December Sale at Crystal Lake Publishing

Our friends at Crystal Lake Publishing are having their biggest SALE ever, and it will last till end of December. Be sure to pick your Christmas books now. Paperbacks will range between $6.99 and $11.99, and eBooks between 99c and $2.99.

And if you share your purchase on Facebook (remember to tag Crystal Lake Publishing or Joe Mynhardt) and you get to ask the author of one of our Single Author collections/novellas a question related to their book (characters, plot, motivation, etc.).
Plus, whoever invites the most people to our Facebook event (based on accepting the invite) will receive a Crystal Lake Publishing paperback of their choosing. Free eBooks to runners up who gave it a serious go.

Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/559318504170222/

Website: www.crystallakepub.com/books

Crystal Lake open for pitch submissions

This just in from Crystal Lake Publishing....

Crystal Lake Publishing will be open for pitch submissions between the 15th of November and the
15th of December, 2014.


We’re looking for DARK FICTION, be it horror, suspense thrillers, fantasy, action adventure, sci-fi (no space operas, please), supernatural, or noir. We’re interested in reading your novels, novellas, short story collections, non-fiction books linked to dark fiction topics, and poetry collections. All books should be above 60,000 words (novellas need to be at least 40,000 or accompanied by one or two extra short stories - otherwise it'll be eBook only), preferably below 110,000.

That’s a pretty wide spectrum, so here are some of the authors and books we enjoy (that does not however mean that we want you to rewrite their work or copy them. Be original. Be yourself):
Richard Matheson, Robert Bloch, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King, Jack Ketchum, Elizabeth Massie, Joe Hill, Ramsey Campbell, Jonathan Maberry, Richard Laymon, Robert McCammon, Adam Nevill, Ray Bradbury, J.R.R. Tolkien, Bram Stoker, F. Paul Wilson, Charles L. Grant, Mary Shelley, John Connolly, Peter Straub, Shirley Jackson, Ambrose Bierce, H.P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allen Poe, Arthur Conan Doyle, Algernon Blackwood, Dean Koontz, M.R. James, Joe R. Lansdale, Jules Verne, Cormac McCarthy, William Peter Blatty, Thomas Harris, Alexandre Dumas and Roald Dahl.

We are not looking for reprints (out of print books will be considered – please inform of when you submit), previously published or self-published books, although up to 50% of your collections can be reprinted stories or poems. Novellas that form part of a collection may be reprints, as long as the majority of the collection are original stories. Please make sure the rights to all reprints have returned to you.

Simultaneous submissions are okay, but please withdraw your story immediately if it is accepted elsewhere.

Your book does not have to be finished at the time of your pitch, as long as it’s at least 70% complete and you can provide the opening chapter plus any other two chapters when asked.

Compensation:
You will be entitled to lifetime royalties on sales, or until a mutual agreement to withdraw the book is reached.
Advance:    $400 against royalties
                 $200 for anything other than a novel
Royalties:   40% of net profits on all online sales (Amazon etc.)
                 25% of net profits on all bookstore sales

Your book will be available to bookstores for a period of two years, after which it will be available via online retailers indefinitely.
Novels will also receive a $400 marketing budget you can spend as you please, as well as a lot of online publicity from us. Anything else receives a $200 marketing budget and the same treatment from us.
You will also receive 5 contributor’s copies before the book is launched.

Submitting your pitch (not before November 15th, please):
We are not looking for sample chapters or your entire book just yet. If you have more than 1 book to pitch, please send them separately.
Send us an email (to crystallakepub@gmail.com) with a polite introduction, and attach an author photo if you so please, along with one Word document containing the following information:
1.   Your 2 page max pitch (genre, projected length, why only you could write this book, biography; 1 or 2 sentence logline, portray your voice and style of writing, similar books – but what makes yours unique. You should also go into detail about your marketing or promotional plans.
2.   Your 1 page synopsis (a step by step summary or walk-through of your book, including all subplots, twists and reveals, or in the case of a short story or poetry collection, a paragraph on each story or poem).

Formatting guidelines:
This single attached Word document should be in 12 point Times New Roman, single spaced. Do not change text color or add graphics to your pitch. We will acknowledge the receipt of your pitch within three days at the most, but please allow up to 12 weeks for a response on said pitch. Please query if you haven’t heard from us in 12 weeks. Please make sure your pitch and synopsis are properly edited.

Staff (some prefer to remain anonymous):
Submission readers: Joe Mynhardt and Emma Audsley
Initial chapter and manuscript readers: Joe Mynhardt, Emma Audsley, Ben Eads, Ben Jones, Dave-Brendan de Burgh, and LelaniViljoen.
Once the submissions period is over, we will evaluate all of the submissions, and invite the very best of the bunch to submit the opening chapter and two chapters of your choosing (or stories and poems in the case of collections).
Feel free to email any questions you may have
to crystallakepub@gmail.com.

Professionalism:
Please remember we are a small press and can only handle a set number of projects a year. So a rejection will not also comment on your writing prowess or talent. There are a lot of factors that go into accepting a project, including personal taste, marketability, timing, professionalism and collaboration of the author etc. I will try to give helpful rejection letters where possible, but please leave your hate mail for the politicians.

Anne Rice Interview

Although not strictly Indie Horror, I couldn't pass up on reporting that Anne Rice, Author of 'Interview with a Vampire' and 'The Vampire Lestat' as well as a slew of other novels, is releasing a new chapter of the Vampire Chronicles, entitled 'Prince Lestat'

"The vampire world is in crisis – their kind has been proliferating out of control and, thanks to technologies undreamed of in previous centuries, they can communicate as never before. Roused from their earth-bound slumber, ancient ones are in thrall to the Voice: which commands that they burn fledgling vampires in cities from Paris to Mumbai, Hong Kong to Kyoto and San Francisco. Immolations, huge massacres, have commenced all over the world. Who – or what – is the Voice? What does it desire, and why? 

There is only one vampire, only one blood drinker, truly known to the entire world of the Undead. Will the dazzling hero-wanderer, the dangerous rebel-outlaw Lestat heed the call to unite the Children of Darkness as they face this new twilight? "

"Anne Rice’s epic, luxuriant, fiercely ambitious new novel brings together all the worlds and beings of the legendary Vampire Chronicles, from present-day New York and Ancient Egypt to fourth-century Carthage and Renaissance Venice; from Louis de Pointe du Lac; Armand the eternally young; Mekare and Maharet; to Pandora and Flavius; David Talbot, vampire and ultimate fixer from the Secret Talamasca; and Marius, the true child of the Millennia. It also introduces many other seductive supernatural creatures, and heralds significant new blood."

Ms. Rice was kind enough to answer a few questions for us...

Did you anticipate the phenomenon the Vampire Chronicles series would become?

I did not anticipate the Vampire Chronicles at all on any level when I wrote the first novel.Eight years passed before I attempted a sequel, The Vampire Lestat, and even then I did not know how many novels might follow. I took it one book at a time, exploring, developing the cosmology of vampires, getting deeper and deeper into the characters.

What inspired you to return to Lestat after more than a decade?

New ideas.New visions.New possibilities.At the time I retired from the Chronicles (2003) I really had no more to say with Lestat.I associated the Chronicles with some of the most painful parts of my life.But as the years passed, I kept thinking of Lestat, wondering what he would think about this or that cultural development, what he might have to say about this or that new film or book.He was alive for me, out there, in exile.Finally I went back and reread all of the books, and he was talking to me again, coming out of exile, out of his ‘depression’, wanting to live again.It was glorious.

Why do you think vampires continue to be such a popular phenomenon? What has changed in the genre while you’ve been writing?

I'm not surprised at all at the popularity of the vampire.The concept is so rich – the vampire is a metaphor for the outsider, the outcast, the artist, the addict, the alienated one. So of course writers would come along and do new and interesting things with such a rich concept.The vampire craze today is author driven.But the movement amongst some very popular authors is towards domesticating the vampire – the very opposite of my approach.We're seeing the vampire as the boy next door, the guy next to you in biology class in high school, or the handsome man you meet at the nearby tavern or bar.It's quite interesting.My vampires are mythic, tragic, larger than life.I'm kind of delighted by all the variations.

Prince Lestat hits a bookshop near you on 30th October, 2014.

British Fantasy Award Nominations 2014

The shortlist for the British Fantasy Awards 2014 have been announced.

The four nominees in each category were decided by the votes of BFS members and the attendees of FantasyCon 2012 and FantasyCon 2014. The exception is the Best Short Story category, in which two stories drawing for fourth place could not be separated and both were put through to the shortlist.

Up to two further nominees in each category were added by the juries as “egregious omissions” under the rules.

Best Fantasy Novel (the Robert Holdstock Award)
Between Two Thorns, Emma Newman (Angry Robot)
Blood and Feathers: Rebellion, Lou Morgan (Solaris)
The Glass Republic, Tom Pollock (Jo Fletcher Books)
The Ocean at the End of the Lane, Neil Gaiman (Headline)
A Stranger in Olondria, Sofia Samatar (Small Beer Press)

Best Horror Novel (the August Derleth Award)
House of Small Shadows, Adam Nevill (Pan)
Mayhem, Sarah Pinborough (Jo Fletcher Books)
NOS4R2, Joe Hill (Gollancz)
Path of Needles, Alison Littlewood (Jo Fletcher Books)
The Shining Girls, Lauren Beukes (HarperCollins)
The Year of the Ladybird, Graham Joyce (Gollancz)

Best Novella
Beauty, Sarah Pinborough (Gollancz)
Dogs With Their Eyes Shut, Paul Meloy (PS Publishing)
Spin, Nina Allan (TTA Press)
Vivian Guppy and the Brighton Belle, Nina Allan (Rustblind and Silverbright)
Whitstable, Stephen Volk (Spectral Press)

Best Short Story
Chalk, Pat Cadigan (This Is Horror)
Death Walks En Pointe, Thana Niveau (The Burning Circus)
Family Business, Adrian Tchaikovsky (The Alchemy Press Book of Urban Mythic)
The Fox, Conrad Williams (This Is Horror)
Golden Apple, Sophia McDougall (The Lowest Heaven)
Moonstruck, Karin Tidbeck (Shadows & Tall Trees #5)
Signs of the Times, Carole Johnstone (Black Static #33)

Best Collection
For Those Who Dream Monsters, Anna Taborska (Mortbury Press)
Holes for Faces, Ramsey Campbell (Dark Regions Press)
Monsters in the Heart, Stephen Volk (Gray Friar Press)
North American Lake Monsters, Nathan Ballingrud (Small Beer Press)

Best Anthology
End of the Road, Jonathan Oliver (ed.) (Solaris)
Fearie Tales, Stephen Jones (ed.) (Jo Fletcher Books)
Rustblind and Silverbright, David Rix (ed.) (Eibonvale Press)
Tales of Eve, Mhairi Simpson (ed.) (Fox Spirit Books)
The Tenth Black Book of Horror, Charles Black (ed.) (Mortbury Press)

Best Small Press
The Alchemy Press (Peter Coleborn)
Fox Spirit Books (Adele Wearing)
NewCon Press (Ian Whates)
Spectral Press (Simon Marshall-Jones)

Best Non-Fiction
Gestalt Real-Time Reviews, D.F. Lewis
Doors to Elsewhere, Mike Barrett (The Alchemy Press)
Fantasy Faction, Marc Aplin (ed.)
Speculative Fiction 2012, Justin Landon and Jared Shurin (eds) (Jurassic London)
“We Have Always Fought”: Challenging the “Women, Cattle and Slaves” Narrative, Kameron Hurley (A Dribble of Ink)

Best Magazine/Periodical
Black Static, Andy Cox (ed.) (TTA Press)
Clarkesworld, Neil Clarke and Sean Wallace (ed.) (Wyrm Publishing)
Interzone, Andy Cox (ed.) (TTA Press)
Shadows & Tall Trees, Michael Kelly (ed.) (Undertow Books)

Best Comic/Graphic Novel
Demeter, Becky Cloonan (Becky Cloonan)
Jennifer Wilde, Maura McHugh, Karen Mahoney and Stephen Downey (Atomic Diner Comics)
Porcelain, Benjamin Read and Chris Wildgoose (Improper Books)
Rachel Rising, Terry Moore (Abstract Studio)
Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples (Image Comics)
The Unwritten, Mike Carey and Peter Gross (Vertigo)

Best Artist
Adam Oehlers
Ben Baldwin
Daniele Serra
Joey Hi-Fi
Tula Lotay
Vincent Chong

Best Film/Television Episode
Doctor Who: The Day of the Doctor, Steven Moffat (BBC)
Game of Thrones: The Rains of Castamere, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss (HBO)
Gravity, Alfonso Cuarón and Jonás Cuarón (Warner Bros)
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Peter Jackson and Guillermo del Toro (Warner Bros)
Iron Man 3, Drew Pearce and Shane Black (Marvel Studios)

Best Newcomer (the Sydney J. Bounds Award)
Ann Leckie, for Ancillary Justice (Orbit)
Emma Newman, for Between Two Thorns (Angry Robot)
Francis Knight, for Fade to Black (Orbit)
Laura Lam, for Pantomime (Strange Chemistry)
Libby McGugan, for The Eidolon (Solaris)
Samantha Shannon, for The Bone Season (Bloomsbury)

The winners of these awards will now be decided by a juries, while the British Fantasy Society committee will decide the winner of the Karl Edward Wagner Award. The winners will be announced at an awards ceremony at FantasyCon 2014 in York on 6 or 7 September 2014, depending on the convention’s scheduling.

http://www.britishfantasysociety.org/

Free Tim Lebbon tale on Kindle

Tim Lebbon has just announced that his story, In the Valley, Where the Belladonna Grows, is available for free on Kindle from the Amazon store from Dreaming in Fire Press.

'An apocalyptic vision from one woman's damaged mind, this story is for anyone who has ever felt alone. A dark nightmare of solitude and rejection, pride and guilt, love found and lost.

Mary exists alone in a valley, happy, surviving, but all too aware that the terrible dangers beyond her home must one day come home to roost. And that day is now. '

The ebook also includes exclusive bonus story 'The God of Rain'

As with all of Tim's work, I can't recommend it enough.

Grab your copy from Amazon UK here

Or for US readers here

Horror 101: The Way Forward

Out this week from Crystal Lake Publishing is Horror 101: The Way Forward, 'a comprehensive overview of the Horror fiction genre and career opportunities available to established and aspiring authors.' For just 77p on Kindle, this is a must have!

Here's the lineup.

Foreword by Mort Castle
Making Contact  by Jack Ketchum
What is Horror  by Graham Masterton
Bitten by the Horror Bug by Edward Lee
Reader Beware by Siobhan McKinney
Balancing Art and Commerce by Taylor Grant
From Prose to Scripts by Shane McKenzie
Writing About Films and for Film by Paul Kane
Screamplays! Writing the Horror Film by Lisa Morton
Screenplay Writing: The First Cut Is the Deepest by Dean M. Drinkel
Publishing by Simon Marshall-Jones
Weighing Up Traditional Publishing & eBook Publishing by Robert W. Walker
Glenn Rolfe Toes the Line with Samhain Horror Head Honcho, Don D’Auria by Glenn Rolfe
Bringing the Zombie to Life by Harry Shannon
Audiobooks: Your Words to Their Ears by Chet Williamson
Writing Aloud by Lawrence Santoro
Ghost-writing: You Can’t Write It If You Can’t Hear It by Thomas Smith
Ghost-writing by Blaze McRob
The Horror Writers Association - the Genre's Essential Ingredient by Rocky Wood
What a Short Story Editor Does by Ellen Datlow
Self-Publishing: Making Your Own Dreams by Iain Rob Wright
Self-Publishing: Thumb on the Button by Kenneth W. Cain
What’s the Matter with Splatter? by Daniel I. Russell
Partners in the Fantastic: The Pros and Cons of Collaborations by Michael McCarty
The Journey of “Rudy Jenkins Buries His Fears” by Richard Thomas
Writing Short Fiction by Joan De La Haye
A beginner’s guide to setting up and running a website by Michael Wilson
Poetry and Horror by Blaze McRob
Horror for Kids: Not Child’s Play by Francois Bloemhof
So you want to write comic books… by C.E.L. Welsh
Horror Comics – How to Write Gory Scripts for Gruesome Artists by Jasper Bark
Some Thoughts on my Meandering within the World of Dark and Horror Art by Niall Parkinson
Writing the Series by Armand Rosamilia
Running a Web serial by Tonia Brown
Reviewing by Jim Mcleod
Avoiding What’s Been Done to Death by Ramsey Campbell
The 7 Signs that make Agents and Editors say, "Yes!" by Anonymous
The (extremely) Short Guide to Writing Horror by Tim Waggoner
Growing Ideas by Gary McMahon
Filthy Habits – Writing and Routine by Jasper Bark
A Room of One’s Own – The Lonely Path of a Writer by V.H. Leslie
Do You Need an Agent? by Eric S Brown
Ten Short Story Endings to Avoid by William Meikle
Submitting Your Work Part 2: Read the F*****g Guidelines! by John Kenny
Rejection Letters – How to Write and Respond to Them by Jasper Bark
Editing and Proofreading by Diane Parkin
On Formatting: A Concise Guide to the Most Frequently Encountered issues by Rick Carufel
How to Dismember Your Darlings – Editing Your Own Work by Jasper Bark
From Reader to Writer: Finding Inspiration by Emma Audsley
Writing Exercises by Ben Eads
The Year After Publication… by Rena Mason
Writing Horror: 12 Tips on Making a Career of It by Steve Rasnic Tem
The Five Laws of Arnzen by Michael A. Arnzen
The Cheesy Trunk of Terror by Scott Nicholson
How to be Your Own Agent, Whether You Have One or Not by Joe Mynhardt
Networking at Conventions by Lucy A. Snyder
Pitch to Impress: How to Stand Out from the Convention Crowd by RJ Cavender
You Better (Net)Work by Tim Waggoner
Vaginas in Horror by Theresa Derwin
Friendship, Writing, and the Internet by Weston Ochse
Buttoning Up Before Dinner by Gary Fry
How to Fail as an Artist in Ten Easy Steps by John Palisano
Writer’s Block by Mark West
Be the Writer You Want to Be by Steven Savile
Afterword by Joe Mynhardt

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Free Short Story from Brian Moreland

Brian Moreland's short, "The Girl From the Blood Coven" is currently available for free for Kindle from Amazon.

'Who—or what—killed them all?

In this short story prelude to The Witching House, the year is 1972. Sheriff Travis Keagan is enjoying a beer at the local roadhouse when a blood-soaked girl enters the bar. Terrified and trembling, Abigail Blackwood claims her entire family was massacred at the nearby hippy commune in the woods. But when Sheriff Keagan and his deputies investigate the Blevins House, they discover there’s more to Abigail’s story than she’s told them. Much more.'

Hit the link to grab your free copy

Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk