Feel That Chill? It’s Time for Our Annual Scary Story Contest

It’s been a hectic year here at Jezebel. As you may or may not know, about 11 months ago, the company that used to own us shuttered the website and laid off the staff. A couple of weeks later, Paste Magazine bought us and brought back Lauren, Kylie, and Audra. Many of the rest of us have stuck around in some capacity or another; I’ve remained as a contributing editor. But while many things have changed, one of Jezebel’s spookiest, creepiest, most time-honored traditions remains: our annual scary story contest. And I still have the enviable job of overseeing all your eerie, hair-rising submissions. 

In case you’re new here (or have missed this particular rite), throughout October, readers just like you will submit their scary stories in the comments section of this post. At the end of the month, I’ll pick the best 10 and publish them, bestowing upon the winners the glory and the recognition of really freaking us the hell out. 

There are but a few simple rules:

• Your story must be true. The best guidance on this comes from former Jezebel editor Madeleine Davies: You are “on the honor system here and—of course—when we’re talking about ghosts, the truth is relative to what you believe. To clarify: It must be experienced or sincerely believed by YOU, the teller.” 
• Your story must be scary. Not pithy or moralistic… Scary. Frightening. Unnerving. Makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up. You get it!
• You must submit your story in the comments of this post. The public nature of these scary story submissions is half the fun.  
• Unnecessarily long stories will be penalized in the final judging—aka I am less likely to pick them. We’re reading these to be scared, not to memorize blueprints of the haunted theater you used to work in. The only edits I’ll give the final stories will be for readability.

One of the many changes Jezebel has undergone over the past year is the move away from Kinja, our former commenting system. Now we use Disqus; to share your spooky story (or to comment on any other posts), you can make a new account or connect Disqus to an existing account you have with Apple, Google, X, etc. (And, though we do offer special perks for our subscribers, commenting is free.)

For reminders of what we’re looking for (and to tide you over until the comments section of this post becomes stuffed with scariness), here are some winning scary story posts from past years: 2023, 2022, 2021, 2019, and 2013.

Time to revisit those creepy memories you’ve tried to forget, and those brushes with the supernatural that have haunted you. I can’t wait to read them.