Author Archive
Welcome to the September 2025 issue of my newsletter, “News from the Crypt,” and please visit Carter’s Crypt, devoted to my horror, fantasy, and paranormal romance work, especially focusing on vampires and shapeshifting beasties. If you have a particular fondness for vampires, check out the chronology of my series in the link labeled “Vanishing Breed Vampire Universe.”
Also, check out the multi-author Alien Romances Blog
To subscribe to this monthly newsletter, please e-mail me at MLCVamp@aol.com, and I will add you to the list.
For other web links of possible interest, please scroll to the end.
My YA ghost novella “Her Death Was Doubtful,” an installment in the “Haunting of Pinedale High” shared-world series from the Wild Rose Press, will be published on September 29.
Eleventh-grader Mia Petrelli’s worst problem is her forthcoming oral report on Hamlet, until a ghost wearing a bloodstained skirt confronts her. The phantom begs for help to find her lost baby. Mia has seen spirits before, but none so alarming as this one. Persistently haunted by the dead girl, she has little choice but to investigate the ghost’s past. With the support of her long-time friend Ethan Abbott, Mia strives to uncover the truth so the ghost can rest. Just as Mia’s friendship with Ethan begins to grow deeper, she discovers a buried secret in his family that threatens their budding romance. To work through the snags in their own relationship, together they must help two troubled spirits achieve peace.
A teaser of the opening scene appears below.
My light paranormal romance novella “Summertide Echoes” received a lovely 5-star review from N. N. Light’s Book Heaven. They say, “The author writes with emotion and lush world-building. Once you start, you won’t want to leave these characters.”
This month’s interview presents Darin TaDream, who writes romance in a variety of subgenres.
*****
Interview with Darin TaDream:
What inspired you to become a writer?
Never in my youth would I have dreamed of writing since I disliked reading. But with my wife being an avid reader, to the point of feeling neglected, I chose to embrace reading. She introduced me to books on my favorite TV show, Star Trek. 135 books later, I joined her in her stories, listening, then reading out loud to each other. When one story in particular had a letdown of an ending and I made a snide comment about the publisher’s choice of authors.
Yep, I said if they published that person’s story, they would publish anybody. Ahh, right I put my foot in my mouth. With a look and a laugh, she pushed that foot down my throat. So, I had to try.
Creating my first story I found I enjoy the creative process of writing, so since 1998 I’ve been writing. After volumes of rejection from not understanding the query, submission, agent acquisition bureaucracy I found the growing self-publishing capability. I decided to self-publish my third work first.
What genres do you work in?
Romance, adult, and young adult, contemporary, from sweet recovery to explicit erotic with widely diverse characters including an LGBTQIA character revelation, imparting the life differences of those declaring themselves LGBTQ to those who live with being intersexed.
Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?
I wing it… being in a manufacturing career that works on cyclic timing, often allowing time for creative thoughts (daydreaming). With each new creative Idea, then the work begins on how to integrate that scene into the story.
What have been the major influences on your work (favorite authors or whatever)?
I can’t say that there has been a major influence, often I notice a lack of attention to a
topic or characters. LGBTQ was being over covered so, RUN THE TABLE: ACCEPTANCE involves an intersex character. Started in 2000, I felt there was a lack of African-American central characters, so, with a son (stepson technically) being interracial, well, CHANCE UPON WILMARTIN needed to be written.
Did you base the background of RUN THE TABLE: ACCEPTANCE on personal experience with Professional Billiards or on research? If the latter, do you have any hints for authors wanting to write about a field outside their own experience?
Let’s say it was family experience that was the background. My oldest brother (7 years older, now deceased) ran a pool hall and made the amateur tours. But yet I still had a lot of research to do. Corresponding with the governing agencies of sports, no matter how obscure the sport, is a place to check for me. Again, my brother’s connections in this case. It was the medical confirmation research that will honestly open a reader’s eyes and mind to the category of intersex individuals. FACT: Intersex individuals are more common than those with natural red hair, fair complexion, and freckles.
FOR MY HEART AND MIND features the movie industry and the beauty pageant subculture (wow!). What research sources did you use for this novel?
Once again, the governing councils of the national beauty pageants have historians, and record archives, for that part of the story. For the movie industry, just watch TV, other movies and shows, documentaries and behind the scenes exposes.
Fun Fact: To even my surprise, FOR MY HEART AND MIND turned out to be a prequel to my debut novel …CAN COME TRUE that mentions the completion of the movie being started.
What is your latest or next-forthcoming book?
FOR MY HEART AND MIND is my latest release with the audiobook version still in work.
What are you working on now?
Currently in progress is UNDER THE NEW MEXICO MOON; an astronomy intern chooses to prove an anomaly is more than a glitch in the computer system. With permission from a UFO network, she reopens an abandoned missile silo turn observatory. Hearing scurrying from within the dome she fears what could be infesting the facility she desperately needs to use. At the same time a lagamorphologist hopes to make a name for himself and save the Zoo he works for from what lies inside. How they build into romance is still unknown.
What advice would you give to aspiring authors?
Be (read my penname again) and …CAN COME TRUE.
What is the URL of your website? What about other internet presence?
I’m on a few of the popular social media sites every now and then, I’m not that impressed with online interaction. Questions and comments are welcomed at fans.darin@outlook.com while my basic website is:
DarinTaDream
Thank you for this opportunity to be part of your Crypt.
*****
Some Books I’ve Read Lately:
GOING HOME IN THE DARK, by Dean Koontz. Like Stephen King’s IT and numerous other subsequent dark fantasy novels, Koontz’s latest work of science-fiction horror features an ensemble cast of youthful friends returning to their hometown in adulthood to confront unfinished business with a supernatural or paranormal evil. Like King’s characters, Koontz’s have also forgotten the past horrors they faced. Their situation differs, though, in that their memories were purposely erased. Furthermore, over the course of the story the “four amigos” have those memories deliberately restored, little by little. Thus the reader learns what happened back then at the same pace as the characters remember. They recall Maple Grove as an idyllic small town like the setting of a 1950s family sitcom. Even the street names reinforce that impression, labeled after characters and places such as Mayberry, Winkler, Cunningham, Harriet Nelson, etc. Yet the four friends are haunted by a vague sense of having forgotten some terrible event. All of them, perhaps as a byproduct of that suppressed trauma, have grown up sort of neurotic, although – typical of Koontz’s protagonists – they’ve remained goodhearted people. Also, each has achieved creative success in a different field, Rebecca as an actress, Spencer a visual artist who paints his canvases in a fugue state, Bobby an author, and Ernie a composer of country songs. The story begins when three of the four amigos receive the news that Ernie, the only one who stayed behind in Maple Grove, has inexplicably lapsed into a coma. During his friends’ visit to the hospital, Ernie apparently dies. Intuitively sensing that he’s not dead but in suspended animation, they sneak his inert body out of the intensive care ward. There follows a madcap series of adventures, simultaneously suspenseful and farcical, as they try to hide his body, evade the shadowy menace threatening them, and solve the mystery of the horrors in their past. The ultimate revelation of who or what lies behind those horrors struck me as satisfyingly unusual. Koontz narrates the story from an omniscient viewpoint. Furthermore, he plays with metafictional elements I haven’t seen in any of his previous works. The narrator addresses the reader directly, sometimes in mini-essays of several paragraphs, about authorial decisions on issues large and small such as pacing, foreshadowing, dialogue tags, and even whether to describe food (he doesn’t). In recent years his similes and other figures of speech have grown progressively more elaborate and idiosyncratic. In this book, they’ve become extravagantly over-the-top. Moreover, although he engages our sympathy for the good guys, a slight feeling of detachment pervades the narrative. While he does ride his customary right-wing hobby horses, the exaggeratedly sardonic tone makes the rants more bearable than I usually find them. Strangely, this book doesn’t include a dog. Nor, thankfully, does it feature his usual cartoonish sociopathic genius bent on destroying the world from no rational motive. The antagonist, whose nature I’m leaving vague because anything more specific would spoil the climactic revelation, does want to destroy 90 percent of the human species. The two minions we meet, though, aren’t geniuses, much less fabulously wealthy and/or powerful supervillains. Given the metafictional passages, the sardonic tone, the moments of dark comedy, and the wildly extravagant flights of prose, I strongly suspect Koontz of deliberately writing a parody of his own typical conspiracy-heavy SF thrillers. This isn’t a book readers new to Koontz should start with; however, long-time fans will probably find it intriguing.
THE GRIMOIRE GRAMMAR SCHOOL PARENT TEACHER ASSOCIATION, by Caitlin Rozakis. The title and cover of this novel suggest a lighthearted, humorous fantasy, and the quote on the front calls it “hilarious.” Those hints are a bit misleading, though. The book starts out funny, true, but it takes a seriously dark turn before the end. Still, granted, touches of humor appear throughout, especially in the headings that precede each chapter, consisting of messages from the school to parents. These epigraphs highlight the vein of incongruity running throughout the story between typical, often nitpicky elementary school preoccupations and the paranormal nature of the pupils and staff. The notifications normally arrive by text, although the alternative of “mental summons” is offered. Among other topics, they cover allergens (e.g., nuts, garlic, and silver), sensitivity to ethnic slurs against various supernatural minorities, avoiding holiday costumes that promote offensive stereotypes, and a rule against harming mortals during the Talent Show (even if they’re mindwiped afterward). Protagonist Vivian’s five-year-old daughter, Aria, has become a werewolf from the bite of a maddened rogue. The revered head of the local pack, accepting responsibility, arranges for Aria’s enrollment as a kindergarten student in an exclusive school for supernatural creatures. Lacking control over her shapeshifting and prone to throwing up as a side effect of wolfing-out, Aria has a lot to learn. So do Vivian and Daniel, her husband, forced to move from their old home to one near the school and abruptly thrust into a secret world whose existence they hadn’t suspected. Even though a vampire teaches the kindergarten class, Grimoire Grammar School seems their only chance at a normal life for Aria (for a certain value of normal), since they’ve been informed any other alternative available to a formerly mortal shifter child is worse. Vivian gets off to a shaky start when she brings brownies to the school potluck picnic. The problem isn’t that werewolves can’t eat chocolate – they know to avoid it – but that, as the only ordinary human mother present, she has contributed such a mundane dessert. Happily, Moira, another kindergarten parent, reaches out to Vivian, the first person to offer her anything like friendship since their family’s relocation. In the awkward moment when Aria involuntarily changes into a wolf cub on the playground, Vivian reflects that at least nobody runs away screaming; they just bestow pitying looks. The first serious setback involves the annual Talent Show. To their dismay, Vivian and Daniel learn the children’s performances determine whether they’ll move up to first grade or get expelled from the school. Although Aria makes a few friends among her classmates, there’s no denying her late start as a werewolf constitutes a handicap. A disaster at the Talent Show forces it to close early, and things get more chaotic from there. Some parents fixate on the idea that an ambiguous prophecy dredged up from the past refers to Aria. Vivian can’t tell whom to trust. Meanwhile, Daniel, who initially alternated between amusement at the school’s oddities and skepticism about enrolling Aria there in the first place, grows progressively more unhappy with the situation. His and Vivian’s relationship becomes strained, especially when she starts studying magic. Anybody, even if not born with magical talent, can learn at least simple spells, and she’s determined to fit in for Aria’s sake. He begins to spend evenings away from home for vague reasons. Dire, potentially life-threatening events occur. Vivian’s initial impressions of some people turn out to be mistaken, and she bonds with unexpected allies and friends over the rapidly worsening crisis. At first, I found it hard to believe in her obsession with fitting in among the “right” people. Good grief, why would anybody care? Later, though, it becomes clear that this character trait isn’t a sign of shallowness, but rather a lifelong trauma caused by a toxic relationship with her mother. The estrangement between Vivian and Daniel also feels genuine, as do their anxiety about Aria and the possible danger threatening the children, parents, and staff at Grimoire Grammar School. Any parent of a kid starting school in a strange town could empathize with Vivian, regardless of this school’s unique challenges.
A WITCH’S GUIDE TO MAGICAL INNKEEPING, by Sangu Mandanna. A cozy fantasy with the requisite “found family,” quirky characters human and otherwise, and a quaint, vividly realized setting. The thirty-year-old witch protagonist, Sera Swan, runs her great-aunt Jasmine’s B&B, the Batty Hole, enchanted by a powerful spell Sera cast in her teens. Other permanent residents include Sera’s preteen nephew, Theo, who also possesses magic; Matilda, a middle-aged woman eccentrically devoted to the growing of vegetables that don’t normally thrive in England; Sir Nicholas, a knight in armor who performs at the local Medieval Fair but lives his role full-time; Clemmie, a fox who’s actually a witch under a curse (and constantly complains about her lack of opposable thumbs); and a skeletal undead rooster Sera accidentally reanimated. Magic runs in families but isn’t necessarily inherited by every member of a bloodline. With the general public unaware of the existence of magic, the inn’s transient guests have no idea why they randomly find their way to this warmly welcoming place exactly when they need it. Sera, born with a dazzlingly strong gift, spent her early youth as the apprentice of the most powerful magician in the Guild. Only later in life does she fully realize how determined he was to prevent her talent from surpassing his own. When Sera was fifteen, Jasmine, the beloved great-aunt who takes the place of her disengaged parents, unexpectedly died. Sera raised her from death, losing most of her own magic in the process. The Guild expelled her for that transgression. Now, at thirty, she continues the seemingly hopeless quest for a spell to regain her lost power. She can perform minor enchantments such as heating the house, but only slowly and with difficulty. Two nearly simultaneous events trigger the main plot: She gets possession of a restoration spell in an ancient language unknown to her. Soon thereafter, Luke, a historian and scholar of magic, stumbles upon the Batty Hole (or so he thinks, unaware of the inn’s supernatural magnetism) with his autistic little sister, Posy. Because of their mundane parents’ fear of magic and Posy’s inability to understand she needs to conceal her talent from the outside world, the two of them had been living at Guild headquarters – where her magic was accepted but not her autism. Realizing his tiny apartment wouldn’t work for her either, Luke hopes to find a new home. He first plans to stay at the inn only one night, then only a week or two. He adamantly refuses to get involved with Sera’s problem. Sure, he translates the restoration spell for her, but that’s all he’ll do – really. Of course, that resolution doesn’t last. The translated spell proves hardly less cryptic, requiring apparently impossible ingredients. Posy loves the inn, and Luke, who gets reluctantly drawn into its life, finds himself helping Sera while fighting their mutual attraction. Triumphs and disappointments, narrow escapes, magical conflicts, and a climactic clash with Sera’s old mentor follow. The endearing qualities of the major characters combined with their flaws and vulnerabilities give this novel a special appeal. Theo, like Posy and Luke, has suffered quiet rejection from his parents because of his magic. Luke has learned to hide and even suppress his emotions; the adjective most often applied to him is “arctic.” Matilda thinks she’s too old to find love. Jasmine, throughout her life, has absorbed the idea that her clubfoot makes her unattractive and unworthy. And Sera considers her basic identity bound up with her magical disability. Also, the cast of characters exhibits a delightful range of diversity, both ethnic (Sera, for instance, has Icelandic and Indian parents) and gender/sexual (at least two same-sex couples), not to mention mundane versus magical, neurotypical versus neurodivergent, and human versus not-quite.
HEMLOCK & SILVER, by T. Kingfisher. This author never disappoints, and I especially love her adaptations of fairy tales and classic literature. HEMLOCK & SILVER (sic) is based on “Snow White,” with elements of Alice’s trip through the looking glass. It gives us a possibly evil queen, a poisoned princess, enchanted sleep (apparently, anyway), apples, creepy mirrors, portal fantasy, a doppelganger dimension, and a talking cat. The opening sentence is irresistible: “I had just taken poison when the king arrived to inform me that he had murdered his wife.” Narrator/protagonist Anja experiments on herself with carefully measured doses of poisons to study their attributes and discover antidotes. She also uses roosters as experimental subjects, since chicken breeders often have a surplus of them. And she keeps a snake, which she describes as more of a colleague than a pet, for the useful qualities of its venom. The king’s unheralded arrival in her solitary workshop throws her into confusion; after all, she isn’t nobility, only a prosperous merchant’s daughter. The monarch killed his wife when he caught her in the act of cutting out their daughter’s heart. Now his surviving daughter, twelve-year-old Snow, suffers from a mysterious chronic illness. Grief and depression? Some kind of food or drink sickening her? Or poison? Having heard of Anja’s expertise in the latter field, the king asks her to tackle the problem because she has no court entanglements. A royal request, however affably presented, amounts to a command, so Anja packs up, snake and rooster in tow, to travel to the palace despite her trepidation. How will the king react if she fails to solve the case? Suppose Snow really is being poisoned and Anja becomes a target, if the culprit sees through her guise of being the princess’s new natural history tutor? Whom can she trust? It quickly becomes clear that Snow isn’t deliberately making herself sick, yet Anja believes she knows more than she’s admitting. The girl’s volatile adolescent moods complicate the situation. Anja methodically sets up procedures for ruling out possible causes, employing the scientific method she excels at and enjoys. On the other hand, she finds attending court dinners an ordeal. Dealing with people has always been hard for her, especially since her usual conversation focuses on poisonous and venomous plants and animals along with other bizarre natural phenomena that fascinate her. According to the Healer who’d been her beloved mentor, most members of their profession regard cases as people with problems; Anja, although she’s sincerely driven to find cures, sees a case as a problem with a person inconveniently attached. When she discovers the strange mirrors made of sand from the late queen’s native country, Anja is baffled. She doesn’t believe in magic. Therefore, she addresses the conundrum of the mirrors and the other world inside them with the same experimental rigor she applies to poisons. She gets help from one of the local bodyguards assigned to her and a one-eyed, talking cat who has no patience with answering tedious human questions. The solution to the mystery and the connection between the mirror realm and Snow’s illness will astonish most readers as thoroughly as it does Anja. Although still unwilling to believe in magic, she keeps an open mind. Between her lack of confidence outside the boundaries of her profession and her bodyguard’s taciturn manner, it takes her a while to begin to recognize their mutual attraction. Its gradual development from friendship to passion is charmingly awkward. The supercilious, enigmatic feline is also a constant delight. (According to the afterword, by the way, he’s based on the author’s own one-eyed cat.) As typical of Kingfisher’s first-person narrators, Anja is an entertaining character whose combined intelligence and vulnerability can’t fail to engage the reader’s sympathy.
For my recommendations of “must read” classic and modern vampire fiction, explore the Realm of the Vampires:
Realm of the Vampires
*****
Excerpt from “Her Death Was Doubtful”:
As usual, the girls’ restroom in the east wing of the school’s second floor was deserted. Mia staggered to the nearest sink, swallowing over and over to quell the churning in her stomach. Her hands shaking, she splashed water on her face until the queasiness faded. She didn’t want to show up at the after-school meeting of the game club looking like a total wreck.
If she couldn’t stand in front of the junior-year AP English class to deliver a two-minute summary of her chosen topic from Hamlet without an attack of nausea, how would she get through the entire oral report later? Why hadn’t Mr. McCall assigned just the written essay, which wouldn’t cause her any problem? Why did he have to require a speech, too?
A moan interrupted her thoughts. Had somebody come in while she wallowed in a pit of anxiety? “Who’s there?” She whirled around.
A girl stood in the middle of the room with her arms stretched out as if begging. “Help me!” What Mia’s grandmother would call “pleasingly plump,” with round cheeks and short, curly blond hair, the stranger wore a baggy sweatshirt over a calf-length, denim skirt.
Bloodstains spattered the skirt. “Help me,” she cried again. “Please, I can’t find my baby.”
Mia gasped and backed away. “OMG, what happened to you? Wait here. I’ll get somebody.” She glanced in the mirror and didn’t see the girl’s reflection. Where did she go? When Mia looked around, the girl was still there. Okay, no mystery. She didn’t happen to stand in the right position to show up in the mirror. Nothing to worry about. Finding an adult to deal with this crisis was the important thing at the moment.
Fortunately, Mia had noticed Hank, the senior custodian, working in the hall a couple of minutes earlier. Rushing from the restroom, she found him pushing a broom just outside the door.
“Whoa, hold up, what’s wrong?”
She gasped out, “There’s a girl in there. I think she’s hurt.”
“Take it easy. Let’s have a look.” He leaned the broom against the wall and opened the door.
Steadied by his calm voice, she walked inside ahead of him. No trace of the girl. “She was just here. She must be in a stall.” Although a glance showed all the doors ajar, Mia checked each one. Empty. “I don’t understand. She couldn’t have gotten past me into the hall. I really saw her, honest.”
Hank said, “I believe you—Mia, right?”
She nodded, “Mia Petrelli. You don’t think I’m lying? Or I imagined the whole thing?”
“Of course not. I’ve seen her myself a few times over the years.” He exited the restroom with Mia trailing behind him.
“Years? What do you mean?”
“Haven’t you heard stories about the school being haunted?” His matter-of-fact tone didn’t sound as if he was making fun of her.
“Sure, but I thought they were just urban legends. You’re saying the girl I saw is a ghost?”
“Yep, and not the only one by a long shot. Don’t worry, they’re mainly harmless.”
-end of excerpt-
*****
The long-time distributor of THE VAMPIRE’S CRYPT has closed its website. If you would like to read any issue of this fanzine, which contains fiction, interviews, and a detailed book review column, visit the Dropbox page below. Find information about the contents of each issue on this page of my website:
All issues are now posted on Dropbox, where you should be able to download them at this link:
All Vampire’s Crypt Issues on Dropbox
A complete list of my available works, arranged roughly by genre, with purchase links:
For anyone who would like to read previous issues of this newsletter, they’re posted on my website here (starting from January 2018):
This is my Facebook author page. Please visit!
Facebook
Here’s my page in Barnes and Noble’s Nook store:
Barnes and Noble
Here’s the list of my Kindle books on Amazon. (The final page, however, includes some Ellora’s Cave anthologies in which I don’t have stories):
Carter Kindle Books
Here’s a shortcut URL to my author page on Amazon:
Amazon
The Fiction Database displays a comprehensive list of my books (although with a handful of fairy tales by a different Margaret Carter near the end):
My Goodreads page:
Goodreads
Please “Like” my author Facebook page (cited above) to see reminders when each monthly newsletter is uploaded. I’ve also noticed that I’m more likely to be shown posts from liked or friended sources in my Facebook feed when I’ve “Liked” some of their individual posts, so you might want to do that, too. Thanks!
My Publishers:
Writers Exchange E-Publishing: Writers Exchange
Harlequin: Harlequin
Wild Rose Press: Wild Rose Press
You can contact me at: MLCVamp@aol.com
“Beast” wishes until next time—
Margaret L. Carter
Welcome to the August 2025 issue of my newsletter, “News from the Crypt,” and please visit Carter’s Crypt, devoted to my horror, fantasy, and paranormal romance work, especially focusing on vampires and shapeshifting beasties. If you have a particular fondness for vampires, check out the chronology of my series in the link labeled “Vanishing Breed Vampire Universe.”
Also, check out the multi-author Alien Romances Blog
To subscribe to this monthly newsletter, please e-mail me at MLCVamp@aol.com, and I will add you to the list.
For other web links of possible interest, please scroll to the end.
The Wild Rose Press has accepted my YA ghost novella “Her Death Was Doubtful” for their “Haunting of Pinedale High” shared-world series. It will be released on September 29 of this year.
My light paranormal romance novella “Summertide Echoes” was published by the Wild Rose Press on July 7. Here’s the blurb:
Joyce Walton wants to sell the vacation cabin she and her childhood best friend, Mark Girard, inherited together. The money will make her long-cherished business plan come true. To her shock, he’s determined to hang onto the place. Although they’ve drifted apart in recent years, she still cares for him. She’s always counted on his support, so why can’t he understand the urgency of her need? Mark believes his younger sister, who died in her teens, lingers on the property, visiting him in dreams at the cabin but nowhere else. He struggles with severing this last remaining tie. Yet he doesn’t want to hurt Joyce, especially when his old feelings for her reawaken. After encountering the ghost of their old Saint Bernard and dreaming of Mark’s sister, Joyce accepts the reality of the supernatural manifestations. Why are the two spirits haunting the cabin? On top of that, she’s falling in love with Mark. How can they settle the clash over their shared property without ruining any hope of a shared life?
The book’s page:
“Summertide Echoes” was featured in a Book Heaven Wednesday spotlight by N. N. Light’s Book Heaven on July 9:
You can read one more excerpt from the story below. After sharing a dinner at the cabin, Joyce and Mark encounter their aunts’ long-dead Saint Bernard.
Issue 48 of vampire and horror zine NIGHT TO DAWN includes my short, funny story “Interview with a Reluctant Vampire”:
By the way, Night to Dawn Magazine & Books also published my collection of three humorous tales about vampire-human crossbreed psychiatrist Roger Darvell, DOCTOR VAMPIRE:
Here’s a follow-up interview with YA fantasy author Mark Rosendorf.
*****
Interview with Mark Rosendorf:
What inspired you to become a writer?
To be honest, this is actually my second writing career, and I call myself a Born Again Author. Let me explain this term I coined:
As a child, I always enjoyed writing and knew that writing books was in my future. I achieved that dream in 2007 when my first book, “The Rasner Effect” was picked up by the publisher, L&L Dreamspell. It was an adult suspense/thriller which was followed by two sequels, a sci-fi book, and a short story. The truth is, I knew nothing about how to navigate the book industry and how to get my work out there for fans all over the world to read. By the time I learned my way around the literary world, I was burnt out. I decided to be happy with the fact that I achieved my dream of becoming a writer and settle on an early retirement as a writer. To show how little of an impact I made on the writing industry, no one else even realized I retired.
Two quick facts about me: I am a high school guidance counselor working with students with special needs. I was also a professional magician (which predates my writing career) and, to this day, I teach magic to my students as part of our performing arts program. A few years had passed since I quit writing books and just focused on working with my students and putting together the shows for the program and teaching them magic.
One night, at about 3:00 am, I was thinking about how much work we put into the magic, yet to the audience, it may as well be witchcraft. Suddenly, the idea hit me for a book I had to write. Over the course of a number of nights, the characters, the plot, and the entire story flashed in my head like a bullet to the brain. I was up for hours those nights writing it all down, under my blanket with a flashlight, trying my hardest not to wake up my wife. This is how The Witches of Vegas, a five book fantasy series written for young adult readers, was born.
So, using all I learned from my first writing career, I have now written and still write a new and completely different series in a different genre (fantasy and sci-fi) for a different audience. That is why I call myself a Born Again Author.
Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?
My best ideas come at the most inopportune times. They hit me while I’m in the shower, at three o’clock in the morning, or when I’m driving. When they hit, they’re like lightning, one bright flash, then it’s completely gone. This is why I keep notepads in the shower and next to my bed with a flashlight. I use a recording app on my phone in the car.
I then take all of my notes and write out the chapter in a notebook. I’m not worried about grammar or sentence structure, just the story. I then take that and type it out on the computer where I’m now focused on grammar, sentence structure, as well as the creative story itself. In essence, my first time typing it out is my second draft.
What would you describe as the special challenges of writing YA fiction?
The biggest challenge is creating a YA story which will appeal not just to teens today but to teens in future generations. Teen slang and interests change almost by the day. I’ve produced published articles and podcasts on the set of rules I’ve created and follow on keeping stories timeless, and much of that advice is geared toward YA books. I call them my “Back To The Future” rules.
The last thing you want is to turn off a future generation of readers because they just can’t relate to the characters in the story. A fifteen-year-old today may enjoy a specific YA story, but what you don’t want is a fifteen-year-old picking up the book in the far future and saying, “the teen in this story sounds like my grandpa.”
Here’s a podcast where I present my “Back To The Future rules that I hope will help any aspiring writers out there: How to Make Your Writing Timeless
Please tell us about your “Witches of Vegas” series.
The Witches of Vegas series features everything you could want in a story. Fantasy, sci-fi, suspense, action/adventure, humor, romance, and starting in the third book, time travel and a unique take on alternate timelines.
The Witches of Vegas revolves around two main characters. One is fifteen-year-old Isis Rivera, the adopted daughter of The Witches of Vegas, a family of witches and their vampire mentor, Walter, who hide in plain sight as magicians on The Vegas Strip. Their show becomes the number one show in Vegas due to the amazing “illusions” they create on stage and the low cost for props and illusions since they’re creating their magic out of thin air in order to train and practice their witchcraft.
The second main character is a teenage magician’s apprentice, Zack Galloway. Zack is raised by and works for his uncle, “The Amazing Herb Galloway,” who used to be one of the Vegas greats. Now, with The Witches of Vegas’ show sending every other magician running for greener pastures, Herb and Zack’s show barely keeps an audience and is in danger of being cancelled. Unfortunately, their failed attempt to keep up with The Witches of Vegas has left them without money to relocate. Their next home could be the streets.
Isis and Zack should be enemies. But, when a threat from Walter’s past comes to Vegas with a vendetta against the entire world, it will be up to these two teenagers to somehow bring their families together. But will even they be enough to stop the threat of Wiccan vampire, Valeria, who has had hundreds of years to prepare?
While The Witches of Vegas series’ two main characters are teens, there are also enough adult characters with different personalities. Guaranteed, there’s a character in this book that will appeal to any and all readers.
As the author of GHOST THERAPY in the “Haunting of Pinedale High” series, please tell us about the background of that novel and what it’s like to write in a shared world.
As far as writing a shared world, I had a huge advantage over other writers in the series in that I went first. I was able to set the tone, create the town of Pinedale, and create the school where the hauntings take place. I did communicate with a lot of other authors in the series, and placing their needs into my presentation of the town (for example, one author wanted a diner near the school, so I implemented that). But everyone else, for the most part, used Ghost Therapy as a reference point for their stories in “The Haunting of Pinedale High” series.
Ghost Therapy revolves around Sam Anderson, a fifteen-year-old student at Pinedale Central High School who is constantly tormented by a bully in the school. He doesn’t have friends at school, until he meets Jessica, a ghost who has been haunting the school for over a century with no way to leave. Jessica convinces Sam to stand up to his bully, advice that proves disastrous when Sam is inadvertently killed in the confrontation.
From that moment, Sam becomes a ghost in Pinedale Central high school. Sam is unable to be seen or heard, not by the living or even by other ghosts. That is, until a brand-new guidance counselor for the school can see and hear him.
Mr. Copeland is a former special forces soldier who has retired from military service and has come to Pinedale to begin his job as a counselor. Soon after discovering Sam, the two form a bond created out of Copeland’s determination to help Sam find his way to the afterlife. Their efforts, however, have consequences…some good, some not so good, and one that could put the lives of everyone in the school at risk.
What have been the major influences on your work (favorite authors or whatever)?
I don’t have specific authors who influence me, but rather specific books, specific works. The one book which had a huge influence on me was Stephen Baxter’s “The Time Ships.” It was a sequel to one of my favorite stories, HG Wells’ “The Time Machine.” What stuck out most to me about “The Time Ships” was that each chapter was relatively short and they each ended on a cliffhanger that excited me to read the next chapter and find out what would happen. I use this technique whenever possible in my own writing.
Douglas Adams’ “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” series was also a huge influence on me. As a kid I loved those books mainly because, beyond the humor, it was an intelligently crafted story with clever anecdotes throughout. Mostly, it was an original concept which made me think, and that’s what I like to bring to my readers.
Outside of books, my biggest influences in my current writing career are my students. I always try to think in terms of characters they’d relate to and embrace when creating these stories as they are a microcosm of all my potential readers out there.
One unique example of my students influencing my writing is that Sam, the main character of Ghost Therapy, is based on one of my students. He is young man who has difficulties with reading. I gave him a copy of Ghost Therapy knowing he would relate to the character; after all, he had a huge influence on Sam. Each day, he would read a few pages with his teacher who would help him break down the words he struggled with. It took almost the entire year, but he finished the book (it was the second book we worked with him on as he had one of a lower grade level the previous year) and he genuinely enjoyed the story. This is a huge statement for a young man who avoided reading at all costs because a page filled with words was too overwhelming for him. When we tested him at the end of the year, his reading levels had jumped up by two and a half grades in one year. That came from reading.
It’s Summer vacation now, but I look forward to letting him know when he comes back to school that the story he read, with a main character he influenced, has won the National Excellence in Storytelling for 2025.
What are you working on now?
I am in the middle of a new and unique YA story called “The Sub.” It’s a futuristic sci-fi adventure revolving around a group of teens who are thrust into an unusual and overwhelming situation they can’t possibly be ready for. This story, like The Witches of Vegas, takes a new and unique take on time travel and paradoxes that also promises to have characters that will emotionally invest their readers. I don’t have a set date as to when it will come out, but it will definitely be worth watching out for. But, until then, I invite all your readers to enjoy The Witches of Vegas series and The Haunting of Pinedale High series starting with Ghost Therapy.
What advice would you give to aspiring authors?
My advice is to get ready for a long, frustrating, and exhausting process, and that’s after the book is written. Whether you’re looking for a traditional publisher or you want to self-publish, you have a lot of work ahead of you. But nothing worth doing is ever easy. When you finally see your book in print, when you look at your cover for the first time, all that hard work is well worth it.
One thing to keep in mind: when your book finally becomes real, that is not the goal…that’s the starting line. It doesn’t mean you won your race, it means you are now entering the race, a race that never ends because there are always people out there that haven’t read your book yet and you want them to know about it.
My second piece of advice: keep reading. The more you read, the better of a writer you become. Good luck, and enjoy the ride.
Check out my website: Mark Rosendorf
*****
Some Books I’ve Read Lately:
A FAR BETTER THING, by H. G. Parry. In A TALE OF TWO CITIES, why does Sydney Carton, the assistant to Charles Darnay’s defense lawyer, look uncannily similar to Darnay? Mere coincidence? Not in Parry’s book, a retelling of Dickens’s novel narrated by Sydney Carton. Darnay is a fairy changeling, substituted for Carton in infancy. Like all children abducted by the fairies, at puberty Carton faced the choice of either transformation into one of the fae or a lifetime as a human servant to the fairies. Having chosen the latter, he lives in the mortal world and carries out assignments for his fae masters (for example, stealing bones from graveyards) whenever ordered to by his contact, a fairy he calls Shadow. He shuns close connections with other people, dulling his emotions with habitual drunkenness. Human servants usually aren’t told the reasons for the tasks imposed on them. They aren’t allowed to learn the true names bestowed on them at their human births, nor are they ever supposed to meet their changelings. Carton knows coming face-to-face with his fairy doppelganger in the courtroom can’t be a random accident. Even stranger, Lucie Manette (Darnay’s future wife) proves to be the changeling counterpart of Carton’s beloved childhood friend Ivy, who died in an alleged accident in the fae realm before reaching the age of decision. His first impulse upon meeting Darnay is to hate him, even though the situation isn’t the fault of the changeling, who has no idea of his true nature. Yet Carton develops true friendships with Darnay, Lucie, and Dr. Manette. Even fully aware that Lucie isn’t Ivy, Carton grows to care deeply for the changeling woman. He also becomes close to an eccentric stage magician who augments his act with genuine magic and ardently desires to enter the fairy realm, a wish Carton regards as madness. He longs for revenge against the beings who stole his life and made him a slave – in vain, until he clashes with a fairy he calls Bartholomew (female, oddly, as far as can be discerned). Bartholomew hatches a plot to open forbidden gates between the realms, overthrow the fairy king, and invade the mortal world. Carton cherishes ambitions to destroy both Shadow and Batholomew, but killing fairies is almost impossible. All these supernatural machinations comprise the main plot, while the story of A TALE OF TWO CITIES as we know it unfolds mostly in the background. Parry’s clever interweaving of the mundane and magical plotlines forms a riveting tale. Carton ends up forced to bargain with Shadow, despite the dire risks of making deals with fairies. It’s fascinating to watch him embrace his humanity as his fate irrevocably progresses toward the climax we know to expect from the original classic novel. We never find out, by the way, the fairies’ exact motive for the changeling custom. If they steal human babies to replenish their own dwindling ranks and/or to gain mortal servants for tasks in the human world, why not just take the children? Why bother to leave changelings? Wouldn’t that defeat the purpose of increasing the fairies’ population? Maybe in the context of Sydney Carton’s own viewpoint, though, this omission makes sense. After all, the fae seldom if ever bother to explain their actions and demands to mortals. That behavior is just one aspect of their terrifyingly enigmatic nature.
THE WINDS OF FATE, by S. M. Stirling. The second volume in Stirling’s “Make the Darkness Light” series about time travel to the Roman Empire in the middle of the second century. In case you’ve read L. Sprague de Camp’s classic LEST DARKNESS FALL, the homage in Stirling’s title will be obvious. In my opinion, however, his fictional development of the premise is better. Like the protagonist of LEST DARKNESS FALL, Stirling’s twenty-first-century characters introduce technological and social innovations to Roman society in an attempt to alter history for the better. They have more knowledge and resources to work with, though. Appreciating THE WINDS OF FATE requires having read the first book, TO TURN THE TIDE; they comprise parts of one continuing story. (Needless to say, I recommend that any fan of time-travel fiction do so.) The set-up: Professor Arthur Vandenberg, now known as Artorius, and four of his graduate students were tricked into participating in a desperate temporal experiment. At the beginning of TO TURN THE TIDE, they and a literal ton of useful baggage were sent to Roman-ruled central Europe in the 160s, seconds ahead of Vienna’s destruction by a fusion bomb in the near-future twenty-first century. (The inventor of the time machine didn’t survive the one-way trip.) Of course, that means all the events of the series after they arrive in the past belong to an alternate history. In that novel, they had the good fortune to be found by a highly intelligent, scrupulously honest Jewish merchant and later to win the patronage of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, plus the friendship of Galen, the greatest physician of classical antiquity. The travelers, under the guise of refugees from a technologically advanced country called America far across the Atlantic, destroyed by a cataclysmic war – more or less the truth – began to introduce what Artorius calls “Type A” innovations. They can be built or implemented, e.g. stirrups, agricultural improvements, gunpowder, vaccination, and anti-disease sanitation measures, among many others, with technology already available in the second century; the Romans need only to be taught the concepts. By THE WINDS OF FATE, set six to eight years after the Americans’ arrival, they’ve begun to advance to “Type B” inventions, requiring new kinds of tools to make the tools. Meanwhile, with gunpowder weapons the Roman Empire has conquered barbarian lands that took many years and much bloodshed to subdue in the original timeline, and a devastating smallpox epidemic has been averted through vaccination. Now they’re directing the godlike weapons against the other great empire of that era, the Parthians. Hidebound traditionalists in the Roman Senate disapprove of the “new things” and the influence of the upstart from nowhere who has the Emperor’s favor. Most people, however, welcome the advances with awe. But a graver danger is brewing on the other side of the world. The Chinese Communist regime also dispatched travelers at the same time, trained and prepared, with their leader bent in the long run on global domination. Now the two groups have become aware of each other, with an inevitable clash set up for the forthcoming next installment in the series. I like the Chinese viewpoint character, a historical linguist added to the team as a last-minute replacement. I was glad to find that feeling justified as the plot unfolds. The five American characters are individualized and likable, even the young man who’s somewhat empathy-challenged. Two of them marry each other, and the other three form marriages or marriage-like unions with people they’ve met since their arrival. The narrative makes it clear the travelers haven’t callously forgotten the horrific would-have-been future from which they were involuntarily rescued, but in the ensuing years they’ve become adjusted to their new situation, even if they still sometimes have to remind themselves it’s actually real. The story’s main emphasis, though, focuses on the monumental changes they’ve introduced to the Roman world, with more to come. Caution: To fully enjoy this book, you have to like reading detailed exposition on technological and sociological topics. I love a well-written expository lump, and Stirling is a consummately lucid explainer. Therefore, the multiple, lengthy passages of explanation, whether in dialogue between characters or in straightforward exposition thinly disguised as internal monologue, delighted me. On the other hand, the major battle against the Parthians went on way too long for me, although I know many Stirling fans glory in that kind of thing. The author’s afterword also provides an overview of his approach to the time-travel premise and the changes made by his characters.
HOW TO FIND A NAMELESS FAE, by A. J. Lancaster. A re-imagining of “Rumpelstiltskin” with aspects of “Beauty and the Beast.” The protagonist, Princess Gisele, was destined to fulfill her mother’s pact with the mysterious creature who spun straw into gold. In Gisele’s infancy her parents carefully kept her separated from her younger twin brother, heir to the throne, for fear the “beast” would take him by mistake. However, neither of them was claimed. Now, at the age of forty, Gisele continues to wait in vain for the claimant to show up. Over the years, the curse that’s a byproduct of the magical bargain has grown more extreme. Nobody can stand to be near her for long, and her presence changes gold to wood or straw. With the latter effect spreading, to the potential ruin of her parents’ kingdom, she decides to take matters into her own hands by crossing into the faerie realm in search of the “evil sorcerer” who holds her debt. Instead, she finds a curmudgeonly but handsome, youthful-looking male fae with red hair and feline eyes, ears, fangs, and tail. Their acquaintance starts badly when she stabs him with a poisoned dagger, offering the antidote only if he releases her from the bargain. To her dismay, he can’t do that without recovering his true name. The tale her family believes, he explains, is based on a misunderstanding. He never required Gisele’s mother to guess his name; he entrusted it to her as a means of protection from his archenemy. The firstborn child part of the deal was a mere formality, required by the nature of faerie magic. He expected to clear up the matter within a year. When things went wrong, he became a recluse. He’s mildly surprised to learn of Gisele’s plight, having lost track of the time that has passed in the mortal realm. Besides, he had no idea his failure to claim her burdened her with a curse. In effect, the nemesis who has overshadowed her entire life basically forgot about her. Gisele must put aside her outrage and cooperate with him in the quest for his lost name in order to free herself. She discovers she has no choice, being now so intimately bound to the sorcerer she can’t even leave his warded property without him. Since he interacts with other people so seldom, he hasn’t bothered to adopt a use-name, so she calls him her Malediction, “Mal” for short. By the way, can’t he just arbitrarily choose a new name? No, true names don’t work that way. She makes a game of running through alphabetical lists of names in remote hope of stumbling on the right one by accident, while they delve into his voluminous library in search of a solution. Gradually and believably, the relationship between Gisele and Mal evolves from hostility to alliance, then friendship, then sensual attraction exacerbated by erotically fraught shared dreams. Gisele finds herself less eager to escape their magical bond and return home, wondering whether the deepening attachment between them will survive the bond’s dissolution. Meanwhile, she becomes friendly with a few odd – people – who visit the borders of Mal’s land. Aside from Gisele and Mal with their intense emotions and lively dialogue, the most engaging characters are his sentient house, constantly rearranging its interior and contents according to the inhabitants’ needs or its own whims, and a supercilious talking cat (communicating telepathically, not aloud). The astonishing revelation of where Mal’s true name is hidden leads to a devastating battle with his enemy. A surprising but credibly foreshadowed eucatastrophe produces a heartwarming conclusion. To my delight, the denouement satisfyingly ties up loose threads rather than rushing directly from the plot’s climax to the final page. Although completely happy with the ending, I became so enthralled with Gisele and Mal I felt half sorry to reach that last page.
THE ENCHANTED GREENHOUSE, by Sarah Beth Durst. While this cozy fantasy is part prequel to and part spinoff from THE SPELLSHOP, the two books can be read independently. Aside from the setting, they’re connected by the sentient spider plant, a major secondary character in THE SPELLSHOP, whose creation triggers the events at the beginning of THE ENCHANTED GREENHOUSE. The two heroines, both librarians, reverse-mirror each other in personality. The protagonist of THE SPELLSHOP is an introvert perfectly content to live in her corner of the library without speaking to anyone except the spider plant for weeks at a time. Upon returning to her home island, she shrinks from meeting people and tries in vain to discourage her obtrusively friendly nearest neighbor. Terlu in THE ENCHANTED GREENHOUSE, on the other hand, expected that as a librarian she would meet scholars and other patrons every day, helping them find the perfect books for their needs. Instead, she works in unwelcome isolation. In her loneliness, she casts a spell to bestow sentience on the spider plant, violating the harsh law against magical activity by non-sorcerers, just to have someone to talk to. She ends up alone on an island with a handsome but antisocial gardener who communicates mainly by grunts and shrugs. The story begins with the trial that condemns her to transformation into a wooden statue as an example to other would-be lawbreakers. Six years later, she reverts to human form, awakening amid a snow-covered landscape on the aforesaid island. The only inhabitant, Yarrow, the caretaker for a complex of enchanted greenhouses, petitioned the capital of the Empire for a sorcerer to stop the gradual degradation of the magic that keeps the greenhouses functional. Instead, he received Terlu along with instructions on how to break her punitive spell. From him, she learns the sorcerer who ruled the island died some time ago, and ever since, greenhouses have failed at regular intervals. Glass cracks, and the spells that maintain their internal environments stop working. The structures house a fascinating variety of plant life, both magical and mundane, in a wide array of micro-climates. Terlu also meets miniature dragons, a winged cat, a talking rosebush, and a roomful of other sentient, ambulatory plants (after she wakes them). One feature of this world I especially like is its diverse population of multiple human races, humanoids, and human-animal hybrids (although in this book we don’t see much of them until the island gets re-settled at the end). Terlu, for instance, has lavender skin, and nobody thinks anything of it. It’s also a delightful novelty to see a “pleasingly plump” heroine with a face resembling a cheerful chipmunk’s. The initially grumpy, withdrawn Yarrow nevertheless helps her as much as possible and invites her to stay in his own cottage, even though he clearly thinks she talks too much. As they work together researching the books and notes left by the dead sorcerer, who became increasingly paranoid with age, to figure out the cause and cure for the failing magic, Yarrow unbends toward Terlu. They become friends who soon share, naturally, numerous moments of awkward romantic attraction. Their growing bond is endearing and believable. It’s also credible that Terlu fears the potential consequences of meddling with magic at a far more serious level than her original transgression. She’s torn between her dread of being discovered by imperial investigators and her longing to save the greenhouses and their precious plants. Of course, we know what she’ll choose, but the suspense is genuine, as is the difficulty of finding out what went wrong and how to fix it. Meanwhile, Yarrow struggles to face his fraught relationship with his extended family who left him alone on the island – even if the sorcerer gave them little choice – while Terlu questions whether she dares to let her own family know she’s alive. All those factors, along with the heartwarming conclusion, made this another story that I hated to see end.
For my recommendations of “must read” classic and modern vampire fiction, explore the Realm of the Vampires:
Realm of the Vampires
*****
Excerpt from “Summertide Echoes”:
Joyce took one stride toward the edge of the porch and peered into the darkness. “Bruno? Bruno, are you here? Come, boy!” Thunder peeled. She glanced at the sky. “What’s with the dramatic sound effects?”
A sidelong look showed her Mark in the glow of the porch light, rigidly staring as if he did think she’d lost her marbles. She called the dog’s name again. This is pointless. Why would a dead pet’s ghost, if that’s what it is, come when I call? About to give up, she glimpsed a four-legged shape, surrounded by a faint glimmer, frisking up the front path. “Bruno?”
The dog climbed the steps to her, his tail wagging. Hesitantly she touched his ruffed neck, and again her hand passed through him. She felt as if she’d reached into a freezer.
Mark got to his feet. “Are you saying this actually is Bruno?”
She swallowed hard. “Try for yourself.”
He stepped to her side and started to pet the dog. When Mark’s arm sank into the furry bulk, he snatched it back, staggering. “Oh, my God. Maybe I’m asleep now.” His voice quavered.
“Not unless we’re sharing the same dream.” She clutched his arm when the dog silently sniffed both of them in turn.
“We’re seeing Bruno’s ghost?” He spoke in a monotone, as if stunned by a blow to the head.
“Unless it’s a mindless psychic trace, like I suggested.”
He brushed his fingers over the insubstantial figure. “This is a whole different level from seeing my sister in a dream.”
Lightning flashed again, and the Saint Bernard vanished.
Mark covered his eyes for a second, then said, “That happened, right? If you saw him, too, it must have, because you’re the practical one.”
Joyce shivered at a gust of wind. “Well, he’s gone now. Let’s go inside.”
“Seconded. It’s getting chilly.”
Another thunderclap sounded. His arm wrapped around her waist, and she leaned against him, trembling.
An unexpected wave of pleasure swept over her. She inhaled his aftershave, the same lime fragrance he’d worn ever since he first started shaving. His heartbeat hammered in her ear, and her own pulse sped up. She pulled away, blushing, scooped up the empty bowls, and scurried into the house.
“How about I start a fire?” he said as he followed her in.
“Great idea.” While he stepped outside again to fetch wood, she lit four thick, pine-scented candles, two for the kitchen table and two for the coffee table. Although the generator should automatically kick on if the power grid failed, it couldn’t hurt to prepare backup light sources. She drew deep breaths to calm herself while until he entered with an armful of logs. Sitting on the couch, she watched Mark ignite the kindling with wads of newspaper. She relished his display of masculine competence, not to mention the flexing of his arm muscles as he arranged the wood on the andirons over the embryonic flames. Sure, she could have accomplished the same task herself, but why not enjoy the show? Purely aesthetic appreciation, she told herself.
Just as the blaze began to catch properly, another burst of lightning strobed in the dark. A crash of thunder followed seconds later. The next moment, the sky unleashed a torrent of rain outside the living room window. She walked over to stare through the pane. Aside from her own dim reflection on the glass, she couldn’t see anything except a sheet of rain, like a giant waterfall.
As she turned toward Mark, who’d just stood up from the hearth, the lamps on the end tables blinked off. She froze, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the darkness relieved only by the fire and a pair of candles. Seconds later, the lights sputtered, then shone steadily again.
He released a long sigh. “Great, the generator’s doing its job.”
Picking up her phone from the coffee table, she navigated to the weather app, mildly surprised to get a signal. “This storm is supposed to hang around until almost midnight. You can’t drive anywhere in that.” She gestured at the window. “You’d better stay over.” At the realization of what that remark might imply, she hastily added, “You can crash in your usual room. I’ve already put my stuff in the other one.”
“Okay, makes sense. In that case, we might as well finish the wine.”
After an uncertain pause, she said, “Sure, why not?” That amount on top of a full meal wouldn’t be intoxicating enough to provoke her to do anything dumb. She fetched the bottle and glasses from the kitchen. They sat on the couch facing the fire, and he poured each of them a fresh drink.
“Seeing Bruno and reaching right through him was—incredible,” he said. “If you hadn’t confirmed that, I wouldn’t have believed it was real.”
-end of excerpt-
*****
The long-time distributor of THE VAMPIRE’S CRYPT has closed its website. If you would like to read any issue of this fanzine, which contains fiction, interviews, and a detailed book review column, visit the Dropbox page below. Find information about the contents of each issue on this page of my website:
All issues are now posted on Dropbox, where you should be able to download them at this link:
All Vampire’s Crypt Issues on Dropbox
A complete list of my available works, arranged roughly by genre, with purchase links:
For anyone who would like to read previous issues of this newsletter, they’re posted on my website here (starting from January 2018):
This is my Facebook author page. Please visit!
Facebook
Here’s my page in Barnes and Noble’s Nook store:
Barnes and Noble
Here’s the list of my Kindle books on Amazon. (The final page, however, includes some Ellora’s Cave anthologies in which I don’t have stories):
Carter Kindle Books
Here’s a shortcut URL to my author page on Amazon:
Amazon
The Fiction Database displays a comprehensive list of my books (although with a handful of fairy tales by a different Margaret Carter near the end):
My Goodreads page:
Goodreads
Please “Like” my author Facebook page (cited above) to see reminders when each monthly newsletter is uploaded. I’ve also noticed that I’m more likely to be shown posts from liked or friended sources in my Facebook feed when I’ve “Liked” some of their individual posts, so you might want to do that, too. Thanks!
My Publishers:
Writers Exchange E-Publishing: Writers Exchange
Harlequin: Harlequin
Wild Rose Press: Wild Rose Press
You can contact me at: MLCVamp@aol.com
“Beast” wishes until next time—
Margaret L. Carter
Joyce Walton wants to sell the vacation cabin she and her childhood best friend, Mark Girard, inherited together. The money will make her long-cherished business plan come true. To her shock, he’s determined to hang onto the place. Although they’ve drifted apart in recent years, she still cares for him. She’s always counted on his support, so why can’t he understand the urgency of her need? Mark believes his younger sister, who died in her teens, lingers on the property, visiting him in dreams at the cabin but nowhere else. He struggles with severing this last remaining tie. Yet he doesn’t want to hurt Joyce, especially when his old feelings for her reawaken. After encountering the ghost of their old Saint Bernard and dreaming of Mark’s sister, Joyce accepts the reality of the supernatural manifestations. Why are the two spirits haunting the cabin? On top of that, she’s falling in love with Mark. How can they settle the clash over their shared property without ruining any hope of a shared life?
Order from the publisher
Order from Amazon