Chilling out at the Festival of Bogles

Just a short drive or train trip from normal, sensible urban life in Falkirk Scotland’s capital of creepiness is the inevitable setting for a Hallowe’en week orgy of horror and loathesomeness (starts October 26).

Most of the tourists who swarm across every square inch of Auld Dreichie during the summer months have gone home, and the pitiless ice-cold wind from the Forth whistles through the forlorn wynds of the sepulchral Old Town.

So ... it must time for another Festival.

Called, not unreasonably, The Edinburgh Horror Festival, this will be the third year in which this elaborate themed wheeze will be seeking to woo punters at the awkward time of the year between August and Christmas when most people like to stay indoors.

A six day programme of events is springing up at Banshee Labyrinth and Lauriston Castle, not to mention the somewhat stodgily titled Horror Film and Literature Conference – which takes place in what’s argued to be Scotland’s Most Haunted Pub.

The star turn at this event is a chap called Dacre Stoker, great great grand nephew of Bram Stoker - author of Dracula - and (it says here) the only person officially recognised by the Stoker estate as being able to continue the Dracula legacy, using Bram’s own original notes.

Meanwhile a “mind reading show” will include a prediction of what will be the front page headline on Falkirk Herald’s sister paper, the Edinburgh Evening News on Hallowe’e n.

The predicted headline will be played in a sealed envelope and kept in a secure location, and will only be opened on the night.

The festival line-up also features regulars of the Edinburgh comedy circuit such as Des O’Gorman, while Big Puppet Theatre

(with sell-out shows in previous years) will be appearing with two brand new horror plays.

Survivors of the nuclear winter can find shelter in Katie Richardson’s boutique bunker in Fallout, an immersive piece which follows domestic goddess Lotta Quizeen’s attempts to maintain order in an increasingly chaotic world that examines “how #MeToo has affected women of all generations”.

Then to help celebrate the 200th anniversary of the publication of Frankenstein, Posturous Productions will be throwing the main switch on their hit Fringe pantomime “Frankomime’s Monster” in “an exciting over 18s only version”.

There’s also that cruise through the zombie-infested canal waters of Fountainbridge to look forward to, a Haunted Hunt to track down an escaped monster, ghost stories in the castle, and very much more besides.

More details and ticket information about what’s being cheerfully billed as “the Edinburgh Fringe for Horror” can be found at