Leigh Blackmore

Leigh Blackmore
Leigh Blackmore in 2007
Born	Leigh David Blackmore 1959 Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Residence	Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia
Alma mater	University of Wollongong
Occupation	editor/proofreader, writer, manuscript assessor, critic, occultist, musician
Known for	"Uncharted," "Exalted Are the Forces of Darkness", Spores from Sharnoth and Other Madnesses
Parent(s)	Rod Blackmore; Elizabeth Anne James
Website	http://members.optusnet.com.au/lvxnox/

Leigh (David) Blackmore (born 1959) is an Australian horror writer, critic, editor, occultist and musician. He served as the second President of the Australian Horror Writers Association (2010–2011). His work has been nominated four times for the Ditmar Award, once for fiction and three times for the William Atheling Jr. Award for criticism.[3]. He has contributed entries to such encyclopedias as S.T. Joshi and Stefan J. Dziemianowicz (eds) Supernatural Literature of the World (Greenwood Press, 2005, 3 vols) and June Pulliam and Tony Fonseca (eds), Ghosts in Popular Culture and Legend (ABC-Clio, 2016).

According to The Melbourne University Press Encyclopedia of Australian Science Fiction and Fantasy, "His name is now synonymous with Australian horror," and a Hodder & Stoughton press release stated that, "Leigh Blackmore is to horror what Glenn A. Baker is to rock and roll." [4].He has also been recognised as "one of the leading weird poets of our era," and has been nominated for the Science Fiction Poetry Association's Rhysling Award.

Leigh Blackmore was born in Sydney, New South Wales, the son of Rod and Beth Blackmore. His early hobbies included philately and phillumeny. He read extensively from an early age, particularly Look and Learn with its Trigan Empire science fiction comicstrip, and later the works of Geoffrey Willans, J.P. Martin, Norman Hunter and W.E. Johns. While attending Lane Cove West Primary School, at around age nine he was deeply affected by a reading of Rudyard Kipling's horror story "The Strange Ride of Morowbie Jukes", by Lucy Boston's fantasy novel The Castle of Yew and by the TV broadcast of Richard Matheson's "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" episode of The Twilight Zone. He also encountered horror fiction via Stephen P. Sutton's anthologies Tales to Tremble By and More Tales to Tremble By.