By Donna Andrews
When Barb Goffman, Marcia Talley, and I came up with the concept for Hooked on Urban Legends--and Murder!, one of my writer friends said, “I guess you already had an idea to fit the theme, right?”
Well, no. I just thought it was a cool theme. And I also knew that I work well with a story prompt. Put me in front of the computer and tell me to write a short story about anything in the world . . . my wheels just spin. But give me a prompt, and I can run with it.
And the idea came to me when I was explaining the concept to the writer friend. I explained that she could make up her own urban legend or use any existing one she liked. In fact, I probably said something rather like what I said in my own story:
The drunken high school boy picking up a beautiful pale hitchhiker who insists that he drop her off at the cemetery after giving him her phone number--a phone number that he will call the next day, only to reach the grieving mother of a girl who’d been killed in a car crash ten years ago that very night. The beautiful lady in a trailing white gown who coaxes small children to follow her into the cemetery--children who will be found the next morning lying across a particular grave, drained of all their blood. The enormous black dog who comes out of the woods every evening to sleep across his dead master’s grave.
Then that last idea seized my imagination. And I sat down and wrote “In the Cemetery” almost in one sitting. And I shared it with Barb, who gave me an idea to improve the ending. It’s not a funny story--that’s one great thing about writing short stories in addition to novels. I don’t get tired of writing a humorous mystery series, but sometimes I like to prove I can do other things, too.
And I was pleased with my story and submitted it to the judges. Because even though Marcia, Barb, and I are the editors, we have to earn our places in each anthology through the same blind submission process as everyone else. This time around, Austin Camacho, Michael Thomas Ford, and Julie Hyzy took on the task of judging. I kept my fingers crossed that they liked my story, and I thought I’d finished the assignment.
Then another story came to me. Another story that riffed on the same urban legend as “In the Cemetery.” Only this one was funny. At least I hoped it was--you never know till it hits a reader.
So I submitted “The Grim,” too. We don’t allow even the most prolific writer to have more than one story in a single anthology, so I figured if the judges liked both, the higher rated one would be in the anthology and I’d figure out someplace else to submit the other one to.
“In the Cemetery” won out for the anthology. But before I started figuring out where to send “The Grim,” Barb mentioned that she was looking for Halloween-themed stories for Black Cat Weekly, and would I like to submit “The Grim.”
You bet I would.
So “The Grim” appeared in Black Cat weekly #165 in the fall of 2025, and “In the Cemetery” appears in Hooked on Urban Legends--and Murder.
And you never know--one of these days I may feel inspired to write a third story about a cemetery grim. It’s a cool urban legend.
What exactly is a cemetery grim, you ask?
You’ll have to read the stories.
Writers with stories in Hooked on Urban Legends--and Murder!
Donna Andrews
Ellen Byerrum
Ginny Fite
Barb Goffman
Shari Held
Kathryn Holland
Smita Harish Jain
Meghan Lewis
Jane Limprecht
Alan Orloff
Pat Remick
K.M. Rockwood
Daphne Silver
Shannon Taft
Marcia Talley
Robin Templeton
Joseph S. Walker
Does your town have an urban legend?
DONNA ANDREWS has won the Agatha, Anthony, and Barry Awards, an RT Book Reviews Award for best first novel, and four Lefty and two Toby Bromberg Awards for funniest mystery. Mystery Writers of America named her a Grand Master in 2026. She is a member of the Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, and Novelists, Inc. Andrews lives in Reston, Virginia. She has written over 30 books in the Meg Langslow mystery series.
