Whatever happened to ghosts?

So, what has happened to ghosts?

Yeah, I know about Ghost Hunters, the TV show, but I'm talking about ghosts in horror stories--the kind of fictional ghosts that haunt houses, walk through walls and do bad things to people. Where have they gone?

Zombies are big now, which is fine. I've always had a warm spot in my heart for zombies. Vampires are even bigger, but of course the romance and YA authors have stolen them from the horror writers. Worse, they've turned them into sparkly vegan boy-toys.

*sigh*

Weres are few and far between nowadays. I miss them too. And you hardly ever see a mummy any more. But I miss ghosts most of all--the good, old fashioned, evil, murderous kinds of ghosts that kept us quaking in fear under the covers late at night when we were kids.

I think I first fell in love with horror as a child when I found out I was pretty good at making up ghost stories and scaring the hell out of the other kids as we sat around a campfire late at night. Seeing their effect first hand was great fun. There's really nothing quite as satisfying as watching your best friend's eight year old brother pee his pants because a story you made up on the fly scared the bejeebers out of him. Those stories were almost always about ghosts. I still think there is nothing more frightening than a good ghost story. So where have they gone?

I wish I knew.

Mr. King, Mr. Koontz? Are you reading this? What about you Mr. Little? Mr. Ketchum? I'm sure you're all regular readers by now *cough*, so let's get on the stick. I want more ghosts. Gimme ghosts. Bring back the ghosts.