Will Cherico Writes!

Hello! I'm Will Cherico (21, he/him). Join me here for all my updates as a reader, writer, and filmmaker. https://linktr.ee/willcherico?fbclid=PAZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAafuDejN9sxC881CAOyjIa9ZnDtDjUPS0wNVacZ7XlmEvvBbac5WT1J5yZq0DQ_aem_23nPw1kwcoP2-Nr5WUpF6Q

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I'VE BEEN PUBLISHED IN MY FIRST PROFESSIONAL MAGAZINE!!!

A British explorer and Wild West showman team up to catch the legendary sea monster, Father Dagon. As they attempt to transport him across the sea, they are set upon by weirdness of the highest order. You can find it now in Lovecraftiana Volume 10 Issue 2. I'm so excited to be able to put a magazine with my own name in it on my bookshelf, and I hope you all will do the same.

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Will Cherico | Instagram | Linktree

Linktree. Make your link do more.

I've split my portfolio in two to better detail my experience in both fields. If anyone you know is looking for a premium writer or for someone to work on a set, send them to the link in my bio! I'm eager to be working more and would love to learn and practice my skills.

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I got a story published!! It's a very creepy one and I'm very proud of it. It's got some of my favorite sentences I've ever written. If you enjoy horror stories please give it a read. The magazine it made it into, Dug Up, is a fantastic publication with some really talented writers.

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I wanted to post a sample of Nidhogg, a fantasy story of mine that was recently published in Zoetic Magazine. If you enjoy it, you can read the rest here.

The darkness that the world had been pitched into was a truly hellish one. No sun. With another seven hours before the moons rose with the stars, Oldran had become a planet of darkness. A total silence blanketed the land, almost like the otherworldly calm of a town enjoying the refuge it’s collectively taken during a snowstorm. Svalbard was the first to act while Eirik and the others only stared into the sky in silence, mouth agape. The skald struck a chord on his lyre and muttered a few verses, and as the magic words filled the air, his instrument began to shine with a glowing blue light, creating a ring about thirty feet wide. Svalbard’s light illuminated the mountainside around them, letting Eirik see his group again. There were five of them, mercenaries sent from Ano Noss when the Nidhogg had made itself present in the sky. They had come out to the Mondon Mountain Pass where they saw the serpent swallow the low-hanging sun, the ball of light growing dimmer and dimmer as it passed through the thing’s body. Chunks of the Nidhogg had flaked off from the sheer heat of the star, falling like comets to the ground (the group had gaped when one slammed into the woods near them, rocking the mountains). Tonna, the leader of the group she called the Snow Wardens, let out a low whistle and spoke the first words anyone had said in a few minutes.

“We can’t move under these conditions.” There was another silence, and then a scoff pierced it as abruptly as a blade.

“Perceptive as always, Tonna.” It was Baug, the largest of the group. She was a hulking mass of black hair, clad in a pelt from a skinned bear. Sitting atop her shoulders were Diddiddit, the wild and unpredictable gnome that seemed to be inseparable from Baug. Eirik shivered under his thick coat. In just a matter of moments, his entire world had been reduced to a circle no larger than his immediate surroundings. Thick and messy trees on one side, a steep drop off the Mondon Mountains on the other. Both abruptly fell into nothingness where Svalbard’s light ended. Baug’s sarcastic interjection cast an uncomfortable silence over the already anxious group, and Eirik gazed numbly into Svalbard’s shining lyre. He found himself thinking stupidly mundane questions, How will the farmers know when to wake up now? and shook himself out of it. He looked to the other four Snow Wardens, and a dark spot danced in front of his vision where his eyes had narrowed on the light of the instrument. Finally his gaze fell on Tonna, the woman of twice his age that he had grown to trust to calm his fear since he was a young boy training to join the mercenaries.

“What do we do if we can’t keep moving?” Eirik asked. Tonna started a bit, as if she had forgotten she was the one in charge.

“I don’t think there’s much we can do.” The voice wasn’t Tonna’s. It was Svalbard’s. All eyes fell on him.

“There’s always something we can do,” Baug said, but Svalbard shook his head.

“I’ve heard songs, but never thought they were true. Stories to scare kids with at the very most.” He continued, “It’s the Nidhogg. It swallows the sun and signals the beginning of the end.”

Find out what happens to the Snow Wardens here, and follow me for more samples of my stories!

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I'm really excited to be working on the fantasy story I'm currently writing. It's called The Horned Crown of Madness and it's a crossover between two of my favorite characters to write. Taking lots of inspiration from the weird crossovers Michael Moorcock would do in the Eternal Champion saga. I wrote about 800 words today too! Excited to be writing it, desperate to tell someone about it, restrained by spoilers 😞

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The new Jurassic World was cool but God I wish they'd just go back to calling it Jurassic Park. Also I'm surprised Tim and Lex haven't shown up for these legacy sequels, especially with how many characters they've introduced and then gone "they were here the whole time, but offscreen!" I'd love to see TIm again.

Also why did the T-Rex teleport

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I'm further into ACOTAR now and it's really funny to me that Feyre takes a LOT of issue with Lucien and Tamlin being rich to the point where she calls their gold plates disgusting but literally a chapter later she talks about Alice "and the other servant woman" and "the stablehands," blue collar workers whose names she presumably never bothered to ask.

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I've begun reading ACOTAR for the first time and I really don't know much about it but Im very tickled by the fact that the main character is named Feyre. Fey. Like the fey. The fey in the books. The fey in the books with the protagonist named Fey.

That's peak.

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What I've Been Writing, 6/17/2025: Paul and Ron vs. The Crocoman of the Everglades (Part 2)

Concept: A splatter-filled story about a pair of old friends who go hunting for the first time for their 60th birthday and are terrorized by a local legend.

I'm stoked to say I finished my story! At 5,252 words long it's a gory, funny story about friendship... and murderous crocodile-men. I cleaned it up a little once I finished and now I'm about to start sending it to magazines to publish! Hopefully it comes out soon, and all of you will be able to read it.

“Biped? Sherry that thing was a biped!” Paul exclaimed. “Two legs!” He turned and saw that she had already made for Bigs, who Ron had managed to drag from the water and extinguish with the mud of the swamp. Paul turned and followed her.

I've got another bit I wanted to include, as I was proud of it when I wrote it. It's some Connecticut humor as well as a play on the fact that I hate the scene in monster movies where what's obviously a monster rolls by and everyone goes "no, there's no way that's what it was." Here it is:

“That was no crocodile,” he said to the group. “You folks are gonna call me crazy but… do you think that Crocoman story has any truth to it?”

“Oh jeez Paul, you’re starting to crack” - Ron began before Sherry interrupted him.

“What did you think it was? Of course it’s the Crocoman!” she said. She looked at Ron.

“If you don’t think it is that’s fine, but I’m not taking any input from the man who cooked my husband.” Bigs, lying on the ground, let out a wheezy laugh. When he opened his mouth, some smoke coughed out. 

“City slickers never believe in the local legends,” he said with a slight moan of pain as he sat up. Paul and Ron looked at each other.

“We’re from Mystic,” Paul said. “And I believe you.”

Shoutout to you if you've been to Mystic.

I was searching "Creature From the Black Lagoon" on Spotify to find some music I could listen to while I write, and I wanted to share this song I found by an artist named Damnit Diana. It's a lot of fun and went on my Halloween Party playlist right after I finished writing.

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What I've Been Writing, 6/9/2025: Paul and Ron vs. The Crocoman of the Everglades (Part 1)

Concept: A splatter-filled story about a pair of old friends go hunting for the first time for their 60th birthday and are terrorized by a local legend.

I know it's an insane title, but it's been a very fun short story to work on. Increasingly long short story, actually - it's nearly 4,000 words long and I think it has about 1,500 words left in it before I get to the end. I enjoy writing dark stories that are still fun like this, and it's actually made me appreciate splatterpunk stories a lot more than I once did - it's really hard to come up with creative gore. In fact, I might have to go back during revision and make it gorier, which has me wondering how I can make that effective. What really makes people uncomfortable but still grin dumbly, a la Friday the 13th? It's been a fun exercise, and I love stories where the sequel ideas come to me while I'm writing. I'm gonna be getting to a couple of death scenes tomorrow (I'll be writing the finale of the story!) so I'm excited to see how that turns out.

I wanted to include my favorite line I wrote for each session in this blog. Here's June 9th's:

“Yeah, I just thought I felt something brush my leg,” Paul said. “Must be nerves.” He sighed. 

“I’ve gotta steel up, it’s just gonna drag us down otherwise.” Something yanked Paul’s leg hard enough to wrench him all the way under the water. He disappeared from view under the murky surface.

“Paul? Paul!” Ron felt around in the water, “Where’d you go, man?” “Ron, come on!” Sherry shouted. “What’re two chomped-up geezers gonna do better than one?”

Ron felt a little slighted by this, having only begun to receive mail from the AARP a decade earlier, but he got the message."

I thought that was pretty funny!

I've been listening to a lot of Roky Erickson while I write this story. The combination of B-movie aesthetics and harsh rock and roll is the perfect auditory blend of what I'm going for with a fun-but-scary story, and I just love Roky in general.

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Welcome to My Writing Blog!

What I hope to achieve from this account is basically keeping anyone interested informed on how my writing is coming along, share moments in my writing I'm proud of, etc. I look forward to sharing one of my favorite things to do with all of you and I hope to read some of your work as well!