Win Free Books!

On 5/1/15 Crazy Duck press is releasing the new edition of My Fearful Symmetry. Friday is launch day. The first 50 people to RSVP will receive a FREE EBOOK. We will also be giving away  five paperback copies.

Vanessa Morgan Talks About Scary Monsters/Giveaway

Today, I welcome Vanessa Morgan to Immortyl Revolution!  She will tell us about the monsters that scare her the most!

Giveaway:  Vanessa is offering a giveaway of two supernatural thrillers. Leave her a comment at the end of the post about your favorite monsters and she will choose one lucky winner to receive ebooks of A Good Man and GPS With Benefits. Deadline to enter is 10/31/12 at 11 p.m. EST.  Winner will be chosen by random drawing. 

Make sure you go back and enter all the other giveaways from the beginning of October, because all drawings are active until the end of the month!

MONSTERS THAT SCARE ME THE MOST

Thank you for having me on the blog today. I'm truly honored to be here with all of you! With the day of the dead approaching fast, let's have a look at some of the scariest movie monsters ever.

DOPPELGÄNGERS

A doppelgänger is a person's physical double. Seeing one's own doppelgänger often heralds death or serious illness. Paranormal investigators believe that the doppelgänger is an individual's past or future self. In some traditions, the double has no shadow or reflection.

Here are two seriously creepy horror movies about doppelgängers...

The Broken (2009): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBbVSlVUiio

Dream Lover (1986): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMa9s-gYxyc

EVIL KIDS

There's something undeniably scary about children gone evil whether it's through vampirism ("Salem's Lot"), radioactivity ("The Children Of Ravensback"), aliens ("Village Of The Damned") or just plain insanity ("Devil Times Five", "We Need To Talk About Kevin”, "The Good Son").

The following are my favorite evil kids movies...

The Children Of Ravensback (1980): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8aJDLCFzo8

Bloody Birthday (1981): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpiELzyx-Xc

¿Quien puede matar a un niño? (aka Who Can Kill A Child?, aka Island Of The Damned)(1976): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-GQThxd3DE&feature=related

THE UNDEAD

As Jud Crandall says in Pet Sematary: « Sometimes dead is better. » Many close friends and family members have seen recently deceased people in their homes, but somehow these real-life encounters with the undead are never as scary as in the movies.

Ringu (1998): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbj-Ihy3ncQ

Let's Scare Jessica To Death (1971): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cX4eZD3GiL0

The Shining (1980): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Cb3ik6zP2I&feature=related

What are your favorite monsters?

***

About the author

Vanessa Morgan is known as the 'female version of Stephen King'. Her screenplays, A GOOD MAN and GPS WITH BENEFITS, are currently being turned into movies. She is also the author of the books DROWNED SORROW and THE STRANGERS OUTSIDE. If she's not working on her latest supernatural thriller, you can find her reading, watching horror movies, blogging, digging through flea markets or indulging in her unhealthy obsession to her cat. She writes in English, Dutch and French. You can cyberstalk her at http://vanessa-morgan.blogspot.com (blog) or https://www.amazon.com/author/vanessamorgan (Amazon).

About her latest releases:

A Good Man

Louis Caron is a good man: a vegetarian who feeds the homeless, takes care of animals and is concerned with the ecological future of the planet. But his altruism has a sinister edge – he's a vampire – and local detective Taglioni is becoming increasingly suspicious. Louis' attempt to escape the police will take him on a journey into his own private hell where he is not only forced to confront his worst fears, but also to destroy the lives of those he cares about most.

A GOOD MAN is out NOW at:

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/A-Good-Man-ebook/dp/B007U253J4/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1350122277&sr=1-1&keywords=a+good+man+vanessa+morgan

Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/A-Good-Man-ebook/dp/B007U253J4/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1350122389&sr=1-1

GPS With Benefits

In GPS WITH BENEFITS  a womanizer purchases a new GPS device, not knowing it's one with a mind of 'her' own.

GPS WITH BENEFITS will be released November 1, 2012

Carl Hose on Why the Zombie Apocalypse Looks Good/Free Ebooks Download

Welcome back, guys and ghouls!  Keeping with this month's Halloween theme, Carl Hose will talk about the appeal of Zombie Apocalypse stories.  

Carl was here in July to talk about his fundraising anthology Dark Light.  You can find a link on the sidebar.  All proceeds benefit Ronald McDonald House Charities.

Get this book free!  Link and coupon code at the end of the post.

Why the Zombie Apocalypse Looks Good 

We live in a world where mass shootings, baby killing, and child molestation are running rampant. You can’t turn on the news without several of these stories hitting you in the face. Maybe it’s always been this crazy, or perhaps it’s just that the Internet and social media allows us to see more of it. Whatever the case, there is a lot of insanity in the world. So much so that even horror fiction has a hard time keeping up.

It used to be that horror fiction was horrific. There were depraved stories, scary stories, and brutally twisted stories created by horror writers that actually scared people. This is getting harder for horror writers to accomplish. Competing with real life can be one hell of a challenge. Writers have to go to more and more extremes to turn readers’ heads (or stomachs) because real life has gotten so gruesome. Mothers and fathers killing their children, kids shooting their classmates, priests molesting children—this stuff is hard to compete with. Don’t blame real life on horror writers, blame horror writers on real life. We only mimic what we see.

People are jaded. The most horrific events, unfortunately so, roll off our backs. We’re becoming immune, and that is a sad thing. Not that we condone the violence that surrounds us in real life, but we accept it. Not only do we accept it, but we accept it in many cases without even giving it more than a cursory thought.

Personally, I’ve never been one to blame real life violence on art. I don’t believe listening to Ozzy Osbourne can cause you to commit suicide, unless of course you’re already predisposed to killing yourself. Likewise, I don’t believe reading a book about serial killers or watching a slasher movie will send you on a bloody rampage. Blaming real-life violence on art is a cop out. This is how parents avoid taking responsibility for not raising their children properly.

Art simply imitates life. Hell, some of my best ideas are inspired by real life.

We live in a world where a zombie apocalypse looks good. A zombie Apocalypse, in fact, looks preferable to most of the horrors that we see every day of our lives. At least we stand a fighting chance with the walking dead. At least we can outrun them.

We can’t outrun the violence that surrounds us every day of our lives. We can’t hide from the psychos and the rapists and the child molesters. All we can do is try to expose the, and that is, I believe, part of what horror fiction does.

Yeah, the zombies don’t seem so bad in the face of all that, now do they?

BIO

Carl Hose is the author of the anthologies "Deadtown and Other Tales of Horror Set in the Old West," "Fematales," "Fematales Supernatural," "Dead Horizon," the zombie novella "Dead Rising," the crime fiction novella "Blood Legacy," and the erotic anthology "Pornocopia."

Carl's work has appeared in the zombie anthology "Cold Storage," which he co-edited. His work has also appeared in "DeathGrip: It Came from the Cinema," "DeathGrip: Exit Laughing," "Loving the Undead," the erotic paranormal anthology "Beyond Desire," the "Book of Tentacles," "Through the Eyes of the Undead," "Silver Moon, Bloody Bullets," and Lighthouse Digest magazine.

Carl's poetry appears in the zombie poetry anthology "Vicious Verses and Reanimated Rhymes."

Carl's nonfiction has appeared in Writer's Journal and the horror film essay anthology "Butcher Knives and Body Counts."

Carl also edited and published the "Dark Light" anthology to benefit Ronald McDonald House Charities.

Website: www.carlhose.net

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/carl.hose?ref=tn_tnmn

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Carlhose

Sylvia van Bruggen on Writing with Soul/ebook giveaway

Today, I welcome Sylvia van Bruggen!   She's on tour with the Virtual Book Tour Cafe.

Giveaway:  One lucky commenter will win an e-copy of her new book, Mindscreens.  Winner will be chosen by random drawing.  Deadline to enter is 7/12/12 at 11:59 p.m. EST.  In addition, all commenters will receive a link and free coupon code for my ebook Annals of the Immortyls.  Please leave an email address or url where you may be contacted. 

How do you know that you are writing what you love to write? You know it because you can't contain yourself, you jump up and down in excitement and really can't wait to see what happens next.

This may mean for instance, that you have been writing a whole wrong genre for you. For me the big change came when I discovered I love to write fantasy. I felt that excitement. I felt my hands trembling as I wrote down my words, and I couldn't fathom not writing anything else.

I feel the same kind of excitement when I write on play. They are the same. Both are connected to my soul.

Yes, there is that word again: soul. I believe that writing, like all forms of creativity, is connected to the soul. It's passion. I define passion as soul sparks, the sure fire way you know that you are doing what you love and what you were born to do.

So, how do you discover what you love to write? By trying. I tried paranormal romance for instance, finished a book in it, and realized I didn't give a damn about the characters. I had a completely different experience when I wrote my novella MindScreens. I do love writing anything but writing MindScreens: oh my goodness. It was completely freewritten (no plot or anything, just an idea), it made me giggle and feel all gleeful and I couldn't wait to write again.

You also know you were meant to write something when you feel your fear kick in majorly. The intenser the passion is, the harder your fear comes poke it's big fat nose around the corner and roars his bum off until you sit shivering in the corner.

So, when fear comes to bully you, you shouldn't cower away, in stead you should be very very happy because it means you have found your passion in writing.

Some of you already may know what you love to write, others may have a hard time with it. To inspire them I have made a list of genres you could try out, and I have added non fiction too. You could start brainstorming topics that you are interested in, that's going to be a lot of fun to begin with. I can highly recommend going to Squidoo and start writing there. It's fun to do and you get to flaunt your knowledge on a specific subject.

A completely incomplete genre list, just to get you going

Science Fiction

Alternate history

Fantasy

High Fantasy (lotr et al)

Magic

Historical

Mystery

Horror

Humor

Detectives

Thriller

Romance

Paranormal romance

Just get the basic ingredients for a story (a character, a setting, and something that changes for that character) and just freewrite. You could even use the same character in each story, and tweak the setting to the genre, and you are good to go.

This discovery is going to be a fun little journey for you :)

Sylvia van Bruggen:

Sylvia van Bruggen is a fantasy/science fiction writer, poet, avid blogger and artist. She is the founder of Playful Creative, a website for creatives who want to work through their mental blocks and who want to learn how to play with their writing. She has self-published a novella, two poetry books, and her poems and short stories have been published in various magazines. She currently writes a fantasy novel, and she works on publishing another poetry book. She lives in the Netherlands with her husband, two cats and several novels in various draft stages.

Mindscreens

Jessamine Harper has it all: University course she loves, job as a Top-level Healer and dream man in the form of desirable Professor Lucas Corwin; but when Corwin breaks down and is taken away by the Mindcops, the world that Jessamine knows begins to unravel. Does the boy she hate, Ben, hold the key to her past as well as her future? Can she escape the clutches of the Mindcops herself? Only time will tell, and does Jess have much of that left?

Excerpt

"What's the emergency?" An equally snappy voice answered straight away, "Healer Harper, report to Med-Office at the south entrance. Slip and fall, going through scanner now, but judging from the bone sticking out I'd say it's broken." Grade A injury, good thing I hadn't eaten.

"I'm gonna miss class, you have to report me!"

"Not my problem, now scoot along."

I pushed my Jotter into my bag, shouted: "Medical emergency!" and started to run down the hallway. Left, right, down the stairs, swerve around some slobbering kissers, and then down the long corridor to the Med-Office, my voice getting hoarser and hoarser from shouting at people. The curse of being a Grade A Healer, only getting called when there's a big emergency. Better learn how to run fast if you want to save someone's life.

http://sylviavanbruggen.blogspot.com/

Steven Saus of Alliterationink on Epublishing

Today, I welcome Steven Saus.  When I put out my short stories, Annals of the Immortyls, I'd never self-published anything before.  I had great help with editing and proofreading from some writers in my crit group, one of whom edits professionally, but I had not the first idea of how to go about formatting a book to make it into an ebook.  Enter Steven Saus, a writer I'd met through sci fi conventions.  He'd started a company that helps authors to convert their works into ebooks.  I asked Steven here today, to tell you a little about his company.

Steven Saus on Alliterationink

“I want to make an eBook,” Slartibartfast (not his real name) tells me. “That’s what you do, right?”

“Yes, I --”

He breaks in: “So here’s my idea. It’ll change the world, it will. First, there’s this guy...”

The specifics of the idea are interchangeable. It quickly becomes apparent that Slartibartfast doesn’t have a book that needs to be converted. He hasn’t written a book yet.

It’s the newest wrinkle on “Hey, you’re an author, you should totally write this idea I had” that you’ve probably heard before. (Honestly, you’ve probably done it before - I know I have.) And in some ways, those of us who are participating in the “digital revolution” are probably encouraging it.

You know the slogans and catchphrases (along with the failed attempts at each): Digital revolution. Vertically integrated publishing. e-Revolution. And so on.

And they’re not wrong. There’s money to be made out there. But in convincing authors that they’re able to make money without a gigantic support network, we’ve given the impression that it’s simple or automatic.

At Origins, I was on a panel with Bryan Young, Tracy Chowdhury, and R.T. Kaelin. All of us - all of us - agreed that when an author takes on the publishing aspects of the business, that it’s not a shortcut. As Tracy said: “I think it took just as long, and maybe more work publishing it myself than if I’d sent it off to a publisher.”

So you already know the difference between Slartibartfast’s “I have this idea for a book you could write” and writing a good book. There’s just as much of a difference between “I have this book you could publish” and (successfully) publishing your own book, either digitally or in print.

Both writing and publishing can be fascinating, fulfilling, and even a lot of fun.

But doing it well isn’t easy. And that’s okay.

---

Steven Saus

Steven Saus injects people with radioactive material for a living, but only to serve the forces of good. He is an author with multiple story credits in markets online and off, including “So You Want to Make an eBook?”. He is also the force behind Alliteration Ink, a small publisher whose titles include “Net Impact” by Donald J. Bingle, the Crimson Pact series of anthologies edited by Paul Genesse, and “Eighth Day Genesis: A Worldbuilding Codex” edited by Sabrina Klein. You can find him at stevensaus.com and alliterationink.com.



Link for Bryan: http://www.bigshinyrobot.com
Link for Tracy: http://worldofshandahar.com/index.html
Link for RT: http://www.rtkaelin.com/
Link for eBook: http://alliterationink.com/store.html#ebook
Link for Net Impact: http://netimpact.alliterationink.com/
Link for Crimson Pact: http://thecrimsonpact.com
Link for 8th day: http://8thday.alliterationink.com

Please leave a comment for Steven to receive a free ebook of Annals of the Immortyls.  You must leave an email address or url where I can contact you.

Sexy Cedric's Playlist/June Drawing Winner/Free Ebook

Greetings, my darlings! First off, I'd like to congratulate, Ann Dieteman-Thayer, the winner of the June drawing!


I didn't get a post up yesterday as my fabulous life in the fast line got in the way, but here is a little something to entertain and edify!


Enjoy!  

Your Host With the Most: Cedric MacKinnon

Sexy Cedric's Playlist

I wanted to share a few of my favorite tunes with you, my darlings.  There are so many to choose from.  It was difficult to narrow it down, but these are the ones that I keep going back to.  Read the list, my darlings, and then share a few of your own in the comments.  Cheers!

1. Suffragette City- David Bowie

2. My Generation- The Who

3. The Man Who Sold the World- David Bowie

4. All Apologies- Nirvana

5. I Wanna Be Sedated- The Ramones

6. Stairway to Heaven- Led Zeppelin

7. London Calling- The Clash

8. Lust For Life- Iggy Pop

9. Imagine- John Lennon

10. Like a Rolling Stone- Bob Dylan

11. White Rabbit- Jefferson Airplane

12. Love me Two Times- The Doors

13. All Along the Watchtower- Jimi Hendrix

14. I Want it All- Queen

15. Bad Reputation- Joan Jett

16. God Save the Queen- Sex Pistols

17. Me and Bobby Magee- Janis Joplin

18. White Room- Cream

19. I Don’t Like Mondays- The Boomtown Rats

20. Stone Cold Crazy- Queen

21. I Am a Rock- Simon and Garfunkle

22. (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction– Rolling Stones

23. Space Oddity- David Bowie

24. Ziggy Stardust- David Bowie

25. Across the Universe- The Beatles

Yes, it's rather heavy to Bowie, but he is a god.  If you missed my Bowie post a few weeks back, here's the link: Everything I Need to Know I Learned From David Bowie. 

This month's giveaway:  anyone who comments at any post and provides a contact email (or url where you may be contacted), will receive a link and free coupon code for an ebook, Annals of the Immortyls, three dark tales, featuring yours truly, Mia and Kurt.  Don't fret if you don't own an e-reader, you can read them on Nook or Kindle for PC or phone, or simply read the pdf version on your PC.  

Don't forget to join me over at Facebook and on Twitter @cedricmackinnon!

Until Next Time!


Love and Dark Kisses,


Cedric MacKinnon

Keira Michelle Telford on Five Things a Writer Should Know

Today, I welcome Keira Michelle Telford.  She is currently on tour with The Virtual Book Tour Cafe.  She has some great tips to share.  


Giveaway!  Please leave a comment for Keira and you'll be entered to win a e-copy of Silver: Acheron (A River of Pain).  Deadline to enter 7/3/12 T 11:59 P.M. EST.  Also, just for leaving a comment, I'll send you a link and free coupon code for my short stories Annals of the Immortyls, and you'll also be entered to win a copy of my latest novel, Servant of the Goddess. Drawing ends 6/30/12 at 11:59 p.m. EST. Please provide a contact email for both giveaways.

Fragment, Consider Revising

From a persistent, irritating wavy green line to the IRS, here’s five things a new writer should know:

First and foremost…

Turn Off the Grammar Checker

It lies. It was the bane of my existence while I was writing my first book, and I quickly learned that there was no way to placate it. No matter what I did, it wasn’t happy. Part of the problem with it is that it doesn’t understand style and aesthetic. My advice? Cut the damn thing loose and make an effort to learn the rules of proper grammar. Rely on your own knowledge, not on a computer program that might understand the dictionary definition of ‘creative’, but doesn’t know how to apply it.

Beta Readers

I can’t emphasize their importance enough. Put together a reliable network of people who read (preferably people who love your genre) and whose opinions you trust. And in case you were wondering, the answer’s no: your mom doesn’t count. You don’t need people who’re going to tell you how awesome you are, and how you’re the next Stephen King. You want people to tell you “there’s something fucky with it” or “that doesn’t make any sense”. If someone reads an entire draft of your book and can’t give you one single criticism, don’t be fooled. You’re not a genius, they’re just a lousy beta reader.

Royalties

Collecting royalties is simple. Just go to a CAA to file a W-7 with the IRS to get an ITIN, then fill out a W-8BEN and send it to… wait. Did I say this was going to be easy? Sorry. I might’ve told a porky. It’s easy if you’re a US citizen, or if you have an agent who can deal with this type of thing for you (or if you don’t mind having 30% of your cheque withheld). But, if you’re a non-US indie like me, and you want that 30%, you’ll need to follow the rules. If you’re published through Amazon/Createspace, it’s laid out in a fairly straightforward manner. Go here if you’d like to read more: https://www.createspace.com/Help/Index.jsp

Ignore, Ignore, Ignore

You’re going to get a bad review. Or two. Or three. Over the course of your writing career, you’ll probably get many. The thing is: a bad review isn’t the end of the world. A lot of times, a bad review isn’t even a reflection on the quality of your work. Sometimes, a reader just won’t ‘get’ you—and that’s okay. Opinions are free, and they’re all valid. The trick is not to take anything personally. To one reader, my use of present tense might be ‘jarring’. To another, it’ll add to the cinematic feel of the text. In any case, whatever you do, don’t respond. Even if a reviewer makes a criticism that you feel is invalid, say nothing. Hold your tongue. Bite back the instinct to defend yourself. In the end, it’s just not worth it.

Learn When to Say No

People are going to want to give you advice. Some of it’s going to be good, and some of it’s going to be bad. Someone once told me that there was too much extraneous information in my narrative. They said that if they took out all of the ‘junk’, they’d cut away a third of my book. My immediate reaction was to doubt myself. In the past, I know that I’ve had issues with dumping information into a narrative like truffle oil over a nice risotto. It’s too much, it’s over-powering and it’s unnecessary. That being said, I’d put a lot of work into pinpointing the weak areas in my text and banishing the exposition where necessary, so I didn’t feel like that was a legitimate criticism of the book.

So what did I do? After much thought, I decided to ignore the advice. And as it turns out, one of the things that’s most often highlighted in the positive reviews of my work is my world-building. See, the person who gave me that advice isn’t a big science fiction fan. It’s not that he doesn’t get me per se; he just doesn’t get the genre. The trick is learning to spot that, and knowing when to go with your instincts.

Ultimately, it’s impossible to please everybody—never forget that. Don’t beat yourself up over a negative comment or a few less stars than you’d like. There’s plenty more where those came from. Just take it on the chin and get ready to do the same thing all over again tomorrow.

Keira Michelle Telford
www.keiramichelle.com
www.ellacross.com
www.facebook.com/thesilverseries
www.facebook.com/silver.acheron
@mylostanddamned


JOIN THE FIGHT

Dishonorably discharged from the Hunter Division and banished for crimes she did not commit, Silver struggles to come to terms with her new prison-like surroundings: a segregated area of the city called the Fringe District, populated by murderers, thieves and rapists. 

Starving, and desperate for money, she reluctantly accepts the Police Division's invitation to enroll in a covert Bounty Hunter program: an initiative devised to infiltrate the criminal underworld of the Fringers, and to force the very worst warrant dodging law-breakers to meet their fate—death.

Unfortunately, Silver doesn't realize that the Police Division is about to up the ante. They need more than little snippets of information and arrests—they need someone to pull the trigger.

They need an executioner.

Book Trailer

Available now:

 

   

Coming Soon!

About the Author:

Keira Michelle was born and raised in the UK. She moved to Canada in 2006, and there she still resides in her west coast townhouse with a husband and 10 guinea pigs.
She is the author of a 10-book series of post-apocalyptic dystopian science fiction novels, all centering on the lead character of Ella 'Silver' Cross. The first book (a novella) in this series, Acheron, was released Nov 2011.




Buy her books on Amazon!

Free ebook Vampire News is out!

Here's a free ebook you can download called Vampire News!



Bertena Varney and Stavros have compiled a book of the great news of vampire events of 2011 They created an awesome timeline with book covers, reviews of book, interview of authors, and essays about movies, television shows and more from various authors and bloggers as well websites to learn more about vampire news.

Bertena and Stavros have decided to offer the book for free so that they can all allow more readers to learn about the vampire world.

For your free PDF go to:  http://bitemereallyhard.com/
Pub/Book Info:


Vampire News


Authors: Bertena Varney, MA & Stavros


Copyright 2012 Bertena Varney and the Lure of the Vampire Publications


Published by Crazy Duck Press


Vampire News Network Copyright 2012 Stavros


Cover Models: Katalina Parrish & Jean-Paul de Jager




Description: A Collection of Vampire News from 2011.