Annie Mitchell and her partner, Stewart Eddinger, get more than they bargain for when they find themselves haunted by intense impulses, hallucinations, and an intangible evil that seems to be the biblical Leviathan incarnate. As Annie and Stew continue their investigation into the heart of the mystery, they discover that they are being slowly consumed by an evil older than time, a horror that reaches from beyond a dark, haunted sea.
Two marine biology students attempt to reopen a cursed oceanographic project off the Outer Banks of North Carolina.
Annie Mitchell and her partner, Stewart Eddinger, get more than they bargain for when they find themselves haunted by intense impulses, hallucinations, and an intangible evil that seems to be the biblical Leviathan incarnate. As Annie and Stew continue their investigation into the heart of the mystery, they discover that they are being slowly consumed by an evil older than time, a horror that reaches from beyond a dark, haunted sea.
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Today we celebrate art from JEA. These reflect a few of my personal favorites.... Susan SimoneDavid McGlumphyMichael FisherNew with JEA: Stephen CooneyMisc.
New release:
Ideas for reading:
7. Do you have favorite words to use in writing? What are they? I love word like Labyrinth, piquant, the complicated little word that don’t get used as much as they used to be. 8. What is the funniest writing experience you’ve had? Funny, hmm, maybe writing “Frankentop” I don’t do humor because I don’t feel solid in it, but that was a lot of fun. It’s about a cat AI who sets out to build a bigger body to fit her ego, there’s humor in that one, some silliness and a touch more toward the end. I wrote it for an antho of Kaiju stories by Essel Pratt called Kaiju Rising. 9. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? Some things I have the title first, while with others it comes from the story itself, it all depends on what gets my mind going first. Usually it’s a reference to a scene or element in the story. 10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? I am not a bragger…I like to think imagery is one, characterization and emotional elements as well? Those are the things I focus on the most when I write and I work very hard to get them across the right way.
9. How do you title a book? Where does it come from?
I chose Undead Season as a title because of the time period of my books’ apocalypse. It only lasts a season. Now, is that a season as in winter, spring, summer, fall? Or is it a season as in just for a small part of a lifetime? That will be revealed in the final part of The Undead Season series. 10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? I think I’m able to make people feel what my characters are feeling or experiencing. I try to write what I know. Actually, that is the best advice I was ever given. I was given the opportunity to meet one of my favorite writers and storytellers, Katherine Tucker Windham, who is well known in the south. After she did a story telling event with a group of high school students, she was going to leave. My favorite teacher asked her to please stay and talk with me. She agreed and we had a private and personal conversation. I told her I wanted to write and she told me that if I wanted to write, to write. She told me a delightful story about her childhood and her father. Then she told me, “See what I did? I just made up a story. But it was about something I know all about. My advice is to write and to write what you know. You can do it!”
7. Do you have favorite words to use in writing? What are they? a. Maybe it is because I write horror, but my favorite word seems to be “nefarious”. I’m not sure why, but I use it a lot. 8. What is the funniest writing experience you’ve had? a. I wrote a story that is quite strange, involving a baby, eating, defecating, and birth. I received an acceptance, although the book as sense faded into nonexistence, and I showed it to my wife during my daughter’s dance recital at school. She read it and yelled out, “What’s a butt baby?” during intermission. I laughed quite hard as people around us stared her down. 9. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? a. Titles are always hard for me. Some book titles just come to me out of nowhere. Others remain hidden until the end. I usually try to use a concept from within the story and summarize it into the title. 10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? One of my strongest abilities in writing is to take a concept or idea and create a story out of it. I think that is why I love writing for anthologies, the themes give me a base to write from and I get to create the sce
10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? I think one of my strongest abilities is I’m able to start a story at any point. I can imagine the ending first, and work the plot around that, or just a random sentence can get the story started in my head. I think that I can explain and carry through a scene and still give the reader a chance to use their own imagination and that is a big thing to me. I want my readers to be able to picture in their minds what I am laying out in a storyline, and when they’re done, put the book down and say, “Wow!”
3. Give us one (or 2) character (s) (tell us the book(s)) and tell us why you admire/hate/ love that person. Answer; In Zombies, Vamps, and Fiends in the story Concrete Skull the character of Dr Thorne is fascinating. Despite a less than normal childhood she overcomes all the odds to become a successful psychiatrist studying the mind of a child killer and writing a book about it. However, she is fatally flawed and as the story progresses you find she is more involved in the crime that you first think until, finally you learn the tragic truth. The story pits good and evil together and shows the difference between the two is so thin. Just a different decision here or there and their lives could have been so different (I’m trying not to give too much away here). 4. Pick one of your covers and tell us how that represents your book. Who did the cover? How was the experience? What was the planning like? Answer; ZV&F. Designed by David McGlumphy. The fire represents the idea of gathering around a camp fire to tell tales of horror and the supernatural. The figures above are characters from a few of the stories appearing in the smoke. David and I exchanged Emails of about three days, we never disagreed on any aspect. I think he understood what I said from the start. We experimented with a few elements but agreed instantly on what worked and what didn’t. I think the whole process was done and dusted in 3 or 4 days despite us being about 5,000 miles, and several time zones apart. 5. What is publishing like? Is it difficult? Easy? Why? Answer; Frustrating. Editing can take so long to get right and it is important to get it right. Nothing frustrates a reader more than frequent mistooks. (Haha) With a good publisher, editor and formatter, and JEA have all these in abundance the process of publishing is a breeze. (Well it was for me. I expect it was a nightmare for them.) 6. In 10 years, what do you want readers to say about your work/you? Answer; “I remember him when he was a nobody, and look at him now?” That would be nice, but honestly, I settle for still writing in ten years and having other people take the time to read it. If that’s the case then I’ll consider myself successful. I’d like to think people viewed my work as an honest attempt to tell a story for the sake of the story, not writing what I think will sell just to make a quick buck. That never works because there’s no emotional investment. (If anyone wants to send me a quick buck, then please feel free! Lol) 7. Do you have favorite words to use in writing? What are they? No, not really. I try to find a word suitable to the story and the character involved. I expect if you read my book (and a recommend you do) you would find I have common or favourite words, but everyone does in their natural speech. The art of writing is too try and remove them, or find a substitute as often as possible to prevent repartition. 8. What is the funniest writing experience you’ve had? Answer; I used to go to a writers group in the local town. It wasn’t a big group, only 15-20 regulars, who were generally older. They asked for us to read a section from a piece we were currently writing. After several women’s magazine style romance pieces I stood up and gave them a gruesome murder of a Santa Clause figure. You could hear a pin drop when I finished, then the chairman said, “Oh well, keep at it.” A week later I signed a contract with JEA and sold that story to an anthology for another publisher. 9. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? Answer; This one just came to me. I obviously need to credit Cher with giving a little help. I thought, ok it’s about Zombies, Vamps and… what else. Thieves… were did that come from? Then the song dropped into my head and after a few minutes, fiends seemed to have taken root. With short stories the title often comes first and inspires the story. Sometimes after the stories written I go back and change the title, but not often. 10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? Answer; Being able to use spellchecker, even if I don’t always agree with it (smug know-it-all) Being perfectly honest, I don’t know. Maybe you should ask someone else that question. Upcoming Titles
4. Pick one of your covers and tell us how that represents your book. Who did the cover? How was the experience? What was the planning like? I have created the covers for most of the books I have appeared in, but I will have to go with DC’s Dead. I started working on the cover around the time I started writing, and it went through a great number of redesigns, evolving from the floating heads that are all to common on movie posters these days, to a dynamic cover, communicating both action as well as a sense of foreboding. The process was trying, to say the least. Sometimes, I can nail a cover on the first shot, while others are constantly demanding revision. Let me clarify; the author is not demanding the changes, but the art itself. 5. What is publishing like? Is it difficult? Easy? Why? Writing is the easy part of the publishing industry. After your manuscript is turned in, it goes through the arduous process of multiple edits, as well as cover design, formatting, advertising, promotion, ending in, hopefully, sales. For the author, it can be easy, but for those of us on the other side, it becomes the thing that consumes your life, which is the sacrifice we all make because we love putting out some of the best books on the market. 6. In 10 years, what do you want readers to say about your work/you? What? There’s a new Michael Fisher book coming out? I’ll see you at the release party, if we can get in.” 7. Do you have favorite words to use in writing? What are they? I don’t necessarily have favorite words, but rather, a favorite style. I believe in writing my dialogue in a very realistic style, and if that involves using profanity, so be it. I have been critiqued saying that the use of profanity is the equivalent of lazy writing, using empty words. I disagree. I write what I have experienced, in that regard, and when people use the term “swears like a sailor,” I remind them that I was a sailor. 8. What is the funniest writing experience you’ve had? I don’t know if I have had any funny experiences, other than the day-to-day laughs I get with the wonderful staff at JEA. 9. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? My titles usually come from a line in the story, although occasionally, it is just a concept the story represents. 10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? Like Bill MacCallen, I think my strongest ability is my determination, sticking with the story until it is done. Otherwise, I think it is my ability to create believable characters, so full of color that they are people you could imagine knowing in real life.
(Cont.) Eye think eye nailed the downward progression of his character well. His character is the most full of surprises. He has secrets. Very bad secrets that have caused him to be the main focus of Scarlett and The Sacred Blade Of Profanity throughout. He is a thief, a con artist, a kidnapper and child trafficker. He isn’t a stranger to the odd occasional murder either. One of my favourite lines in The Scarlett Curse is where Joshua is sitting on the end of his bed, realizing what a despicable piece of shit he is, and tells himself out loud… “Joshua Melkerin, you sir, are a worm. You will get what you deserve for your transgressions.”
4. Pick one of your covers and tell us how that represents your book. Who did the cover? How was the experience? What was the planning like? Toneye- Once again, The Scarlett Curse, done by JEA’s own McG.! David McGlumphy took my idea of a young woman, who is actually more like 300 years old but untouched by time, and of course, a dagger to represent The Sacred Blade Of Profanity. With just the description from the first paragraph of the book he put together a truly awesome cover! Scarlett appears almost precisely how eye imagined her. Eye look in her eyes and see that weary, ancient gaze. She has seen and experienced so many different things in her time with The Blade, and David absolutely nailed it! So haunting, and dare eye say, beautiful. Especially with the trees behind, depicting Mellowood Forest and The Sacred Blade wallowing in a recent bloodfeast in the foreground. Eye couldn’t be happier with the result. 5. What is publishing like? Is it difficult? Easy? Why? Toneye- My experience with publishing has been so easy and exciting! The support network throughout the world of the independent author and publisher is phenomenal, and eye have been on a constant learning ride since eye first approached JEA. Eye had my very first submission accepted (T.S.C.) by JEA as well as some poetry eye submitted for REJECTED For Content anthology. Eye then had several subs accepted with JEA and another fine independent press, James Ward Kirk Fiction in other anthologies before getting my first rejection, from eye don’t remember where now. Eye was still on such a high though, from the whirlwind eye found myself in. Rejection is fine. It brings you down to earth and keeps your feet on the ground. My writing obviously isn’t going to appeal to everybody, and eye understand that. The hardest thing, and at the same time, most exciting, is the waiting. All eye have to do is write, submit, wait, and promote. Everything else is done for me, which is great, because until eye got serious with my writing, all eye knew how to do was write scary stories. Now, by working with editors and a publisher, eye have learned so much more to it. Then, there’s always tomorrow. Learn something new every day J Eye would like to one day try my klaw at self-publishing something, to see just what goes into the creation of a book to the finished, marketable product, and also to see if eye have what it takes to be able to pull it off. Right now, though, eye just love to write stories, short or long. Eye am very happy with the situation eye am currently in, so that plan will remain in the pipeline for the time being. 6. In 10 years, what do you want readers to say about your work/you? Toneye- Wow! He really isn’t the monster he portrays in his books!... Or, is he? 7. Do you have favorite words to use in writing? What are they? Toneye- Blood gets splashed around quite a bit in The Scarlett Curse, and it’s spattered throughout most of my work. Eye like the sound of the word, and how it looks like it should read as “blued” hahaha. 8. What is the funniest writing experience you’ve had? Toneye- This one time, at band ca- uh yeah, where was eye? Oh! Yeah. Oh, by far eye would have to say, is when eye recently jumped genres and tried my hand at Bizarro for the CHUNKS2 antho coming soon from JEA, and came up with a sick and twisted tale called “What Are Turds Worth?” It was hard to type, because my eyes kept tearing up from laughing so hard. My neighbours would’ve heard me, for sure hahahahaha! Eye hope it was gross enough to be accepted hahaha. 9. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? Toneye- The Scarlett Curse was inspired by a friend by the name of Scarlett, who told me to write a book, so eye did, and named the main character after her. The sub-titles of Books 2 and 3 came about when eye was around 10k words into each book. Usually once eye see a definite thread of something which permeates the story eye base it on that. Sometimes, eye will base it on where eye want to see the story go. Very rarely, eye come up with a title first. An exception is my poem, “Fred, The Dis-embodied Head”. That title jumped into my skull one day and eye just started writing. It’s one of my favourite pieces. 10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? Toneye- Eye like to think eye am pretty good at setting and building a mood. Whether eye have an entire book to create in, or a poem to capture the reader’s attention and pull it along to the end. And… Eye do believe we’ve reached the end. Muahahahaha! Thanks Catt, for the deep n meaningful. It’s been great answering these questions. Lots of fun! Let’s do this again sometime J Anybody wants to know more or just to konnekt, you’ll find me here at these links below. Cheers, Hails ‘n’ Howls to you all! Hope you enjoyed the tour
3. Give us one (or 2) character(s), tell us the book(s) and tell us why you admire/hate/love that person. Chalice Rayne is sweet and loveable and wants to save the world but doesn’t really know how. She’s the farthest thing from a modern era butt kicking female protagonist though: an absolute peacenik, she is extremely vulnerable to the dark forces she seeks to expose as the trilogy begins. But she deals with it. In the end she doesn’t become what they are. She finds another way (admittedly with the help of a couple of more world-wise people with the same noble intentions.) Still, I love her for her wondrous heart. She’s kind of a really hot little Gandhi. 4. Pick one of your covers and tell us how that represents your book. Who did the cover? How was the experience? What was the planning like? Well, since I already mentioned Kati’s great work on Dragon’s Game (she did the beautifully eerie cover for The Ballad of Chalice Rayne too) I’ll go with the cover “Superman” Don (D.F.) Noble did for Mushroom Summer. I told Don “Well, how about some bright red-yellow-green fungi on there to both grab the eye of the potential buyer and depict the core concept of the first book: that alien intelligences may well exist within the networks of mycelia of mushrooms?” Don knew well where I was coming from as he and I had talked of Terence McKenna, cathedrals of the mind and machine elves the first time we met. And so the trippy cover, with Chalice in the center of a mind expansion mandala, was born. 5. What is publishing like? Is it difficult? Is it easy? Why? Like anything (self) publishing is easier if you know someone who is doing it already. The groundbreaker again here was Don, who was already self-publishing and had the system more or less down. He showed me how to format so I do that for myself now (unless I sign a contract to let someone else do it.) He also put together the books once they were formatted, adding his (and later Kati’s) artwork and finishing the documents for upload. We had to go back and forth some once I went into upload mode so that I checked and marked all the right boxes for Createspace and Kindle. But once I had published Mushroom Summer I went back, looked at everything I’d marked and written and created a “publishing guide” MS Word document to make the process much easier for subsequent book uploads. After three books I pretty much know where to put the check marks, etc. anyway though. 6. In 10 years, what do you want readers to say about your work/you? Ideally that it is important and that I have created something worthy of those writers, musicians, scientists, philosophers and movie makers who influenced me. Oh, and that I was on the good guys’ side and I went about it all very cleverly. That’s ideally. I’d settle for “the guy was out there but his books are really fun.” 7. Do you have favorite words to use in writing? What are they? I like to work in every word I can. It bugs me when I catch myself repeating an uncommon word twice in a paragraph or two; makes me feel like the thing is echoing around in my head. Specific words really appeal to me but I can’t just pick one. I roll D and D dice on occasion to determine alien character names, but by the same token I often seek meaning in the name by going to behindthename.com and running a little research. The real key is that in the end whatever words you use run like a roller coaster and don’t hit snags. 8. What is the funniest writing experience you’ve had? Well, I’ve made myself laugh a few times. I guess tops to this point would be my short story Emerald City Confidential, which is to be featured in an upcoming Riot Forge anthology called Baum-Ass Tales. The story is narrated by the No Longer Cowardly Lion, who is telling a tale of intrigue in which he gets drunk in a bar, is shanghaied and eventually tortured for information. The torture is unique: he’s still drunk, very proud of his fine clothes, and his interrogator straps him to a rotating wheel and spins him around until he throws up and ruins his suit. Thinking about that scene is making me smile again even now. His best line: “If you’re not supposed to eat them how come they’re called Munchkins?” 9. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? Mushroom Summer came out of the cosmos while I was mowing our lawn. After its completion a similar bolt from the blue named both of its sequels at the same time. I knew The Ballad of Chalice Rayne and Dragon’s Game would be the titles the moment they popped into my head (in the hot tub, in fact.) A Year in the Borderlands came from the concept (one story dedicated to each month of the year) and the idea that the Borderlands were the space where our reality meets others. Plus Twilight Zone and Outer Limits were already taken. I guess, like my man Keith Richards has said many times, “I’m just an antenna and it’s coming to me from somewhere else.” 10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? Character and plot. I’m an engineer by trade, not a writer, so all that book-standard technique has had to come to me as I’ve struggled along. I like to think that I can envision very believable and well-defined characters without beating on the details. And I’ll stand by my plots. My stories start somewhere, go somewhere and the path can be traced (generally without too much effort and with little contradiction.) I’d also like to think that I have my style down fairly well by now and my work is an easy read.
4. What is publishing like? Is it difficult? Easy? Why? For me, getting published was relatively easy, but I believe that it was timing and luck. While I had submitted other work in the past to publishers, it was nowhere near ready for publication. I think small presses are the future. Sure, everyone would love the big name publisher and the royalty check that comes with it, but with a smaller press you know you are being listened to and you have more of a say. I love the atmosphere of JEA. It is a real community, which you wouldn’t get with a big publisher. 5. In 10 years, what do you want readers to say about your work/you? I would like them to say –She tells great stories. If one person loves my books and looks forward to future releases then I’ll be happy. 6. Do you have favorite words to use in writing? What are they? I don’t have favorite words but I do find myself using the odd phrase in different projects and then I have to change it. 7.. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? Sometimes the title comes first, although this is rare. Once the book is written I try to think of a theme or phrase that works. After was actually the file name on my computer and it stuck. I chose Queen of Hell for my other book because I think it is an interesting title and tells you what the story is about. 8. What are your strongest abilities in writing? I think I write good dialogue. I try to sound as natural as possible and read it out loud. It helps that I like to talk so I have plenty of practice.
3 What is publishing like? Is it difficult? Easy? Why?
I’m new to this. Suburban Secrets is only my second published story so I would have to say the whole idea is still pretty damned exciting. 4. In 10 years, what do you want readers to say about your work/you? “I can’t wait to read what she writes next!” 5. Do you have favorite words to use in writing? I always thought bamboozled was a funny word though, maybe I’ll work that in somewhere. “Ham bag” also funny. 6. What is the funniest writing experience you’ve had? When I was writing “Chuckles” and he weighs his new role as the liberator of the dead dogs against his current moniker and decides to keep Chuckles because Liberator would make a shitty clown name. I still laugh out loud when I read it. 7. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? My stories so far have sort of named themselves due to content. I did have a couple of ideas for “Warp” though and I put them out there to my fellow writers to see which one sparked the most interest. It was so helpful to have that kind of support. 8. What are your strongest abilities in writing? I’m a beginner so I can’t really say for sure but it seems no matter what I’m writing about I always seem to find the character’s emotional flaws and drag them out in the open. Name: Jim Goforth Titles: Plebs, With Tooth and Claw, Feral Hearts, Rejected For Content: Aberrant Menagerie (editor) and numerous stories in such anthologies as Rejected For Content: Splattergore, Floppy Shoes Apocalypse, Autumn Burning” Dreadtime Stories For the Wicked Soul and several others. Down and Dirty Questions: 1. If you had one image/idea to represent you, what would it be? Grindhouse splatterpunk heavy metal driven horror pretty much sums up what I write and what I would be happy to stamp my brand all over. There are no single images which would best represent that, more of a collage of different things. 2. What s one theme you cover and explore within your writing? I explore a vast assortment of themes ranging from friendship, finding purpose, isolation, fear and terror (of course), relationships (of all sorts), revenge and many others which are probably relatively common in the horror genre, but I always like to put my own spin on them. For the purpose of the question, I’ll confine it to one theme and one that does recur through a lot of my work relates to a blurring of lines between man and monster. There may be truly inhumane monstrous entities drifting through a particular story, but often their deeds pale alongside the monstrous things human monsters can be capable of. 3. Give us one (or 2) character (s) (tell us the book(s)) and tell us why you admire/hate/ love that person. Ah I have many characters I’m quite fond of in several ways, be they good, bad, utterly reprehensible or just somewhere in the murky middle. Most of my characters aren’t clear cut good or bad per se, but are generally just shades of grey, as is the case with most people. There are several characters I could pick from Plebs, notably the female protagonists, but since the second person I’m going to mention is a strong female character from another book, I’ll go with Corey Somerset from Plebs. Corey is an easygoing guy, sometimes to the point where he is too easily led by more strong willed associates and that gets him into all sorts of trouble. He is also something of an idle slacker, with no real purpose in life. However, as things progress he grows and develops, finds things in himself that he wasn’t aware of, and gradually acknowledges that there is more meaning out there for him than random partying and mindless good times with his buddies. The second is Angela Rollins, my chief protagonist in the collaborative novel Feral Hearts. Angela is somewhat cut from the same cloth as some of the strong women in Plebs; she’s had a horrendous life riddled with abuse, mistreatment, betrayal, drugs and all manner of sordid activity, but rather than break her it has made her stronger and resilient. Granted, it has also left her with some deep seated commitment issues and inability to allow many people to get close to her, but it leaves her wholly prepared for the worst from people and having experienced plenty of humanity at its ugliest, she is ready to combat anything. She’s quick-thinking and spirited and above all she’s a fighter, having never let the worst of life get the better of her.
9. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? It varies. Sometimes I have a title already and base an entire book/story etc. on it while other times I might write the whole thing, or majority of it, without ever having any title, bar a working title if that. Then I might pull some key phrase, word or symbolic thing from the story itself and that becomes a title. I have titled stories after songs (predominantly heavy metal ones) and I have completely changed titles I thought were fitting until I actually finished the story, to something else. I also have an enormous list of potential titles which I made up many years ago for stories, songs, poems and other things I was writing which are always there to fall back on. I used to look through them, pick one that grabbed my interest and proceed to write something revolving around that. 10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? I’ve heard a few different things such as character development, intensity, bold, no holds barred and things along those lines, but to me, the main thing I’d say is storytelling. That is the chief thing I set out to do each time, tell a story. It may be visceral, gruesome, comprehensively drenched in blood, with a splash or two of humour or even romantic overtures, some explicit detours into various shenanigans and a few characters with mouths that would make sailors blush, but the bottom line has to be the story itself. Then, there are probably some people who will say, one of my abilities is writing a lot of words. Which I can definitely do too.
7. Do you have favorite words to use in writing? What are they?
I try and avoid favorite words because I don’t want an editor or reader to become annoyed with me, but I have always wanted a cool catchphrase. 8. What is the funniest writing experience you’ve had? I’m still new. I have yet to do interviews or conventions. I’m sure those will be coming up though at some point. 9. How do you title a book? Where does it come from? Titles are hard. I sometimes will hear a song or hear somebody say something and I’ll use it. I’m working on a novel now that needs a title. 10. What are your strongest abilities in writing? I’m not afraid to take chances as long as it fits the story. I usually try and not just push the envelope, but ball it up and throw it away. As a horror writer I just throw on a helmet and seat belt and head straight for the wall.
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