Land of a Thousand Leaks

You can read the column I write for a local newspaper right here. Just click on “Current Issue” and look for my piece at the top of page 2.

For Your Snow Day Listening Pleasure

 On Pod of Horror #80, Kealan Patrick Burke tells us about Sour Candy...Nanci and Mark talk about David Bowie, The X-Files and maybe some horror...and we review books by Kealan Patrick Burke and Brian Keene.

If you’re a horror fan, this is the one podcast you can’t afford to miss! You can listen to Pod of Horror on iTunes or stream it right here. Just click on the link below.

What I Did With My Sunday

In addition to writing, we recorded a great installment of The Call of Kalanta today. Nanci and I discussed David Bowie, The X-Files, The Taco Society and, oh, yeah, horror.

Pod of Horror #80 will go live on Wednesday with special guest Kealan Patrick Burke. You’ll find it here.

 

Mr. Powerball

This week in my newspaper column, I reveal what I’ll do once I inevitably win the Powerball. You can read it for free here. My column is on page 2. Also, past columns are available in the archives.

Mark Gets Marked Up

As a follow up to my posts this week on The Dead Sheriff, my wife pointed out that the original book is listed on Amazon for $201.70. Heck, there’s another copy listed for $390.56.

Listen, I’ll be happy to sell you one of my personal copies for a mere $200. That’s what we call a real bargain back home.

Seriously,  the new version of the book will be out this year with more than 20,000 words of new material.

And it will be a lot less than $390.56.

The Dead Sheriff Reviewed

While digging through some books and magazines yesterday (okay, okay, the truth: a towering pile of unshelved books and unboxed magazines toppled over in our crowded den/writing office, and I was picking them up) I came across the March 2013 issue of Rue Morgue, the one with this review:

It’s my first and only review in a major magazine, and it reminded me that I have to get the revised version of the first Dead Sheriff book off to Airship 27 so it can begin to make its way through their production process.

I have a couple of more days writing on the horror novel until I reach a point where the plot of the book takes a dramatic twist. After I hit that part, I’ll pause work on that project to write the new novella for TDS: Zombie Damnation. I have my fingers crossed that will take about two weeks. After that, I’ll send the whole manuscript off to my first readers and then to Ron at Airship 27.

The second TDS book is done in first draft. It will also include a separate-but-connected novella. What I have planned for that one puts a rather large smile on my face. More on the second TDS later in the year.

Deadneck Dreaming

A couple of days ago I posted about a buddy of mine who is stationed in Afghanistan. He called me to say, among other things, that he’d just enjoyed my story “Deadnecks”.

A little background: “Deadnecks” concerns a small Kentucky town exposed to a zombie outbreak. Once the town's good ol’ boys are converted to the dead side, the retain their original personalities. So they drink beer and watch NASCAR, as well as eating brains. The story was horror with a big dose of humor.

The story was first published in Dark Discoveries magazine. In 2007, I wrote a sequel to the original “Deadnecks” and both stories were published in Deadneck Hootenanny, a chapbook by Novello Publishers. In 2010, there was a third story, “Deadneck Woman”, in the Novello anthology Dark Jesters.   

Since then I’ve contemplated writing a Deadnecks novel, incorporating the three stories. I think it would be a hoot to write, but until I can carve out more writing time, the redneck zombies will be pouring back PBR on the back burner.

I just found Deadneck Hootenanny listed on Amazon for $36.00. I would like to have another copy, but not at that price.

By the way, both stories from DH are in my collection Looking at the World with Broken Glass in My Eye.  You can still get a copy here.

Another Dead Sheriff Custom-Made Figure

Last Christmas, my talented friend Brian Spears presented me with a custom-made Dead Sheriff action figure. Now, on the heels of the announcement of a new publisher for the character, Brian gave me another figure, this one of Sam, the Dead Sheriff's "partner". Truly amazing work that left me speechless.

A Work In Progress

This isn't the opening to the novel I'm currently working on. It's a novella I started a few years ago and shelved to work on The Dead Sheriff, The Dead Earth books and some other stuff. I like the story and hope to finish it in 2016. Feel free to leave feedback in the comments section. This is the first page and a half of what is a 45 page manuscript. So far.

###

Dale Hewitt heard the sounds the first night he lived in the house.

            This was after the moving men left in the truck that spewed vile blue smoke like a rolling factory, and after his old friend Brody had finished the last slice of pizza before hitting the road. Brody gave him a man hug, patting Dale on the back and bumping shoulders. Brody belched, then departed, trailing the odor of pepperoni and banana peppers as he went out the door.

            Dale cleaned up in the kitchen (actually, he tossed the pizza box and the paper plates and the empty cans of Mountain Dew; cleaning the kitchen would commence after he unpacked the kitchen) and stood for a long time staring out of the small window above the sink. The unfamiliar backyard was barely visible through Dale’s reflection. In the twilight shadows, he made out the shape of a big maple tree and the beginning of the hill that climbed to the sky.

            He felt like crying.

            He wasn’t sure why, but he didn’t have to search far for reasons: the impending divorce, the events that led to the end of his marriage, moving back to his father’s house. Okay, technically he hadn’t moved back anywhere. Dale didn’t grow up in the house and had only visited a handful of times since his dad sold the old place and moved here a couple of years back. The house sat empty for almost six months after his father passed away and now Dale stood in his father’s kitchen, looking at his father’s backyard and feeling untethered from everyone and everything.

            It was a notion he would have embraced when he was 18. At 38, it produced tightness in his chest and the early tickle of a panic attack. His doctor had given him a prescription for Alprazolam, but the bottle was stowed away in a suitcase or his duffle. Dale leaned on the sink and closed his eyes. Taking deep, slow breaths, he tried to break down the reasons for his anxiety.

            That’s easy. You’ve never been alone.

            It was true. He had moved from his parents’ house—the one he actually grew up in—to the dorm at WVU. He met Renee in his sophomore year and they became inseparable. The marriage was the day after graduation, and they moved into a crappy little apartment in Morgantown, while he snapped up all the substitute teaching gigs he could find and she started part-time as a dental hygienist.  After he got on full-time at the elementary school, they saved up the down payment and moved into a small two bedroom home in an old and quiet neighborhood. It was a great time in their lives. Dale had never been happier than in those early years, struggling to meet the mortgage and having candlelight dinners of cheeseburgers from Dairy Queen. Life was so good then that Dale even half-joked to Renee one night about waiting for the other shoe to drop. She wasn’t amused.

The Dead Sheriff Has A New Home

Several years ago I wrote the first novel in what was going to be a series called The Dead Sheriff.

It was the legend of the Lone Ranger turned inside out and pureed in a blender.

The myth of The Dead Sheriff says that a lawman died trying to protect his family, only to return from his grave to avenge their deaths and avenge all who suffer injustice.

The truth was very different.

What if...

...the faithful Indian sidekick was really the guy in charge?

...the undead lawman was a reanimated corpse controlled like a puppet by an arcane magic stolen by a young man who barely understood the power he controls?

...a writer from the east traveled west to report the story of The Dead Sheriff, only to be caught up in a world of magic, murder and monsters?

The Dead Sheriff: Zombie Damnation, the first volume, was published a few years back. It got several good reviews (including one from my favorite horror magazine Rue Morgue) and I started writing the sequel. For several reasons, some personal, the book was never published.

A few months ago, the original publisher of the book decided to take the company in a different direction, leaving me free to pursue a new home for The Dead Sheriff.

I’m happy to announce that Airship 27, award-winning publisher of New Pulp and the leaders in pulp fiction publishing, will bring The Dead Sheriff back into print.

The new version of The Dead Sheriff: Zombie Damnation will include the full text of the original novel, plus a new novella set in the world of The Dead Sheriff that will ready the stage for the second book The Dead Sheriff: Cannibal Carnage.
 
Airship 27 produces beautiful books with action-packed covers. I can’t wait to see what they come up with for my reanimated lawman.

Publication dates will be announced as the books are scheduled. I have quite a bit of writing to do before the manuscripts are ready, then we have to fit into Airship 27's very packed schedule.

Thanks to Ron Fortier at Airship 27 for believing in the project. I can’t tell you how excited I am that my dead lawman still lives.

I’ll update you here as the project progresses.

Writing Update

With the erratic nature of my schedule (and other issues over the last few years) I’ve decided not to make any predictions or premature announcements about my writing.

Having delivered that disclaimer, I can say the writing is going well on the new horror novel. If things stay on track, I hope to have this finished around Thanksgiving. Typing “The End” and following it up with mashed potatoes and dressing would be a powerful combination.

Also, there’s movement on another project. It’s actually an old one, but by the time it’s published it will be new again. Is that cryptic enough?

I should be able to announce something here right around the first of the year.

Keep your fingers crossed. I’m hoping for good things in 2016.

Pulp For Charity

This is the back cover for a new anthology of pulp fiction ( or "new pulp", as some like to call it) for Airship 27 Press. Benefiting Pro Se publisher Tommy Hancock, this book is going to be huge. I've read the work of some of the writers in this project, and I am very interested in thumbing through it.

My entry is "The Shadow Men of Az Zibar", featuring my modern pulp adventurer Donovan Pike. 

I don't know the release date yet, but Ron Fortier at Airship 27 seems to move like lightning. I wouldn't be surprised to see this out in the next few weeks. I'll let you know.

Thursday Update

Over at I Was A Bronze Age Boy, I review the new LADY ACTION book by Ron Fortier. 

If you scroll down, you can find a brief writing update.

Also, this week in the Ashland Beacon, I present a primer for cities in naming festivals. It's on page 2.

While you're browsing the Beacon site you can find video of me acting rather undignified for a man of my advanced years.

Pod of Horror #76

PoH #76 is live now, featuring my interview with writer, editor and Cemetery Dance publisher Richard Chizmar. We talk about his career and his excellent blog, Stephen King Revisited. The interview starts around the 39-minute mark. Listen here. 

As always, your feedback is encouraged. The links are at the top of the PoH page.

Painted and Inked

This week's column in the freakin' Ashland Beacon explains what happened when I fell under the evil influence of Philip Stewart at Russell Railroad Days. It's on page 2.

Double-Naught Seven is Back

Discover an untold take of the Argillite Secret Service in my column this week in the freakin' Ashland Beacon. It's on page 2

Of Possible Interest

Last weekend I participated in a local Halloween Storytelling Festival. I wrote a children's ghost story for the event and read it live, along with Tammie Womack and Geoff Moore providing award-worthy performances in bringing two of the characters alive.

It seemed to go over well. I've enjoyed every children's or YA piece I've written, and I find myself wondering why I don't produce more of it.

I have two YA book series I would like to write. It's a matter of getting proposals and actual first volumes written. Which will come after I finish up a number of other projects.

Meanwhile, the story I wrote, "The Ghost and the Constable" is my column in this week's Ashland Beacon. You can read it here on page 2.

Also, Dave Wilbanks and I recently chatted about the beginning of our writing relationship. He's put the conversation up on his blog. If you like this sort of thing, please let one of us know and we'll share more if it.

Thanks to Matt Cowan at Horror Delve for including my novella “The Autumn Man” on his annual Halloween Reading List.

I was more than a little stunned to be included on a list of legendary writers like Manly Wade Wellman, Ramsey Campbell, Joe Landsale and Norma Partridge.

“The Autumn Man” is included in my collection Looking at the World With Broken Glass in My Eye. I believe the publisher is out of business, but Amazon still lists new and used copies here.
I have plans to eventually turn “The Autumn Man” into a novel, hopefully in the next year or so.

Cover Guy

Today is the birthday of Bob Eggleton, immensely talented artist and the creator of amazing covers for fantasy and SF book. 

Of course, I have a preference for one of his pieces in particular. Thanks to Nick Cato at Novello Publishers for scoring this cover.

By the way, I have an idea swirling around in my head for a novel that would link the Deadneck stories. I hope funny zombies never go out of fashion.

Reader Mail

I answer it in this week's column in the freakin' Ashland Beacon. You can read it online. It's on page 2.