Halloween: A Frightening Reminder of Our Climate Crisis

The Drowned Will Rise and Other Tales of Climate Terror features five entirely fictional (and wonderfully punny) authors. Their “stories” aren’t real, but the science behind the scares definitely is. Here’s a peek at the fake horrors—and the real headlines inspiring them:

The Drowned Will Rise — by Marina Trench

Fiction: The ocean claims the coasts—and the drowned souls are marching back to shore.

Reality Check: The sea itself is already reclaiming the coasts. Since 1880, global sea level has risen 8 to 9 inches, and the rate has doubled in just the past 30 years. Entire neighborhoods in places like Miami, Jakarta, and the Pacific Islands now flood even on sunny days. NASA data released this year showed that the oceans are rising faster than expected—a quiet, relentless tide rewriting the map of the world. The ghosts are metaphors. The water isn’t!

Children of the Permafrost — by Icyla F. Chillmore

Fiction: Spirits long frozen in the Arctic awaken as glaciers melt.

Reality Check: The Arctic really is giving up its dead. The region is warming four times faster than the rest of the planet, and the once-frozen permafrost—ground that’s stayed solid for millennia—is thawing. It’s releasing massive stores of methane and carbon dioxide, gases that trap heat and accelerate the cycle. Scientists have even found viruses thousands of years old in thawing ice. We made up the ghosts, but something ancient really is stirring.

The Blooming — by Flora Ghastly

Fiction: A sentient vine feeds on human grief and spreads across the globe.

Reality Check: In truth, climate change is feeding an invasion. Rising temperatures are turning once-cold regions into perfect breeding grounds for invasive species—plants, insects, and fungi that choke out native life. The U.S. Geological Survey calls climate change a “threat multiplier” for invasives, while the IUCN warns they’re now one of the top five causes of global biodiversity loss. Our grief isn’t just emotional; it’s ecological.

The Last Ember — by Ember L. Pyre

Fiction: Wildfires grow so vast that the smoke whispers the names of those next to burn.

Reality Check: In real life, it doesn’t whisper—it chokes. 2024 saw record-breaking wildfires in Canada, Greece, and across the western U.S. The smoke turned skies orange from New York to Europe. Scientists warn that wildfires now burn twice as much tree cover as they did twenty years ago, and climate change has doubled the pace of these infernos. By 2050, smoke-related deaths in the U.S. could exceed 70,000 a year. The monsters here aren’t spirits—they’re drought, heat, and human neglect.

The Importance of Fiction in Facing Reality

So why write fake horror stories about real horrors? Because sometimes, fiction helps us face the truth. These made-up tales remind us that the scariest monsters aren’t ghosts or vines—they’re rising CO₂ levels, melting ice, and our own inaction.

Luckily, real-world authors are already turning climate anxiety into powerful storytelling. Check out works like The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson, Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler, and The Deluge by Stephen Markley—stories that mix hope with horror and challenge us to imagine a different ending.

Fake horror. Real climate crisis. The only thing scarier than these stories is pretending they’re fiction.

Conclusion

As Halloween approaches, let’s remember that the real terrors we face are not just in our imaginations. They are rooted in the reality of climate change. The tales we tell can inspire action and awareness. This Halloween, let’s turn our fright into fight. Let’s address the climate crisis head-on.

Together, we can create a future where the only things we fear are the ghosts of our past inaction.