Showing posts with label horror. Show all posts
Showing posts with label horror. Show all posts

Friday, May 2, 2014

MEET POET DAVID S POINTER, AUTHOR OF THE NEW BOOK "BEYOND SHARK TAG BAY" AND ENTER TO WIN A SIGNED COPY OF HIS PREVIOUS BOOK "SUNDRENCHED NANOSILVER"

Today at my blog, I am showcasing Poet David S. Pointer

 
His latest collection “Beyond Shark Tag Bay” is another stellar example of his highly evocative poetry, downloaded from his own twisted world. While one is tempted to label this realm steampunk or cyberpunk, tropes from these genres are more like seasoning he spreads on the layers of his own completely original universe.   
I recently chatted with David and asked if he had always considered himself a “speculative poet”:

I started out as a political/social justice poet. My first poetry publication in 1990 in "Pleiades" journal was a horror poem though. When I took the surgery technology program and we dealt with human anatomy, I couldn't hold back on the horror and Sci-fi genre pieces any longer.

Most of David’s poetry I have had the pleasure to read, including them in my own anthologies, and posting them here at this very blog, are speculative in subject matter. Elsewhere,  I have called his poems whirlwinds, driving you deliriously down to the end, taking in the overall effect, and then you go right back to the beginning to savor the Devil in his details.
 


“Beyond Shark Tag Bay” contains some wild and intriguing alternate histories of Poe and Einstein, and the American West and Victorian England. Again, Pointer adds his own twisted and often dark comic take on these varied subjects.

 
Another unique quality of this book is that every poem is this collection has a Spanish translation. I asked David about this:

I decided to go with Spanish translations because screaming and bleeding is a complex diverse issue with a changing American readership.

 

“Beyond Shark Tag Bay” also contains some fabulous cover art and interior illustrations from Justin Jackley. (as seen below) If you like what you see, check him out at -- www.justinjackley.com or crom1513@hotmail.com.




I am not alone in my enthusiasm for Pointer’s work. Nathan J.D.L. Rowark, Editor-in-chief  of Horrified Press states:

David S. Pointer is a poet who has a talent for language exploitation. His words bend and twist like a river and David uses this skill to take the reader upstream - away from the mediocre everyday. David delivers free form masterpieces that fire the imagination and wake the senses. “Beyond Shark Tag Bay is a collection full of such gems and a must for all poetry fans and fans of fictional expression in general. Prepare yourself to be left breathless.
 

I recently co-founded Thirteen Press, an imprint of Rowark’s Horrified Press. David has already been accepted into several anthologies completed or in progress by Thirteen, including At the Stroke of Thirteen, Steamworld, and The Ripple Effect.

Here is a link to all Available Thirteen Press Titles:
 
Other Horrified Press volumes featuring his work are  Ron Koppelberger’s Silent Fray anthologies and Fractured Realms, a fund raiser for autism by Suzie and Bruce Lockhart.

All of us at Thirteen Press are excited to continue working with David Pointer. Anytime I ask him for a poem on any subject, upcoming holidays and such, for my blog, he comes through with something highly original and in his own visionary voice.
 
I asked David what he is up to next:
 
I am thinking maybe I might do a weird western chapbook or book with French translations.

I am sure either choice will yield an excellent and highly original book well worth your time. Here are some links David provided to learn more about him and his work:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_2_12?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=memento+mori+james+ward+kirk&sprefix=memento+mori

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Noir+Erasure+silver+birch+press



 
 
 

CONTEST TIE-IN FOR THIS BLOG POST

RUNNING UNTIL MAY 31, 2014:

WIN A SIGNED COPY OF POINTER’S COLLECTION SUNDRENCHED NANOSILVER



 
 
This is another terrific recent publication by David S. Pointer. Click on the Rafflecoptor Link Below to enter to win a signed copy! You can enter once a day by either following my blog or leaving a comment on this post.
 

Contest Ends May 31, 2014 at 11:59 PM

 
BACK OF BOOK BLURB:
 
David Pointer is nothing if not prolific. But it doesn’t pay to just be a prolific writer. A good prolific writer, however, is a step above the rest. Here we find the fortunes of David Scott Pointer. David’s work appears in a plethora of publications and collections. He’s begun to receive the accolades his work deserves. As a publisher, I’ve always felt fortunate to have a poet such as David gracious enough to want to work with and share his gifts. As a writer, he’s always been generous and humble about his work and what he has to offer to the reading public. As a poet, he has offered us a body of work rich as diverse and plentiful. His voice and style of writing has grown, reaches vast topics and intricately and understandably weaves into a seamless strand of poetic thought. Vibes of surrealism and post-beat rhythms in a cadence of the genuine poetic beat, David’s work is also brave. He is the only writer I’ve known to openly and eloquently address such current issues as the Presidency, government and politics, the economy, and health and history. The reality is captured in verse, an invaluable insight in the time of coward academics, the underground raises up, offering to us another child of Apollo granting insight and enlightenment through art and poetry.
Michael A. Casares, Virgogray Press
 

 CLICK ON THE LINK BELOW TO ENTER: 

 
 
<a id="rc-c540f00" class="rafl" href="http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/c540f00/" rel="nofollow">a Rafflecopter giveaway</a>
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Thursday, December 6, 2012

WELCOME TO ZOMBIE BLOG HOP

 

WELCOME TO THE BLOG HOP OF ALL THINGS ZOMBIE!


THIS IS A ONE DAY ONLY BLOG HOP



My horror stories vary in theme, subject matter and types of monsters, but I have been known to spin a zombie tale once in a while.

To read my flash fiction story, "The Leftovers"--CLICK HERE.

To promote this blog hop, I am giving away a copy of my new ebook horror collection Silhouette of Darkness. Full details on how to enter are provided below.


Silhouette of Darkness Page, Buy Links
Silhouette of Darkness includes the zombie story "Now Playing."

It's 1980.

The last thing Gabe remembers is being quite tanked at a Halloween party. He wakes up in a coffin at a funeral home, assuming he is the victim of a sick practical joke.

As he leaves the building, he begins noticing some freaky things about himself and also soon learns it is now Election Night. What happened to those four nights in between?

The answers are shocking....





Those of you who follow this blog know David S. Pointer, a speculative genre poet who can always be relied on to contribute a piece on ay subject. Here is his contribution to the zombie hop, which also has a bit of holiday flavor added for good measure.

The No Zombie Poetry Zone
David S. Pointer

Zombie war protester,
ringing his bell alongside
a medical punk princess
working holidays with the
Salvation Army Corps
of Christmas volunteers,
about to read his zombie
redneck Christmas poem,
but the princess asks him
not to in the name of mad
medical science everywhere
and the old trench shotgun
in the trunk of her red car.

AND NOW---THE RULES OF THE CONTEST:


Anyone can enter the contest by doing two things:

1) Post a comment on the blog. You can leave me feedback on the blog itself, comment on your experience with the blog hop, or say something about our mutual friends--zombies!

2) Follow this blog by ENTERING YOUR EMAIL in the "FOLLOW BY EMAIL" BOX on the sidebar of the blog. If you are already a follower and/or a friend on Facebook, mention that in your blog comment.

The contest begins at Midnight, December 6, 2012 and ends at Midnight December 7, 2012. ONE DAY ONLY!

Please be sure to provide your email address in your comment so I can contact you.

Silhouette of Darkness is available in any ebook format or as a PDF.

 The winner will be announced on this blog and my facebook page no later than December 9, 2012.

This contest is fully funded and operated by me and not Precious Monsters or the Zombie Blog Hop.

Thanks for participating and good luck!

Also, a shout out to our gracious host, Precious Monsters!

CLICK ON ANY LINK BELOW TO CONTINUE HOPPING:





Thursday, November 15, 2012

A Chat with Shane Collins, Editor in Chief of The Speculative Edge


Today, my guest is Shane Collins, Editor in Chief, over at THE SPECULATIVE EDGE, a monthly magazine of fiction, poetry, non-fiction, interviews and reviews in the speculative fiction genres. We discuss his decision to start up the magazine and check in on how the first four months are going.

 
 



Welcome, Shane. We met as fellow editors of Static Movement themed anthologies. What made you decide to move toward publishing a monthly magazine instead?

Thanks, George, for interviewing me. I’m excited to be here! Static Movement was the perfect stepping stone after working as an editor at my college’s undergraduate literary journal. Creatively, it gave me 100% autonomy. I could pick themes like “apocalyptic” or “colonizing the solar system” and choose any stories I wanted. But after I finalized the manuscript, that was the end of my involvement. I really wanted to try my hand at the other side of editing a publication. I wanted to distribute to libraries and small book stores. I wanted to choose the  artwork, collaborate with other editors and market on Facebook and other social media. I knew the creative end of editing but I hadn’t tried the business side and a monthly magazine seemed like the best medium.

 
Okay, so you decided to edit a monthly magazine. Why speculative fiction?

I think – like you – I was raised on a diet of science fiction movies. I was raised watching Star Wars and Star Trek. The first movie I remember seeing in the theater was Jurassic Park. The first book I loved reading was The Hobbit. In college, though, I really delved into the literary classics. My own writing started to evolve too. For years I had only written science fiction and fantasy and suddenly I was dabbling in mainstream fiction. However, rather than ditching my love of science fiction for literary fiction, they fused together. The idea that science fiction could have literary merit was my basis for what I wanted The Speculative Edge to be.

Well, Shane, I am impressed that so far, you are right on time--four months, four issues. I understand you and your staff have other jobs. How do you find the time to get everything done?

Haha. It’s not easy. All three of us editors have lots of other things going on. Danielle – the assistant editor – is finishing her last semester at the University of Wisconsin in Parkside. She also currently edits for Static Movement and a third publication – Straylight Magazine. Chloe – the poetry editor – works one job at a law firm and another at a bird sanctuary. And I work as a substitute teacher at a local elementary school and as a tour guide at the Harpoon beer brewery. We’re a diverse bunch.

Now that the magazine has been up and running a few months, we’ve kind of gotten into a rhythm. During the week, I can usually get two or three days to dedicate to working on the magazine. That gives me enough time to (try to) keep up with submissions, to keep the website and Facebook page up to date, to answer emails and get feedback to and from authors, along with a million other tasks. This month, in addition to our regular issues, we’re also judging our first poetry contest, and are getting ready to release our “Best of the Year” collection so it’s feeling especially overwhelming.

 Tell us about your staff.

Aside from the editors, there are a lot of other people who make The Speculative Edge such a cool magazine. John Carney is our film critic. He eats, sleeps, and breathes movies. He works on various film sets in Connecticut – last month he was working with Cuba Gooding Jr. Trevor is our book critic. Not including what he reviews for the magazine, I think he must read a book a week. Lately, he’s been into George RR Martin and one of Steven King’s series. He’s a student at Parkside along with Danielle.

Brooke – our highly esteemed intern – is a college student in Michigan. She completely handles our blog, she helps me read through submissions, and she’s currently working on an essay for an upcoming issue.

And last but not least, we have Blaise Lucey who handles all of our email marketing. If you get our newsletters, he’s the reason they’ve gotten so much prettier over the last few weeks. He’s also a think-tank for strategizing how to market the magazine and coming up with ideas for new content. He lives in the North Shore of Massachusetts and works as Constant Contact.

For our readers that may want to contribute, are you actively seeking submissions? If so, where should one go for guidelines?

We’re always looking for more submissions. We have a couple of themed issues coming up and the guidelines for our first annual Summer Fiction Contest will be going up online in a month or two. You can check out all of our guidelines here: sites.google.com/site/thespeculativeedge/submissions

What ingredients are you looking for in fiction and poetry?

Like any other publication, we’re looking for the best quality work we can find. For fiction, that means work that has depth to it. It should have memorable characters that develop over the story. Stylistically, I tend to love work that is dark and gritty. I think the best way to see what we’re looking for would be to get a copy of our “Best of the Year” collection when it comes out and check out the six stories I nominated for the Pushcart.

Tell us about some content you have lined up for future issues. What does the future hold for The Speculative Edge?

We’ve got some great stuff coming out soon. For December, we have an apocalyptic issue to celebrate the end of the Mayan calendar. It has a HUGE fiction section. Apocalyptic fiction has always been one of my favorite genres – I may even be slipping one of my own stories in there. We’ll be interviewing Jo Cannon – a UK author who published a great collection of apocalyptic stories a couple years back. And, with the rising popularity of survivalism and shows like Doomsday Preppers, we’re publishing an essay by James Wesley Rawles, author of How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It, about prepping.

After that, Danielle will be guest editing a romance issue for February and also something special for April Fool’s Day. We’re currently conducting a reader survey that will help us decide where to go from there. We’re hoping to revamp the website in the future – that’s one of our big goals to do in the next six months.

Are you working on any other projects?

Oh, man, am I. Haha. I recently finished editing a pair of novels and am looking for representation. One is the first book of two in an epic military science fiction series about the first navy in space. The second book is a coming-of-age new adult book about a typical college student on a road trip with his ex girlfriend but with one caveat – he’s in ROTC and is about to become an active duty officer in the army for the next seven years.

And this January, I will be going on an adventure to the final frontier: beginning graduate school to get my MFA in Fiction at the Stonecoast program alongside Danielle.

Thanks for the interview, George!

Thanks to you for stopping by. You can visit The Speculative Edge by clicking on the link at the beginning of this post or right here: https://sites.google.com/site/thespeculativeedge/.

Please take the time to check out this exciting new magazine.
 

 

 

 

Monday, November 12, 2012

Do You Believe in Ghosts? Stories in my new book SILHOUETTE OF DARKNESS Explore this Universal Theme


It is wonderful that five thousand years have now elapsed since the creation of the world, and still it is undecided whether or not there has ever been an instance of the spirit of any person appearing after death. All argument is against it; but all belief is for it.

-SAMUEL JOHNSON, The Life of Samuel Johnson


This quote is as true today as ever. Even though the show Ghost Hunters and its countless imitators has offered a certain level of proof spirits exist, most often that evidence is still not nearly enough to win over stanch skeptics.


Over two hundred more years have passed since Johnson wrote this—two hundred years of vast technological advancement—and still, this subject comes down to the simple notion of belief vs. disbelief.
Fiction provides an effective venue where this debate can be mediated in a safe environment. While readers entertain the notion that ghost smay exist, we are safe in this created world we can leave at any time, compared to a more extreme form of experiment, such as agreeing to attend a séance or serious session with a Ouija board.

In his book The Fantastic (Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1975), Tsvetan Todorov offers one of the best explanations of how readers participate in a “gothic hesitation” to sort out this potentially disturbing subject.

The fantastic, we have seen, lasts only as long as a certain hesitation: a hesitation common to reader and character, who must decide whether or not what they perceive derives from reality as it exists in the common opinion. At the story's end, the reader makes a decision even if the character does not; he opts for one solution or the other, and thereby emerges from the fantastic. If he decides that the laws of reality remain intact and permit an explanation of the phenomena described, we say that the work belongs to another genre: the uncanny. If, on the contrary, he decides that new laws of nature must be entertained to account for the phenomena, we enter the genre of the marvelous.

I have had my own brushes with the uncanny and found there is always a frustration when trying to relay the experience to a friend later on. In the moment, I was positive I was faced with the “new laws of nature” Todorov presents, and that “all belief was for it,” but once I began explaining it to another person, the certainty became diminished with each passing word I tried to place upon it.

This is why ghost stories are so popular. We read the book, or watch the film, and can safely entertain the notion, in the guise of fiction, that we accept the supernatural as real. We are safe there. We wander the halls of The Overlook or Hill House expecting entertainment but also to enter the world of the what if, the Todorovian hesitation that allows for the real possibility that the spirit world is real.




My new collection, Silhouette of Darkness includes two ghost stories.


The Blues in A Minor
Since surviving a tragic accident, Mona is troubled by blackouts. Waking from one of these spells, she enters an eerie tenement and discovers Zach, a young man who plays blues guitar that speaks to her soul.





An Act of Naming
Norman wanders the streets after a night of drinking and meets Angela, a homeless amnesiac. The moment their eyes meet is the beginning of an evening of mystery.




These stories are not meant to frighten or disturb, as are most of the other selections in Silhouette of Darkness. Rather, they explore the classic themes at the heart of every ghost story—who are the ghosts and more importantly why are they spirits? What has trapped them in the region between life and whatever exists beyond death?
To read these ghost stories, and eleven other tales of horror and dark fantasy, check out Silhouette of Darkness, available in all electronic formats through Musa Publishing  here:

http://musapublishing.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=397





Tuesday, November 6, 2012

And I Swear This is True--My anthology of Urban Legends

STATIC MOVEMENT
is a great small press for beginning writers and editors alike. Since it is non-paying, there is less competition than one faces if trying to answer a call for submissions with semi-pro or better rates. Though there is no pay involved, the process gives writers exposure and also the chance to work with an editor.

One of my first completed Static Movement anthologies as editor was
AND I SWEAR THIS IS TRUE, stories inspired by urban legends. I left the theme wide open, encouraging writers to conceive their own legends or an original twist on a well-known one.

While some writers did use an existing concept for their launching point (e.g. Chupacabra by Jonathan Savill eorThe Zodiac Killer by Andy Echevarria) each offered unique twists on the legends.

Most of the stories, however, are the writer’s own invention, but all still have the exciting qualities of urban legends—the insistence that (hence this book’s title) the narrator “swears it is true,” the small shred of evidence left behind that can be passed off as coincidence only by the most tenacious skeptic. There are several stories of haunted places and for some reason quite a few involving spiders.

Some of the writers explore the reasons these legends might be so prevalent. The Devil and Rich Levi by Ken L. Jones is dedicated in part to Washington Irving and emulates that writer’s style well. It also reinforces the idea that urban legends are not a new phenomenon at all.

In one way or another, some character in each of the tales "swears it is true." Skeptics requiring proof write the supernatural off as nonsense. The tales collected here provide enough evidence to the contrary to leave the incredulous reader a little less certain about that stance.
 
We believers have always known there is a world of shadow beneath reality.

Urban legends are simply the stories where the layer between those two planes is paper thin.

You can purchase this exciting anthology at Amazon here: http://www.amazon.com/And-I-Swear-This-True/dp/1617061727

Monday, November 5, 2012

Jeffrey Thomas Talks Punktown in a New Interview with Taylor Preston

In a new blog post, Taylor Preston (author of BLOOD RED MARS) interviews writer Jeffrey Thomas on world-building in science fiction, and the creation of his dark future setting "Punktown": 

http://taylor-preston.blogspot.com/2012/10/interview-with-jeffrey-thomas.html

Friday, November 2, 2012

AUDIO PODCAST: The Gangster's New Clothes, A Dark Fantasy Tale

 


THE GANGSTER'S NEW CLOTHES
A Tale of Dark Fantasy from
On the Verge of Madness
by George Wilhite 

This audio presentation is a slightly edited version of this story, read by J.B. Goodspeed, originally presented on the Well Told Tales podcast.

Lars, a hitman waiting for his mark to arrive, bored stiff, held up in a one-horse town, decides to indulge himself in a new suit.

A convenience store owner suggests a tailor, which Lars finds kind of odd, but he makes the fateful decision to visit Hymie, the purveyor of "a perfect fit."

This Twilight Zone inspired tale from my self-published debut collection On the Verge of Madness finds Lars wandering the city streets in his new suit, soon doubting his sanity as the world shifts around him in space and time.

Hear the whole story here:

http://archive.org/download/WellToldTales-PulpFictionPodcast/wtt_56_gangsters_new_clothes.mp3

If you like what you hear, check out this blog's  On the Verge of Madness page by clicking on the link below the cover:


ON THE VERGE OF MADNESS PAGE

Thursday, October 18, 2012

Monday, October 8, 2012

MONSTERS ABOUND IN MY NEW HORROR COLLECTION SILHOUETTE OF DARKNESS


My childhood was immersed in reruns of old monster movies and other creepy stuff from the Fifties and Sixties. I remember staying up late on Saturday nights (if I could stay awake) with my Dad, watching Bob Wilkins hosting “Creature Features” in the San Francisco Bay Area. Those great old films knew how to scare us without relying on gore and exploitation.


I write all kinds of horror but particularly like to create work that harkens back to those early days of monster cinema without overtly stealing their tropes. Readers of my fiction know I write very few vampires, werewolves, and other traditional monsters. While these creatures make an occasional appearance, I tend to create my own original monsters, or at least my own hybrids or mutations of what has come before.


Buy from Publisher in all e-book formats

In Silhouette of Darkness, my new e-book release from Musa Publishing, you will find these “Creature Features”:

Fatal Insomnia

The central idea of this story began with the characters, not the monster. I wanted to write a story in one setting, with a few characters who were isolated together for some time, and going slowly mad. I would pick up their story far down the road, on the night that everything went to Hell.

I wrote about three siblings and their best friend living in a farmhouse, and after sketching them a bit I decided that, for some still unknown reason, they were forced to stay awake all night and sleep during the day. Their normal circadian rhythms disrupted, this was the pressure that drove them to the breaking point.

The monster of this story, The Blight, took shape from this central idea. I wanted the creature to be a bizarre construction of unknown origin. The knowledge that one must stay awake all night to avoid being its victim came from experience with it, not because anyone understood exactly what was going on.

I hope you agree The Blight is worthy of comparison to some of the stranger monster movies of old, and perhaps even a nod to one of my favorite masters of the horror, H. P. Lovecraft.


Jerrod’s Brood

I remember being very creeped out by the film “Willard.” Watching it now, it seems a bit corny, but the whole notion of a loser like Willard communing with rats and becoming their master is still disturbing. I wanted to take another loser and “bless” him (or curse him, depending on your viewpoint) with a brood of his own, creatures that seem to appear from nowhere but bond to him immediately.

Read this story to find out where life takes this poor soul on this fateful night.

Ashton Howard’ Dark Process

Carnivals are fun but they can also be a bit scary, right? Whether it’s the Bradbury classic “Something Wicked this Way Comes,” the clown in “It,” or some of the characters in the B-movies exploiting the carnie life, at one time or another we have all mused about the possibility that all may not be as merry with carnivals and circuses as they appear on the surface.

I wanted to take the idea of the freak show and give it a bit of a horror twist. What if there are no actual “freaks of nature,” but instead an evil mad scientist is creating them?

Read this short story and learn secret behind the sideshow “Ashton Howard’s Tent of Oddities.”

These are just three of the creatures I created in the dark tales found in Silhouette of Darkness.



STILL CAN’T GET ENOUGH MONSTERS?

CHECK OUT MY FLASH FICTION ANTHOLOGY, MONSTER GALLERY

Buy from Amazon

As editor of this collection, I simply put out a call for flash fiction featuring monsters. No more specific conditions on content. I received hundreds of tales of wondrous and horrible creatures, some humorous, others poignant, many quite disturbing.

The end result is 93 flash fiction stories of every type of monster imaginable by these great writers.

Jeffrey Thomas, author of the Punktown series and many other stories and novels, provided a wonderful introduction on the subject at hand.
Check it out at the Amazon purchase link below the cover image.


So if you like monsters, you need look no further Silhouette of Darkness and Monster Gallery. What are you waiting for?

As always, if you check out either or both of these books, I would be most greateful if you left your thoughts in comments on Goodreads, Amazon, or any other review forum.

Follow my blog by entering your email on the sidebar or through Google Friends Connect to learn more about my own writing as well as that of my guests.