Grave treasures! A little interview at
Cemetery Travel
about "things" you might find in the land of the dead.
Wednesday, February 28, 2024
Tuesday, February 27, 2024
Distant Early Warning Alert:
Scares That Care Presents AuthorCon III!
It's coming up on the horizon —
Scares That Care Presents AuthorCon 3 — happening at the
Doubletree by Hilton Hotel Williamsburg, April 12–14, 2024. It's one of the best gatherings of
horror/fantasy/science-fiction authors and fans on the planet, and I'll be
there at the
Crossroad Press
table in the hotel's Promenade area, with plenty of copies of
Fugue Devil: Resurgence,
Deathrealm: Spirits, Blue Devil Island, my various
Ameri-Scares
titles, and many others on hand.
AuthorCon 3 includes hundreds of authors, a massive dealers' room, and
top-notch programming. This year's guests of honor are Carver Pike, Aron Beauregard, Daniel J. Volpe, Kristopher Rufty, Eric
LaRocca, Grady Hendrix, Paul Tremblay, John Langan, Valancourt Books,
Michael Cisco, L. Marie Wood, Bryan Smith, Clay McLeod Chapman, Sherrilyn
Kenyon, Chesya Burke, and R.J. Benetti.
Hope to see you there.
Monday, February 26, 2024
It's Just Overkill
After my morning walk, I planned to spend the rest of the day writing. I ended
up taking a much longer walk than usual, and when I got home, it was
lunchtime. So, I decided to build a fire in the fire pit and cook a couple of hot
dogs for lunch. They were yummy. But while out there, I realized the yard
needed some serious work, and... before I knew what had happened... I found
myself doing serious yard work.
After that, my arms fell off, but I've still gotta write. I hope my laptop
takes good dictation.
Sunday, February 18, 2024
The Smith River, a Haunted Island, and the Spooky Place
Almost every day, I walk somewhere between three and four miles around our
neighborhood, which has done wonders for my physical and mental health. This
afternoon, Ms. B. and I decided to go walking out on the
Fieldale-Smith River Trail, which is my favorite of the trails in this area. In 2009 and 2010, I loaded
up a mile-plus length of the trail with geocaches, and they're all still
active. Yesterday, in fact, a group of geocachers found them all. Just for
good measure, I decided to give each of the caches a physical check-up, and I
was pleased to find them in decent condition. One of them (called "Haunted Island") involves a little tree climbing, and since that's one of my favorite
physical activities, up I went (the view in the photo to the left is actually from up in the tree). I even managed to get back down.
My favorite of the trail's attractions is the view of the old
Koehler Warehouse across the river on Route 57, which I've always
called "The Spooky Place" because it was the site of the Martinsville
Jaycees' infamous Halloween Haunted Castle when I was a teenager and a bit
beyond. For a couple of tales of my sordid adventures in the Haunted Castle,
you may visit my article at the
Horror Writers Association Blog here. Don't be afeared... much.
|
| A view of the Spooky Place without the spooky people in the way |
|
| A view of the Smith River from the trail |
|
| Tree damage! |
|
| A happy little community of mushrooms Ms. B. discovered |
Thursday, February 15, 2024
Happy, Horrific Valentine’s Day and Damned Rodan’s Madre de Dios Spiked Salsa
This weekend, friends Joe and Suzy are hosting a gathering
where folks bring their own homemade salsa, so I spent a portion of the
afternoon conjuring up
Damned Rodan's Madre de Dios Spiked Salsa, which gets its heat from a combination of cayenne, jalapeno, habanero, and ghost pepper in the
ingredients. I'd post the recipe if I had one, but for this, I just gathered
all the stuff that one puts into fresh salsa (Campari tomatoes, onion, green
onions, cilantro, lime juice, garlic, cumin, chili powder, lemon pepper, and
the various peppers; chopped everything up; and threw it together in what
looked like reasonable proportions. I hit the mix with our immersion blender
and... voilà! Damned Rodan's Madre de Dios Spiked Salsa. The
heat is not trivial, but the stuff is fookin delicious. Needless to say, I'll
probably never be able to duplicate it precisely.
Spent a portion of the afternoon on the
Lovecraft eZine Podcast
with host Mike Davis and author Jeff Thomas, which was a blast.
I hope to be meeting them both face-to-face for the first time in August at
Necronomicon in Providence, RI. And I managed a fair amount of forward
progress on my current novel,
The House at Black Tooth Pond.
Till whenever...
L: Brugger's homemade 2024 Valentine's Day card for the Old Dude; R: Damned Rodan's homemade
Madre de Dios Spiked Salsa
Sunday, February 11, 2024
DEATHREALM: SPIRITS at Lovecraft eZine!
Thursday, February 8, 2024
Number 1 and Driving High
Up and at 'em early this morning. Allison and I made breakfast—she made her
special scrambled eggs and I cooked up my Damned Rodan's Crematorium-Style
Bacon. Then Scott and I hit the road for Rocky Mount and Boones Mill,
thirty-some miles up the road toward Roanoke. We found several enjoyable
caches, a couple of which took us out on the highest, narrowest, windiest,
scariest fooken mountain road I have ever driven. You know those videos of
single-lane roads along cliffs, with sheer drop-offs on one side and a high
vertical wall on the other? This was kind of like that. Thanks be to Yog
Sothoth no vehicles came from the other direction because I fear that might
have been all she wrote for us.
At the end of the scary mountain road, we had the pleasure of meeting fellow
geocacher, Varunner7, since she and her husband had placed a cache on
their property. A very pleasant caching conversation followed, and after a
while, off we went again, back toward Rocky Mount. We found lunch at a lovely
BBQ joint called the
Rocky Mount Smokehouse, where Scott and I both ordered brisket. We found it delightful.
|
| Fun sign in the bathroom at the smokehouse |
Several years ago, Brugger and I had gone after a cache on a huge, steep ridge
on the outskirts of Rocky Mount. That cache has been long since archived, and
a newer one took its place relatively recently. Since it was very close to the
restaurant, Scott and I trekked up that remarkably steep incline and finally
hit the summit. It's rocky as hell and covered with cactus, which isn't
something you typically see around these parts. I indulged in all kinds of
acrobatics in precarious settings as I set about hunting the cache—something I
haven't been able to do much recently—but after a serious amount of time, we
came up empty. Based on some intel we received from Ms. Varunner7, we
concluded that the damned thing has already gone missing. Drat and alas.
Also in the "good shit" column, I received hopeful news about one of my recent
short stories from a publisher (which I'll remark upon later, when the word is
given), and, thanks to the big
Bookbub promotion, which I detailed yesterday, Deathrealm: Spirits reached number 1 in sales on
Amazon.com
in three categories: horror anthologies (Kindle), horror anthologies (books),
and fiction anthologies. It held onto that position for a full 24 hours, which
is a fair achievement. It slipped a few notches for a couple of hours this
evening, but then it climbed back into the lead positions.
It's the little things that make one smile, wouldn't you say?
In the "bad shit" column, which does not make me smile, Ms. B. got laid off
from her job of 21 years, ignominiously and with a piss-poor severance deal.
Out of respect for Kim—certainly not for the company, which gets absolutely
none from me—I'll elaborate only a little. I hope this will prove a blessing
in disguise, as leaving one position behind for another sometimes does. I
feel horrible for her, though, because she loved that job and gave everything
to it that she had to give. That she was shown no more appreciation and
consideration than she was is disgraceful (note that this applies only to the
parent company, not the wonderful local bunch that we both worked with for
many, many years). Needless to say, this puts us in a bigger financial and
logistical bind than we'd been prepared to deal with. Still, we're in a better
place than many in similar circumstances, so I suppose there's that.
Anyway, tomorrow will bring what it's gonna bring, and we'll give it what for.
|
| Looking down at Rocky Mount from "Rocky Top" |
|
||
| One of the crevices I explored along the cliff face |
|
| Old Dude at "Rocky Top" on Christmas Day, 2011, photo by Ms. B. |
Wednesday, February 7, 2024
DEATHREALM: SPIRITS Bookbub Deal!
From Bookbub...
With terrifying tales from Bram Stoker Award–winning authors Brian Keene, Elizabeth Massie, Joe R. Lansdale, and other masters of the genre, this recently released anthology is filled with unsettling horrors that will keep you anxiously turning pages…
With terrifying tales from Bram Stoker Award–winning authors Brian Keene, Elizabeth Massie, Joe R. Lansdale, and other masters of the genre, this recently released anthology is filled with unsettling horrors that will keep you anxiously turning pages…
Publisher Description
Deathrealm: Spirits is a horror anthology, edited by Stephen Mark Rainey, featuring new stories from genre legends Joe R. Lansdale, Elizabeth Massie, Brian Keene, Eric LaRocca, and many others.
This is the first anthology of new Deathrealm stories since the original magazine ceased publication in 1997. Once called one of the most important horror lit magazines being published at the time by acclaimed editor, Ellen Datlow, Deathrealm presented a wide variety of dark fiction.
Deathrealm: Spirits is a horror anthology, edited by Stephen Mark Rainey, featuring new stories from genre legends Joe R. Lansdale, Elizabeth Massie, Brian Keene, Eric LaRocca, and many others.
This is the first anthology of new Deathrealm stories since the original magazine ceased publication in 1997. Once called one of the most important horror lit magazines being published at the time by acclaimed editor, Ellen Datlow, Deathrealm presented a wide variety of dark fiction.
Sunday, February 4, 2024
Pre-Dawn Muggle Madness and More
My first stop was Burlington, a few miles east of Greensboro, where there is a
newish Wherigo cache, courtesy of friend Ranger Fox.
Despite the 25º-degree temp, I hoped I might make my way through the
stages without becoming an icicle. But after fifteen minutes, I still had a
pretty good way to go, and even though I was reasonably bundled up, the chill
and the brisk breeze convinced me that trying again at a later (warmer) time
might be more prudent.
However, stopping here offered me yet another chance to experience the
single-most inevitable geocaching experience of geocaching experiences: the
fooking muggle sitting in his fooking car. At 5:15 in the fooking a.m., a
muggle (one of the non-geocaching persuasion) drives into this otherwise
totally deserted parking lot, parks his fooking vehicle, and proceeds to
fooking sit while I'm going from stage to stage. It never fails when there is
an otherwise totally deserted parking, does it? In this case, not necessarily
a complication, since muggles will be present at this location on a regular
basis. However, under these circumstances, it just reinforces the notion that
there is no empty parking lot into which a muggle won't insinuate himself at
precisely the wrong time. Go fooking figure.
From there, I headed farther east and snagged a handful of caches. My favorite
was one in the woods along the Eno River, just east of Efland, NC. A lovely
location just downriver from a dam, which was visible in the distance from the
cache site. So despite the pre-dawn muggle madness, I enjoyed myself no end.
A now a week of bachelorhood, writing, and, hopefully, more geocaching.
|
| Sunrise is imminent... |
Thursday, February 1, 2024
Hellnotes Reviews Fugue Devil: Resurgence
"This collection from Stephen Mark Rainey is among the best ones I’ve read. Each story is a shining gem and if you enjoy Lovecraftian horror, there is much that will please you here... 5 stars—Highly recommended. Buy one for yourself and one for a friend."