Steven LaChance Blog

“He turns; I can see his frontal torso in the light. It’s covered in blood. Is he looking at me?

The room begins to spin. The sound of his desperation matches the tempo of his hands scrubbing his body. The room keeps spinning and spinning. I still feel his eyes on me. I can’t breathe. Oh my God, I can’t breathe…”

Steven LaChance

The Uninvited

It’s hard to believe it’s been almost twenty years this week since I sat down to write my story.

Part of me was afraid to do it.

Part of me just needed it out of me.

Looking back, it really was a kind of exorcism. Not of a house, but of my memories and the nightmares tied to them.

That nightmare you just read was one of the catalysts. They came over and over again. Not just dreams, but something that lingered after I woke up. They didn’t fade. They stayed with me, adding to the confusion, the fear, and the need to understand what had happened to us.

When I finally started writing, it didn’t come out slowly.

It poured out.

The entire book was written in less than three weeks. Once the first words hit the page, it was like something broke open. I couldn’t stop it. I didn’t try to.

There were days I sat at the keyboard and cried while I wrote. Not because I was trying to be emotional, but because I was back in it. Every moment. Every feeling. Every unanswered question.

I think that’s what made The Uninvited different.

It was never just about fear.

It was about what leads up to it.

What it does to you.

What it leaves behind.

At the time, I wasn’t thinking about readers or reception. I was just telling the truth as I experienced it. But over the years, I’ve come to understand that this is probably why people connected with it. It wasn’t polished. It wasn’t distant. It was lived.

Sharing that much of yourself with the world is a strange thing. You open the door and you don’t know what’s going to walk in. Of course there are critics. There always are. But I’ve been fortunate. The good has far outweighed the bad, and that’s something I don’t take lightly.

I still remember the day the book was released.

I was terrified.

I didn’t know if anyone would care. I didn’t know if anyone would believe it. I didn’t even know if anyone would understand it.

And now here we are, nearly two decades later.

Those pages are still finding people.

And I still hear from them.

When I heard it had been called a must-read in true horror, I remember just sitting with that for a moment. Not out of pride, but out of disbelief. Because for me, it was never about horror. It was about trying to make sense of something that never made sense.

So thank you.

Thank you for reading this book.

Thank you for reading the others.

Thank you for staying on this road with me.

I went looking for answers back then. I thought if I could just understand it, maybe it would settle something inside me.

It didn’t.

What I found instead were more questions. And over time, I’ve come to accept that the answers may never come. Maybe they were never meant to.

What I do know is this.

Something happened to us.

Something real. Something that changed everything.

And no answer, no matter how complete, would ever undo those days.

I can live with that now.