Hangman, Highwayman, Coachman

Since the death of DarkFuse, the rights to Hangman and Highwayman have reverted to me. Coachman will complete the series.

I made the covers for the audio, ebooks and paperbacks today, together, so they match. I'll be releasing/uploading the ebooks for Hangman and Highwayman this week, so they'll be available again. Coachman will be completed at a later date.

Here are the covers, and there are samples available in the 'sample' section above.

Nothing Ventured, Nothing Gained

I asked the nice man at Severed Press if he'd be interested in publishing my work, and he agreed to take my latest novel after a proposal and sample from me. I'll always be grateful and not a little surprised that any publisher gives me the time of day. I've written around thirty novels now, and I'm still about as confident as a teenager asking someone out on a date. To the pictures, or dancing, or whatever people do in this millennium...

I signed the contract a couple of weeks ago, but didn't want to post here until I finished at least a second draft, which I did (today).

Some of my favourite authors (and people) are on the roster, friends through FB and elsewhere. Gregory L. Norris is on there, without whom I'd still be languishing in submission hell with my first novel. Ian Woodhead, who I've known for literally years, gave me some valuable advice, Paul Mannering (very nice chap), Alex Laybourne, who lives up the road (I think - I don't go out much, so everyone lives up the road to me). Daniel Marc Chant's there, and I met him at FCon - really friendly, and I like him, too. I like a lot of people. David Bernstein - I follow him around from publisher to publisher, and I've known him ages. I love his work, and Tim Curran's, too. Suzanne Robb (my mate!), and...I could go on, but I won't. Oh, Wrath James White's there, and Michael Bray...and a ton of other people. It's great company to be keeping, 'specially as I'm still just a little fish in a great big sea of great writers.

Here's the website if you want to have a look:

SEVERED PRESS

They don't solely publish horror (some, but more dinosaurs/lost worlds, space marines, lit-RPG...they're pretty diverse). I write lots of genres, though, so it suits me fine and it's good to stretch my brain-legs. Severed Press feel right, like it's where I'm supposed to be. Hoping they'll keep me around for a while, and feeling positive about my writing for the first time in a long time.

That'll do for now.

Love you.

Masters of Blood and Bone audiobook out soon.

I went for an old school horror vibe with the cover, and I'm happy with it. This will be out soon - narrated by Lee David Foreman. Soon as I'm done with an ongoing project I'll begin re-releasing the paperbacks and kindles, now rights have reverted. 

Love you, the end.

What will happen to my DarkFuse titles?

I've thought about this for a while, and have been fairly sure which way the wind was blowing before DarkFuse, publisher for several of my novels and novellas, declared bankruptcy. I was leaning toward putting them out myself, rather than trying to place them with another independent publisher. I'm still leaning toward this.

I do this anyway - any novel with an indie press which reverts to me I've put out on my own. It suits me fine, and trying to sell reprints is, frankly, kind of a pain in the butt. When rights revert, or if a press closes, I still have a novel I wrote, whose rights I own, edited. All I have to do is make a cover and reformat. It's not a difficult process, and a novel will make me just as much through Amazon as it did through DF.

I like being a hybrid author, though. I like having a publisher alongside my indie works, so that's what's been concerning me, rather than the future of a few books. That's my focus at the moment.

So, Highwayman, Hangman, Masters of Blood and Bone, and Left to Darkness are all coming out from me, issued on my own. I'm kind of busy, so I'll get to them when I get to them. I'm busy because of the other thing, and I figure readers (love you) have plenty to be going on with and ain't overly worried about the absence of a few novels from me.

The only other novel of interest is 'Ghost Voices', which I sold to DF but is unpublished. This, I will be submitting here and there.

As for how I feel about the demise of DF? I've said my thanks and goodbyes elsewhere to those concerned. On here, though, my blog? I'm sad to see one of the larger independent presses fall. I'm sad readers and authors are left out in the cold, financially. Personally, I've been publishing independently and with small presses for nearly ten years. Presses come and go. Big publishers come and go. It's not my first rodeo. I'm over it, and it's time to move on.

Love you, back with more news when I get it.

x

R.I.P. DarkFuse.

Highwayman will be the first I issue for Kindle and Paperback, as I already have the artwork. ;)

My George A. Romero Wake

I had a little wake for George A. Romero on my own, in the shed. He was a big chap for me and many others who were formed in the 80's. Were the 80's the heyday of horror? I don't know, but it's a thing...not necessarily a true thing, but a thing.

Romero was zombies. I quite like zombies. Cute, bits falling off, all shambly and oooooharrrg - teenagers without all the attitude. If the 80's were the heyday of horror, perhaps this is the heyday of the zombie - right here and now. And that's Romero, isn't it? The Walking Dead, 28 Days Later, Shaun of the Dead, Juan of the Dead (brilliant Cuban zombie romp), and on, and on...zombies are entrenched in modern popular culture and Romero's the father of all that and a bag of doggy biscuits. As a legacy he left us a great big zombie baby and it's growing at an alarming rate.

Romero's favourites of mine, though, were Creepshow, Monkey Shines, and The Crazies...I watched Creepshow at the end of the week as a final salute, but plenty of you have seen that, and this isn't about movies, per se...this little post is about how I felt about them.

This was my week of horror movies - my Diary of the Dead...hohoho.

Day One - Sunday: I have a confession to make - I don't like horror movies. I don't enjoy be grossed out, freaked out, or bored. Sometimes I appreciate horror movies - the construction, the acting, the vibe...but very rarely do I 'enjoy' them.

I started off light, like warming up for a working out I didn't want to do, and watched 'Scary Movie'. The idea, this week, was to force myself to watch movies I'd never seen, and force myself to watch them beginning to end whether I was enjoying them or not. Scary Movie sucked. Building up to a slightly heavier set, I watched 'Cabin in the Woods'. I didn't know anything about it, and going in after 'Scary Movies' I found it pleasantly enjoyable, and shouting at the TV for the characters to die. Overall, it was a good day. Scary Movie 1/10 if I'd been a teenager. Cabin, 7/10. I surprised myself, thinking I didn't like horror movies and frankly enjoying Cabin - proved myself wrong straight off the bat.

Monday: 'Viral'. Cheap and cheerful, mildly annoying characters, and a maddening refusal for most of them to die. I enjoyed it well enough, though. I'll give it a 6/10.

Tuesday: Stupid movie day. Further confession - I've torn my shoulder and couldn't be bothered to search for a movie, so I just watched what I could on Netflix. 'Funhouse Massacre' and 'Cockneys vs Zombies'. Both absolutely shit, hence my enjoyment factor was multiplied by two as I generally like shit movies as long as they're watchable. 2/10 on face value, with a x2 multiplier for campy-shitness rounding them up to a 4/10.

Wednesday: Freddie vs Jason. I watched this for nostalgia, more than enjoyment. It was fine. Middle of the road. 5/10. I followed it up with 'Let us Prey'. I tend to quite like anything from the Irish Film Board, and I really enjoy Liam Cunningham. It was daft, over the top, and very watchable. I'm giving it a 7/10. One of the better nights in my horror week.

Thursday: Jaded, I think. I searched in vain for something on Netflix I could be bothered to watch. I tried 'House of the Dead II' just because I quite like stupid video game adaptations, but it was unbelievably dire. I like 'Resident Evil', even 'Doom'...they're just fun. This, however, wasn't. I said earlier about the Irish Film Board, who were behind 'Stitches'. I tried it and hated every single character so much I turned it off. I watched 'The Void' after that. The set up was great, the effects, the pace...but my god. The dialogue and script were so awful it killed it. I didn't watch either to the end, and Thursday was a bust, and nearly broke the week for me. So, after resolving to watch every film this week 'til the end, I failed three for three.

Friday: At this point, I didn't have the stomach for anything horror, or a movie at all. I ended up watching 'The Tournament', for no reason at all. It was watchable (Robert Carlyle, Kelly Hu and Ving Rhames - and Liam Cunningham, again). Nice change of scene. 6 or 7/10.

Saturday: Thinking about how I felt about horror. Loads of other films to watch, but honestly? I enjoy writing horror, but watching horror feels a little like a busman's holiday. I don't want to watch most of the things other people watch and rave about. I like sci-fi, and action, and comedy, and for preference in the horror field - comedy horror, or cheesy horror...overwhelming dread and unrelenting misery just aren't my bag. I thought about a rewatch of something funny (Tucker and Dale vs Evil, Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse, Final Girls) but watch this instead:

I've been thinking about horror the whole week. That's what a wake is, isn't it? A farewell, but a chance to reflect, too. A farewell to Romero, certainly.

It's not a dead genre. It's flourishing. Novelists like me struggle, maybe, but the horror genre (with regard to movies and games in particular) is massive and shows no sign atrophy.

Shame for me, good for many others.

Saturday night, after Creepshow, I turned off the PC gratefully, sank into my armchair with Joe Hill's 'The Fireman', and for the first time in a week enjoyed something with no reservations, no qualms, and no expectations at all.

Love you x