (Motion Picture Purgatory) and original illustrations by Toronto artist Mike McDonnell.

**Also JUST ADDED: The Foreword will be written by none other than APOCALYPSE CULTURE editor and Feral House honcho Adam Parfrey, with the afterword by John Schooley, SP aficionado and legendary one-man band.

What We Need and What You Get:
We’ve completed pre-production work on Satanic Panic, and it is now in the final stages of layout, with a print deadline the first week of June.  To help cover the printing costs, we’re offering the chance to pre-order the book and help us get the book released in time for the Fantasia International Film Festival, where we plan to launch it in conjunction with Librarie Drawn & Quarterly, followed by a US launch shortly thereafter. 

The funds raised here will go specifically toward printing costs and artist fees – not only designer fees, but all contributors to the book receive royalties on every copy sold. Part of our goal with Spectacular Optical is to create a small but sustainable business that is able to pay artist fees to the many awesome (and often underpaid) writers and graphic artists working in our field, and to give them books they are proud of. Any writers who contributed to our last book, KID POWER! can vouch for us on this count.

The book will be a stylish 7 X 9” paperback book, approximately 350 pages, B+W with a full colour section.

Check out some rough sample pages below:

FOREWORD
By Adam Parfrey

INTRODUCTION
By Kier-La Janisse

REMEMBERING MICHELLE REMEMBERS
By Alexandra Heller-Nicholas

THE UNHOLY PASSION: SEX AND GENDER ANXIETY IN RUSS MARTIN'S EROTIC HORROR PAPERBACKS
By Alison Nastasi

DICING WITH THE DEVIL: THE CRUSADE AGAINST GAMING
By Gavin Baddeley

20-SIDED SINS: HOW JACK T. CHICK WAS DRAWN INTO THE RPG WAR
By Paul Corupe

MASTERS OF THE IMAGINATION: FUNDAMENTALIST READINGS OF THE OCCULT IN CARTOONS OF THE 1980s
By Joshua Graham

DEVIL ON THE LINE: TECHNOLOGY AND THE SATANIC FILM
By Kevin L. Ferguson

ALL HAIL THE ACID KING: THE RICKY KASSO CASE IN POPULAR CULTURE
By Leslie Hatton

"WHAT ABOUT THESE 10,000 SOULS, BUSTER?" GERALDO'S DEVIL WORSHIP SPECIAL
By Alison Lang

THE FILTHY 15: WHEN VENOM AND KING DIAMOND MET THE WASHINGTON WIVES
By Liisa Ladouceur

SCAPEGOAT OF A NATION: THE DEMONIZATION OF MTV AND THE MUSIC VIDEO
BY Stacy Rusnak

TRICK OR TREAT: HEAVY METAL AND DEVIL WORSHIP IN 80s CULT CINEMA
By Samm Deighan

STEALING THE DEVIL'S MUSIC: THE RISE OF CHRISTIAN METAL AND PUNK
By David Bertrand

THE TRACKING OF EVIL: HOME VIDEO AND THE PROLIFERATION OF SATANIC PANIC
By Wm. Conley

BEDEVILING BOB: PRANKING "TALK BACK WITH BOB LARSON"
By Forrest Jackson

CONFESSIONS OF A CREATURE FEATURE PREACHER: OR, HOW I LEARNED TO LOVE MIKE WARNKE AND STOP WORRYING ABOUT SATANISM
By David Canfield

BOUC EMISSAIRE: MANIFESTATIONS OF SATANIC ANXIETY IN QUEBEC
By Ralph Elawani and Gil Nault

THE DEVIL DOWN UNDER: SATANIC PANIC IN AUSTRALIA, FROM ROSALEEN NORTON TO ALISON'S BIRTHDAY
By Alexandra Heller-Nicholas

GUILTLESS: BRITAIN'S MORAL PANICS, SATANIC HYSTERIA AND THE STRANGE CASE OF GENESIS P-ORRIDGE
By David Flint

FALSE HISTORY SYNDROME: HBO's INDICTMENT: THE MCMARTIN TRIAL
By Adrian Mack

END OF THE 80s: PARANOIA AS COMIC CATHARSIS IN JOE DANTE'S THE 'BURBS
By Kurt Halfyard

AFTERWORD
By John Schooley

Editions of the book include:

·  Regular Edition

·  Collector’s Edition (limited to 75, comes with Rick Trembles’ fake Christian comic tract “Satan’s Soap Suds”)

·  Collector’s Set (limited to 24, comes with Rick Trembles’ fake Christian comic tract “Satan’s Soap Suds”, a ‘Satanic Panic’ dice-bag, Satanic Panic back-patch and 80s Evangelical Replica T- Shirt 

*"THE COLLECTOR" Perk level comes with:
The SATANIC PANIC Book, Rick Trembles evangelical tract, T-Shirt, dice bag nd back patch as well as several artifacts that went into the making of this book, including:

Italian 976-EVIL locandina, An EVILSPEAK Japanese pressbook, 3 Slovenian WARGAMES Lobby cards, original Cornerstone magazine featuring Mike Warnke expose, Newsweek “Trash TV” issue, People Magazine featuring original Michelle Remembers Coverage and later People magazine featuring McMartin Trial, two original full colour Dungeons and Dragons early 80s advertisements, one magazine-sized poster of Blackie Lawless, 8 X 10 of Bob Larson in the 1970s, three original colour handbills for Ron Ormond's THE BURNING HELL, Aug 2007 issue of Fortean Times featuring Rosaleen Norton, 8 X 10 of TRICK OR TREAT (1986), RIVER'S EDGE 4-page sell sheet, painted He-Man cartoon trade advertisement, Nov 6, 1982 issue of UK Sounds magazine featuring Psychic TV, original German VHS of “RAGMAN” aka TRICK OR TREAT (1986), DVD of “Creepy Christian Cinema” from AV Geeks, official DVD of the original HELL'S BELLS: THE DANGERS OF ROCK AND ROLL.

Plus we've got additional perks from Synapse Films, Fantastic Fest, Miskatonic London as well as from the Spectacular Optical back-catalogue!  Here's the "KENNY" skateboard deck as listed in the "DEVIL'S TOY" perk level:

This funding challenge not only allows you to pre-order a limited edition copy of SATANIC PANIC (including goodies that won’t be available after this campaign), it’s also intended to help make the book as awesome as we know it can be and to get it to the audience that will be most appreciative over the coming festival season. We have opportunities to launch the book this summer that we don’t want to miss out on, and getting the printing funds together within a certain time will make that difference!

*PLEASE NOTE SHIPPING IS EXTRA AND MUST BE PAID AT THE TIME OF PURCHASE.

Who We Are:

Kier-La Janisse is a film writer and programmer, the founder of The Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies and Owner/Editor-in-Chief of Spectacular Optical. She has been a programmer for the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema in Austin, Texas, co-founded Montreal microcinema Blue Sunshine, founded the CineMuerte Horror Film Festival in Vancouver (1999-2005) and was the subject of the documentary Celluloid Horror (2005). She has written for Filmmaker, Shindig!, Incite: Journal of Experimental Media, Rue Morgue and Fangoria magazines, has contributed to The Scarecrow Movie Guide (Sasquatch Books, 2004) and Destroy All Movies!! The Complete Guide to Punks on Film (Fantagraphics, 2011), and is the author of A Violent Professional: The Films of Luciano Rossi (FAB Press, 2007) and House of Psychotic Women: An Autobiographical Topography of Female Neurosis in Horror and Exploitation Films (FAB Press, 2012). She co-edited Spectacular Optical Book One: KID POWER! with Paul Corupe, and is currently writing A Song From the Heart Beats the Devil Every Time, about children’s programming from 1965-1985.

Managing Editor: Paul Corupe