http://med4treat.top

Author Archive

Welcome to the August 2023 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

You can subscribe to this monthly newsletter here:

Subscribe

For other web links of possible interest, please scroll to the end.

My lighthearted erotic paranormal romance novella “Sweeter Than Wine,” featuring the lusty ghost of a Revolutionary War smuggler, was released on July 3:

Sweeter Than Wine

Lovecraftian erotic romance novella “Song from the Abyss” came out on July 26:

Song from the Abyss

An excerpt appears below.

This month’s interview spotlights thriller and romance author Michelle Godard-Richer.

*****

Interview with Michelle Godard-Richer:

What inspired you to begin writing?

From the moment I learned to read as a child I wanted to write my own stories.

What genres do you work in?

I write thrillers, romance, and horror. I often blend and bend genres together.

Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?

I’ve been working with loose outlines and mostly winging it. Lately, I’m trying to change my process and outline in more detail.

What have been the major influences on your work (favorite authors, life experiences, or whatever)?

My interests fuel what I write. I’ve always been a true crime buff, and my educational background helps. When writing romance, I think I draw more on life experience and what I see in the world around me. I’m also an avid reader, and I admire many different authors.

Since you have a degree in Criminology, how do you draw upon that background in writing mystery/suspense?

The thing with crime that I find most fascinating is the impact it has on all of us as a society. We all alter our behavior in simple ways like locking doors, installing security systems, and being aware of our surroundings. For those directly impacted, and those closest to them, sadly the effects are much greater and longer lasting. And I think understanding human behavior is the key to creating realistic characters that readers can identify with.

Please tell us about your time-travel-with-jellybeans duology. How did you come up with that plot? What kinds of research did you need to do?

The jellybean duology was a lot of fun to write. The idea for the first book spawned from the announcement in the Wild Rose chat room of the new line. Our President Rhonda mentioned liking time travel romance and I connected that to magic jellybeans and was off to the races. I spent as much time researching as I did writing to try and capture the mood and setting of small-town Illinois in the 1920s and 1930s. I looked into simple details like what cars existed at that time. When was the doorbell invented? Did they have handheld hair dryers? What did they wear? How did men view women’s role in society?

What is your latest or next-forthcoming book?

My latest book is Forward in Time with Jelly Beans, and my next book will be a horror novella releasing in the Friday the 13th Collection on October 13, 2023

What are you working on now?

I have three books on the go. The final book in the Fatal Series, a standalone domestic thriller, and the upcoming horror novella.

What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

Write what you love, embrace the writing community and all it has to offer, and have a thick skin for feedback that will help you improve your craft.

What is the URL of your website? What about other internet presence?

My website is Michelle Godard-Richer and my favorite social media platform is Instagram where I enjoy sharing books I’ve read with the bookish community. Instagram

*****

Some Books I’ve Read Lately:

THE ROAD TO ROSWELL, by Connie Willis. Romantic comedy, road trip, and zany first-contact SF all in one novel. Willis discusses the background and writing of this book in her recent LOCUS interview:

Connie Willis: Roswell Redux


Protagonist Francie, a levelheaded skeptic, arrives in Roswell, New Mexico, as maid of honor for a friend’s wedding. She hopes she can influence the bride to break off her engagement to a flying-saucer true believer before it’s too late. The wild and crazy atmosphere of the annual UFO festival is a pleasure in itself. Wearing her bridesmaid dress (which, she later finds, inconveniently glows in the dark) and driving the bride’s SUV, Francie gets carjacked by a bona fide alien. “He” (although his actual gender remains unknown) resembles an animated tumbleweed with multiple elongated, flexible tentacles. He eventually gets named Indy, after Indiana Jones, because of his whiplike appendages. It soon becomes clear that he doesn’t intend to hurt her, only force her to drive him—somewhere. For most of the story, she has no clue where he wants to go, and he doesn’t seem certain, either. Along the way, they pick up a hitchhiking self-styled con man named Wade, a UFO conspiracy theorist even more fanatical than Francie’s friend’s fiancé, a sweet little old lady devoted to casino gambling, and—after Francie casually remarks that they need a bigger vehicle—an elderly man with a luxurious RV (or, as he insists, a Western trail wagon) and a collection that apparently includes every classic Western movie ever filmed. Pop culture references abound; Indy learns English, after a fashion, through exposure to endless hours of movies. None of Francie’s companions turns out to be exactly what he or she appears, aside from the UFO fanatic, who’s every bit as nutty as he seems, unquestionably believing every alien conspiracy theory in existence, including those that originate from movies. A stop in Las Vegas includes a side trip to a wedding chapel with an Elvis-themed mock ceremony. Francie and Wade begin to fall in love, insistently encouraged by Indy. Men in Black appear on the scene. The romantic plot arc includes the typical black moment followed by a comic (in both the classic and modern senses) reversal. A thoroughly delightful story with a satisfying conclusion in both the romance and the science-fiction dimensions. The SF plot brings to mind Willis’s novella “All Seated on the Ground,” whose heroine also has to learn to communicate with extraterrestrials and figure out what they want. Although THE ROAD TO ROSWELL doesn’t attain the heights of TO SAY NOTHING OF THE DOG or BLACKOUT / ALL CLEAR, a second-tier novel by Willis matches or surpasses the best work of most other authors.

HOW TO SELL A HAUNTED HOUSE, by Grady Hendrix. Having heard so much about this horror novel, I finally decided to read it because of the author’s outstanding vampire novel, THE SOUTHERN BOOK CLUB’S GUIDE TO SLAYING VAMPIRES. One noticeable difference between the two is that the reader of the latter book knows early in the story that the vampire really exists; in HOW TO SELL A HAUNTED HOUSE, we’re invited to hesitate between a supernatural explanation and the idea that the house is haunted only by toxic memories. In fact, we don’t get a definitive answer until the halfway point. Louise, a single mother with a little girl, gets a phone call from her brother, Mark, telling her their parents have died in a car accident. Right away, the siblings’ interaction demonstrates the longstanding resentment between them. Louise, who has made an outward success of her life, considers Mark a slacker as well as a drunk, unable to keep a job and spoiled by their over-indulgent (to him, not to her) parents. We gradually learn Mark has his own reasons for hostility to Louise. In a series of confrontations painful to read, the text explores the way brother and sister cling to opposite impressions of their shared childhood. Planning the funeral incites only the first and least of the explosive clashes between them. As much as we sympathize with Louise, little by little we start to realize Mark has some justification for his attitude, too. They fight over what to do with the house and its hoard of artwork and puppets created by their mother, who also collected dolls, I was initially disappointed to discover the haunting consists of apparently demon-possessed or poltergeist-animated dolls and puppets, a trope I consider more dull and annoying than scary. But a puppet that possesses its handlers? And holds the key to decades of buried family trauma? Wow. Their mother’s first and always favorite puppet, Pupkin, gradually develops from unsettling to profoundly creepy, spouting childish dialogue that sounds almost obscene without ever including words formerly labeled “unprintable.” The creature’s physical threat culminates in two violent, gory combat scenes, the first of which goes on far too long for my taste, becoming more tedious than horrific until its shocking outcome. But that isn’t the end by any means. The siblings’ eccentric relatives unite to help defeat the supernatural menace, while Louise’s daughter also plays a vital role. All the characters, minor as well as major, are compellingly vivid. Discoveries and revelations lead to fresh mysteries, including the question of whether even their parents’ ostensibly straightforward death means more than it appears. Aside from containing more physical violence than I like (an element that, for me, distracts from rather than enhancing the horror), HOW TO SELL A HAUNTED HOUSE impressed me as gripping and ultimately satisfying.

THE SALT GROWS HEAVY, by Cassandra Khaw. Narrated by a mermaid married to a king—in present tense, perhaps justified by the way the story places her survival in doubt—this short novel deconstructs the familiar plot of “The Little Mermaid.” At the beginning of the story, the mermaid’s many half-human daughters have devastated the kingdom and devoured most of its people, including their royal father. This mermaid didn’t marry the king out of love; he captured her and took her by force. She didn’t sacrifice her voice for a chance to win him; she can’t speak because he cut out her tongue. Still, the former queen remains powerful, inhuman, cold (by human standards), and virtually immortal. Nevertheless, Khaw makes her a sympathetic character. She travels with a “plague doctor,” clothed in a black robe and masked by the skull of a vulture. The doctor, a quiet, gently sardonic presence, is nameless and apparently genderless. The mermaid shares a bond with “him” that she’s reluctant to define, even to herself. They stumble upon a village of children who make a game of killing each other under the guardianship of three “saints,” who bring the dead back to life. The three surgeons, as the mermaid thinks of them, perform gruesome experiments of human vivisection and reconstruction. The surgeons turn out to be the makers of the plague doctor, revealed as a patchwork of organs and skin like Frankenstein’s creature. At first treated like honored guests or privileged prisoners, the mermaid and her companion attempt to help the children—most of whom unquestioningly worship the “saints”—and suffer ghastly punishment for their interference. The often lyrical prose softens the scenes of extreme body horror. The mermaid’s love for the plague doctor ultimately reveals itself in both violence and self-abandoning devotion. The book includes a bonus in the form of a 2016 short story, “And in Our Daughters, We Find a Voice,” to which the longer work is a sequel. I have only one complaint about the book (aside from paying full-length-novel price for a slim volume comprising a novella and a short story, hardly the author’s fault): I want to know a lot more about the biology and life cycle of merfolk, of which we get only passing hints.

NIGHT’S EDGE, by Liz Kerin. A grippingly unusual treatment of the “vampirism as disease” trope. It takes place in a slightly altered history of our current timeline; the disease, labeled Saratov’s syndrome, surfaced in 2010, when the protagonist, Mia, was ten years old. Her first-person narrative alternates between then and now. (With both threads in present tense—why? Why not use past tense for the flashbacks?) Devon, one of the earliest carriers, turned Mia’s mother into a “Sara” in 2010. The dysfunctional dynamic among the three of them resembles a family with an abusive stepparent. Mia and her mother eventually break away from Devon, who, however, finds them again in the present. Occasional reminiscences about their pre-Sara life allow the reader to understand and sympathize with Mia’s desperate love for her mother, combined with a resentful sense of being trapped. In the present, her mother holds a night job, while Mia works by day at a bookstore. She also serves as her mother’s blood donor. Fortunately, Sara victims need to drink only about a quarter of a cup of blood in each twenty-four hour period; however, it has to be human and fresh. These sufferers display some traits of popular-culture vampires, highly vulnerable to sunlight, dormant during the day, fast and strong, with preternatural healing capacities. There’s nothing romantic or glamorous about them, though. They struggle to survive while avoiding the notice of the general population. Exposure would mean consignment to a “Sara center,” allegedly a sanctuary where they can live in safety without hurting other people, or, according to Devon, a prison under another name. At age twenty-three, Mia yearns for freedom from her constricted, secretive existence but feels guilt at the very thought of deserting her mother. Her life changes when she meets a free-spirited female musician named Jade, a barista at a coffee shop near the bookstore. For the first time in her life, Mia becomes fully aware of her attraction to other women. How can she get involved in a relationship while hiding her mother’s condition? Although Mia admits to herself she’s falling in love, is the feeling requited, or is she only a fling to Jade? When the danger of her mother’s being exposed becomes acute, does Mia dare to elope and start a life of her own? The early stages of the Sara epidemic recall the initial discovery of AIDS, including the terror inspired by victims infected with the new, mysterious illness. The present-tense chapters resonate with echoes of the COVID-19 pandemic years. Instead of universal masking as a precaution, almost all public venues require mandatory scanning upon entry to keep out Sara carriers. I found this a depressing book, for which it’s hard to imagine any kind of happy ending. Mia is a sympathetic character whose narrative voice holds the reader’s attention even though her plight is almost too heart-rending to dwell upon. Yet the final scene does offer a glimmer of hope for her future.

CLAWS AND CONTRIVANCES, by Stephanie Burgis. This fantasy Regency romance, although technically a sequel to SCALES AND SENSIBILITY, can be read on its own. A family of sisters, after the sudden loss of their parents, has been split among households of different relatives. Unlike Elinor, heroine of SCALES AND SENSIBILITY, in this new novel her sister Rose has gained a pleasant home with an affectionate aunt, uncle, and three girl cousins. Her uncle, who studies the legends and natural history of dragons, awaits the arrival of a fellow scholar, the event that helps to trigger the whole plot tangle. In this alternate version of the early nineteenth century, the real existence of dragons has recently been discovered. About the size of cats, the rare, expensive creatures have become highly valued pets, fashion accessories, and status symbols for upper-class young ladies. Unlike their counterparts in myth and legend, they don’t fly, breathe fire, or, as far as anyone knows, have magical powers. Rather than devouring hapless victims and ravaging the countryside, they’re typically docile and timid. Although a passionate aficionado of dragon lore, Rose’s uncle can’t afford one of the creatures himself. Therefore, she’s baffled when a dragon shows up in the house. Conjecturing that it may belong to their nearest neighbor, the wealthy, reclusive Sir Gareth, who has recently bought a decaying medieval mansion, she sets out for his home on foot to investigate. In the process, she’s nearly run down by a carriage transporting Mr. Aubrey, her uncle’s anticipated dragon specialist visitor. The kinds of mishaps expected in a madcap love story force Rose and Mr. Aubrey to pretend they’re betrothed. They run across and clash with Sir Gareth, whom Rose distrusts on sight. Her romantic-minded cousin Serena, on the other hand, sees him as a character from a Gothic novel. He does turn out to be a villain, but not the brooding, Bryonic type in need of redemption through the love of a good woman. Shortly, a second dragon appears almost literally out of nowhere. It seems these dragons may actually possess magic—or, as Mr. Aubrey insists, hitherto unknown abilities that must have some scientific explanation. Zany complications abound as Rose struggles to keep the creatures’ presence secret. Meanwhile, of course she and Mr. Aubrey begin to fall in love,while trying to deny their feelings, and sapphic sparks ignite between Rose’s cousin Georgianna and Sir Gareth’s mistreated niece. Aside from Sir Gareth’s truly evil schemes, CLAWS AND CONTRIVANCES is a delightful romp of suspense, romantic tension, inconvenient secrets, and misfortunes serious to the characters but funny to the reader. A happy ending, of course, bestows just rewards on all participants even when their plight seems impossibly desperate. I’m looking forward to the next installment, which will doubtless introduce us to Rose’s remaining sister.

For my recommendations of “must read” classic and modern vampire fiction, explore the Realm of the Vampires:
Realm of the Vampires

*****

Excerpt from “Song from the Abyss:

Under the sound of surf wafting in through the open window, a voice seemed to whisper. It hissed words in a language Alyce didn’t recognize, yet it sounded all too familiar. Almost as if she’d heard those sounds before, maybe at the age of twenty, on the night before she’d left her Aunt Cora’s house for the last time.

Until today. Furthermore, it was her house now. It wasn’t a monster that would swallow Alyce whole and trap her like Pinocchio inside the giant fish. The waves did not sound like the hoarse breathing of a creature from an alien world.

“Shut up,” she ordered the imaginary voice. The phantom whispers fell silent. What was wrong with her, getting spooked in such a mundane setting? Sure, she was alone in a run-down oceanfront house built in the 1880s, but nothing could look less haunted than her late aunt’s cluttered office. Books overflowed shelves and tottered in precarious towers on the floor. File drawers gaped half open. Papers heaped on the desk almost hid the polished wood surface. The humid air smelled like mundane dust, not the mold of ancient tomes. Yes, some of those volumes might almost qualify, but Aunt Cora wouldn’t think of letting her tomes molder.

If she had magically foreseen dropping dead and leaving Alyce to rummage through the house, she would probably have tidied up the place and hidden or destroyed her most esoteric materials. Although much older than Alyce’s mother, Aunt Cora had seemed in excellent health, so the fatal stroke must have surprised her as much as it had her family. Actually, it was a wonder she hadn’t changed her will long ago. Why had she bequeathed her estate to the niece who’d fled from this house four years previously and refused to answer so much as a Christmas card ever since?

Most likely because I’m her only relative except for Mom, and at least Aunt Cora and I used to be close. She and Mom hadn’t spoken face-to-face in a lot longer than four years. Emails, phone calls, and holiday cards between the sisters hardly counted.

So she’d had a choice between leaving the house to Alyce, as originally planned, or willing it to some flaky cult. I’m almost surprised she didn’t do that. Such a choice would have been typical of the woman Alyce’s mother always referred to as “my crazy sister.” For the hundredth time in the past few weeks, Alyce tried to dredge up a proper portion of sadness. She felt she’d long ago lost the aunt she’d loved, the one who’d treated her like a younger colleague instead of an airheaded kid, the one who’d taken her on excursions to historic sites off the well-traveled tourist track and taught her to delve into research many layers deeper than the top page of a search engine. Alyce had lost that relative four years earlier, when she’d dragged Alyce into some kind of arcane ritual.

Shaking her head and raking fingers through her hair, she forced herself to focus on the immediate chore. Beside the desk, empty cardboard boxes and a giant trash bin waited to be filled. Got to plunge into this mess sometime. Might as well get started.

Rustling the papers, she sneezed at the dust they raised. Her hand brushed the edge of a half-open desk drawer.

Alyce!

She jumped. Now I’m hearing voices inside my head. One voice, more accurately, and it sounded like Dean’s.

He’s gone. He’s been gone for seven years.

Seven years since he’d vanished, four years since she’d fled from this house like the monster she imagined it to be. Maybe returning had triggered some kind of flashback. All along, she’d suspected Aunt Cora of secretly dosing her with a mind-altering drug on that last night. Why else would she have forgotten almost everything about those hours?

-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, e-mail me to request the desired issue, and I’ll send you a free PDF of it. My e-mail address is at the end of this newsletter. Find information about the contents of each issue on this page of my website:

Vampire’s Crypt

A complete list of my available works, arranged roughly by genre, with purchase links (gradually being updated as the Amber Quill and Ellora’s Cave works are being republished):

Complete Works

For anyone who would like to read previous issues of this newsletter, they’re posted on my website here (starting from January 2018):

Newsletters

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):

Fiction Database

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 July 2023 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

You can subscribe to this monthly newsletter here:

Subscribe

For other web links of possible interest, please scroll to the end.

Barbara Custer, editor of NIGHT TO DAWN magazine, gave “Bunny Hunt” a five-star review on Amazon:

“I loved reading this. It was perfect for Easter. I especially enjoyed the use of the amulet and setting. Margaret Carter has worked her magic with her characters again. This is a must-read.”

The Wild Rose Press is releasing two of my former Ellora’s Cave erotic paranormal romance novellas this month, “Sweeter Than Wine” (July 3) and the quasi-Lovecraftian “Song from the Abyss” (July 26), very different in tone from each other.

“Sweeter Than Wine”: Maybe an amorous Revolutionary War ghost is just what Marie, widowed for a year and a half, needs to attract tourists to her historic bed-and-breakfast inn. “Song from the Abyss”: A recording of an eerie song summons Alyce’s old boyfriend from the alien dimension into which he vanished during an arcane ritual many years ago.

Below is an excerpt from “Sweeter Than Wine.”

This month I’m interviewing paranormal romance author Terry Newman (another writer in the “Jelly Beans and Spring Things” line).

*****

Interview with Terry Newman:

What inspired you to begin writing?

I’m not sure there is one thing I can point to that was inspirational. I’ve wanted to write fiction since I was in grade school (sounds so cliché, I know). My earliest memory of my decision to be a writer was when I read The Happy Hollisters, a typical 1960s series for elementary and middle grade students. I fell in love with the characters and the places they went and the things they did. And I wanted to create a world of my own. At the time, I thought I would write my own books and illustrate them, too. You should be thankful I don’t illustrate my novels today.

What genres do you work in?

I write paranormal romance. But I’m laying out the characters and the plot for a cozy mystery. It’s about murders in an assisted living facility. The idea came to me when I was writing a scene for Heartquest, which will be a companion volume to Heartquake.
In the scene, several older women sit talking about a local television personality who they believe is good looking. When they talk about the assisted living facility, Lily of the Valley, one lady says it should be called Death Valley, since someone is killing of the residents. “Yes,” I said, rubbing my hands together. “Yes, they are.”

Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?

I pretty much wing it. I write romance, so I know the ending will be a happily-ever-after, but I don’t know much else. I usually have an opening scene in mind that sets the tone for the story and a few other scenes. I also have an idea of some of the points I want to make in the story. I try to let the characters take me where they want to go. I know that may sound crazy, but once I start writing the action, options I hadn’t thought of come to mind. That’s the thrill of the creative process.

What have been the major influences on your work (favorite authors, life experiences, or whatever)?

My books reflect the author I admired most at the time of the writing. When I originally wrote the story that would become Rewrites of the Heart, I had been reading Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series. I admired her humor and sometimes just bizarre circumstances she put Stephanie in.
Heartquake’s style was inspired by the romance novels of Jessica Bird. You probably know her better as J.R. Ward, the author of the Black Dagger Brotherhood series. I was unsure if I pulled the story off well, but it’s a finalist for a RONE award, sponsored by Ind’tale Magazine.
My favorite-authors-of-the-moment are Ali Hazelwood and Alexis Hall. Their words keep me glued to the page. And Hall especially creates quirky characters that make his stories shine. Hazelwood’s The Love Hypothesis is a great take on the fake dating trope. It inspired me to write one myself. Its working title is Hearts on the Rocks.

It’s often said that humor is hard. Any tips on writing romantic comedy? For instance, how do you keep the stakes high for the characters while creating fluffy fun for the reader?

When I was a senior in high school, I had the role of Karen Nash in Act I of the play Plaza Suite, by Neil Simon. I fell in love with how he interjected humor in the midst of a tragic moment.
Timing is the key to good humor and that comes with practice. Once you’ve written something that makes you laugh, read it to someone else and gauge their reaction. If they don’t laugh, go back to the drawing board.
Many of the high stakes moments in a story can be defused with humor from the quirky secondary characters. Every great romantic comedy needs an offbeat character or two. Alexis Hall mastered this in Boyfriend Material. Don’t be afraid to make outrageous characters. You can always tone them down.
Finally, create characters who have a sense of humor. In this way, when something tragic strikes them they can naturally see the humor in it. And the comic relief will not be forced.

What inspired your story in the “Jelly Beans and Spring Things” line, THE WIZARD OF HER HEART?

I created a character who was a wizard, because I felt there were too few of them and too many witches in literature. That’s how Wyatt Ginn was born. It seemed only proper that a wizard in the real world would have a paranormal publishing house. And, of course, his new employee—and love interest—had to be a skeptic of magic. I thought the idea of casting love spells over jelly beans set the tone for a romantic comedy.
I enjoyed their meet-cute in front of the post office.
Once I began thinking of paranormal activity, I thought of UFOs and Bigfoot. I’ve attended many paranormal meetings and all the topics I use in the story, I’ve experienced in real meetings. And yes, I have attended a Bigfoot conference.

I enjoyed your trailer for that book. Can you tell us a bit about the process of creating a book trailer?

I’m still new to the process of making book trailers. Some individuals make trailers from still photos. I prefer short clips of videos. I use the blurb for the book, and edit it some. Then I look for clips that give me the feel of the description. I deliberately chose videos that were close to specific scenes and situations in the book.
Then it’s a matter of mastering the technology to get the length you want. I use Canva Pro. It has so many choices of text and options for transitions from one clip to another.

What is your latest or next-forthcoming work?

The Wizard of Her Heart is my latest book. Nothing is scheduled for release at the moment because, well, I’m still writing them.

What are you working on now?

I have two works-in-progress. The one I’m actively writing is Hearts on the Rocks. It’s a fake dating trope inspired by some of the romantic comedies I’ve read. The second, Heartquest, is a companion to Heartquake. I give the secondary characters, Jared Sparrow and Mel Milan, their own love story while they’re raising funds for an aviary for the local natural museum of history. I’m about three-quarters of the way done with that.

What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

Make sure you really want to write. Determine whether it’s just a whim or “writer” is something you just want to call yourself. Once you know writing is your driving desire, then write. Write anything. Write often. You don’t have to write every day. But you write.
One of the habits I’ve found that has helped me is to keep Morning Pages. Julie Cameron, in The Artist’s Way, described them. I write 20 minutes every morning, pen and paper. Often I find myself creating scenes for stories I’m working on. Write anything during that time. The intent is to create a stream of consciousness-like writing flow.
If you’re serious about writing, don’t ever give up. Don’t let people say you’re not good enough. The only way to become good enough, to become great, is by writing. Writing. Writing.
And believe in yourself.

What is the URL of your website? What about other internet presence?
Social media links
Website
Terry Newman
Facebook: Terry Newman
Twitter: @tnewmanwrites
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Goodreads

BookBub

*****

Some Books I’ve Read Lately:

THE GRACE OF WILD THINGS, by Heather Fawcett. When I discovered that the author of EMILY WILDE’S ENCYCLOPEDIA OF FAERIES (reviewed in the June newsletter) had written numerous children’s fantasy novels, I immediately decided to read a few of them. THE GRACE OF WILD THINGS, partly inspired by ANNE OF GREEN GABLES and also set on Prince Edward Island, features a preteen orphan girl who, like Anne, becomes the ward of a crotchety older woman who at first doesn’t want her. Grace, realizing she has some innate magic, runs away from an orphanage with the dream of becoming apprenticed to the woman rumored to be a child-eating witch. Learning from a witch has to be preferable to her dreary life so far. The witch, having no desire for an apprentice, shoves Grace into an oven littered with bones of former victims. Grace manages to make a deal: Within a designated time period, if she masters all 100 (and a half, the hardest challenge) spells in the witch’s grimoire, she’ll be accepted as a pupil. If not, the witch can take all her magical power. Like Anne, Grace loves poetry and longs for a home and friends. She soon comes to regard the witch’s cottage as home, and she makes a best friend. As in ANNE OF GREEN GABLES, Grace gets into trouble with her friend’s mother but wins acceptance by intervening in a crisis. Meanwhile, with her friend’s help Grace works through the grimoire, one spell at a time. Children have no trouble believing in magic, although most adults forget and/or rationalize such phenomena. It gradually becomes clear that the witch has actually come to like and depend on Grace, although the old woman maintains her curmudgeonly façade and constantly grumbles about what a nuisance the girl is. As Grace develops her magical gift, gains confidence, and wins other friends (even the school’s mean girl), the witch’s health declines, and a threat from her past looms. To save their home, Grace must draw upon her newfound power and the help of her friends. Her quirks and her warmhearted impulsiveness make her delightful. The old woman proves to have hidden depths beneath the outer layer of wicked-witch stereotypes she displays to the world, and the bond between her and Grace grows in a natural, believable way.

THE SCHOOL BETWEEN WINTER AND FAIRYLAND, by Heather Fawcett. In this novel’s magic-school setting, the protagonist isn’t one of the star pupils. Rather than a wizard in training, she’s a servant among many in and around Inglenook School, housed in a vast castle with the requisite secret passages and towers. Like her grandmother (her parents are dead), her brothers, and their ancestors before them, Autumn works as a beastkeeper, with the gift of animal communication. She and her family tend the monsters kept at the castle for student magicians to practice on. She gets along well with most monsters and has a boggart (a shapeshifting creature, amorphous and essentially invisible in its true form) as a loyal companion. Her twin brother, Winter, has disappeared, presumed dead by everyone except Autumn. She can sense his presence and spends most of her spare time vainly searching for him. A breakthrough occurs when she glimpses him in a reflecting surface. Is he trapped in a mirror dimension? This book does include a Chosen One, but it subverts that trope as well. Twelve-year-old Cai, handsome, intelligent, kind, and universally admired, lives under the shadow of a prophecy: Before he reaches the age of thirteen, he’s destined to slay the terrible Hollow Dragon that lurks in the forest, ironically called Gentlewood, adjacent to the school. Cai, however, has a severe dragon phobia. Whenever he gets near one, he becomes so paralyzed with fear he often passes out. Dragons come in many shapes, sizes, and degrees of danger or harmlessness, and although they guard hoards like classic dragons, their hoarding takes the form of cultivating gardens. Cai makes a deal with Autumn that she will help him overcome his phobia while he helps her look for Winter. Being treated like a human being by a magician, even a student, instead of being ignored or regarded as a lesser life form, is a new experience of which she’s suspicious. In the course of their shared quests, they become friends. Meanwhile, scenes from Winter’s viewpoint reveal what has happened to him, at least as far as he can remember, and raise the stakes of the timeline for his rescue. Eventually dire secrets about Cai’s background and destiny come to light, along with the truth about the prophecy and his link to the Hollow Dragon. Moreover, Autumn learns a mind-boggling fact about her own family line. Her fiercely single-minded focus on saving Winter makes her a sympathetic as well as compelling protagonist, although prone to rushing into frightful predicaments. The monsters, while resonating with familiar fictional and legendary portrayals of the same or similar creatures, have intriguing quirks to distinguish them from the typical beasts of fantastic tales, such as the gardening dragons. The revelation of the true nature of the Hollow Dragon is chillingly gruesome. The overall happy ending nevertheless includes irrevocable loss. One element of the story strains my suspension of disbelief, however: Autumn’s grandmother turns out to know much more about Winter’s fate than she has told Autumn, for reasons I don’t find totally convincing. Not quite an “idiot plot,” but still a bit hard to accept. On the whole, though, I highly recommend this novel for its characters and its fresh approach to the tropes it engages with. Fawcett seems to have a special interest in the theme of people who aren’t what they seem to be, e.g., Cai in this novel, the male lead in EMILY WILDE’S ENCYCLOPEDIA OF FAERIES, the witch in THE GRACE OF WILD THINGS, and a boy in a book I haven’t reviewed, EMBER AND THE ICE DRAGONS (set at an Antarctic research station in an alternate-world nineteenth century), who’s a mystery to himself as well as others.

OUR HIDEOUS PROGENY, by C. E. McGill. The author’s afterword confesses a dislike for FRANKENSTEIN upon first reading. Later rereadings altered McGill’s attitude toward the classic book, aside from an unchanged conviction that Victor Frankenstein is a “wimp,” and this novel, set in the 1850s, is the result. The protagonist, Mary, is the granddaughter of Victor Frankenstein’s only surviving brother, but she knows nothing about her great-uncle except that he vanished in mysterious circumstances. She doesn’t stumble upon the letters that reveal his secret until about a quarter of the way through the book. Part I introduces us to Mary and her husband and lays out the background of her determination to recreate Victor’s discovery. She and her scientist husband, Henry, have recently lost a baby girl, who died within an hour of birth. The parallel with Mary Shelley, who also suffered the death of a very young baby, is obvious. The novel’s title quotes Shelley’s description of the book that won her fame. However, it’s also clearly meant to refer to the life Mary and Henry aspire to create. Later in the story, Mary indignantly repudiates the suggestion that this project serves as an outlet for her thwarted maternal drive, as if a woman existed only to produce children and couldn’t have any other ambition. Although she works as an equal research partner with her geologist and paleontologist husband, his scientist colleagues view her (if they think of her at all) as a mere secretary and illustrator. His unconventional theories about dinosaurs and his readiness to get into fights over them make him unpopular, while he’s determined to prove his correctness and his rivals’ wrongheadedness. This attitude doesn’t help the couple’s desperate financial straits. When Henry’s father’s death summons them to his ancestral home in Inverness, Mary meets the sister Henry labels “the dreaded Margaret.” To her surprise, Margaret (nicknamed Maisie) turns out to be a sickly but cheerful and affectionate girl younger than Mary herself. Disappointed by the provisions of his father’s will, Henry returns home depressed and embittered. While the loss of a child sometimes brings a couple closer together, it has done the opposite to Henry and Mary. Her discovery of his gambling debts makes matters worse. They need something to mend their relationship as well as vindicate Henry’s theories. In her great-uncle’s secret, Mary finds that “something.” Rather than attempting to build an artificial man, they plan to recreate one of the extinct aquatic saurians. They decide to complete their work at the family estate in Inverness, where Mary and Maisie form a close bond. Mary’s gradually worsening estrangement from her husband is believable and heart-wrenching. Meanwhile, an obnoxious professional rival forces himself on them and tries to take over. Mary finds her cherished creature in danger and herself robbed of any credit for the grand achievement that was her idea in the first place. The story draws the reader deeply into the plight of women in the mid-nineteenth century, especially intelligent women frustrated by society’s limitations. Mary stands for the many female scientists of that period whom mainstream history has virtually erased. The science-fiction dimension of the novel is equally fascinating. The experiment apparently succeeds, but are the wide-ranging applications of it imagined by the villain possible, or have the experimenters merely animated dead flesh rather than creating life?

THE GOD OF ENDINGS, by Jacqueline Holland. An unusual vampire novel in the first-person voice of a woman transformed as a child of ten. In this author’s mythos, undead children grow to adulthood; they “bloom but do not decay.” Therefore, the horror and pathos of Anne Rice’s child vampire Claudia play no part in Holland’s story. Other features of her novel more than make up for this difference, though. The horror and pathos of protagonist Anna’s afterlife spring from the many losses she suffers through her unnaturally prolonged life, her loneliness and estrangement from ordinary mortals despite her repeated (and increasingly reluctant) efforts to make connections. I especially like the way Holland embeds Anna’s pre-change life in the actual nineteenth-century American “vampire” panics associated with tuberculosis epidemics. After her parents and brother die in a tuberculosis outbreak suspected of being caused by vampire attacks, and she’s also on the verge of death, her Hungarian grandfather appears out of nowhere, whisks her away, and ironically transforms her into what her neighbors feared. Far from a doting grandparent, he believes in strength through self-reliance and eventually ships her off to Europe in the care of his trusted minion. Frightened and repulsed by the man, Anna soon finds a loving home with a mysterious but benign witch-like woman and a pair of brothers, one vampire, one mortal. Sadly, that interlude ends in the first of Anna’s multiple bereavements. Chapters recalling her two and a half centuries of existence alternate with chapters set in the novel’s present, the 1980s, when she runs an exclusive preschool in her grandfather’s former home in upstate New York. Although I normally dislike present-tense narration, its use for the current story in contrast to the flashbacks works for me in this book. Immortally young and apparently indestructible, Anna doesn’t share many other conventional traits of fictional vampires. She sleeps at night, isn’t bothered by the sun, and has no special powers such as transformation or mesmerism. Feeding only on animals except in exceptional circumstances, she ordinarily needs only modest amounts of blood. Recently, however, her craving for it has increased beyond her control. Furthermore, she starts to suffer blackouts and fugue states resulting in evidence of violent rampages she can’t remember. Having little contact with her grandfather and none with others of her kind, she has nowhere to turn for an explanation. Meanwhile, although she has resolved to stay aloof from mortals rather than risk fresh heartbreak, she reluctantly gets entangled in the problems of a little boy with precocious artistic talent, trapped in what may be an abusive family situation. The bittersweet ending promises hope in the midst of sorrow.

For my recommendations of “must read” classic and modern vampire fiction, explore the Realm of the Vampires:
Realm of the Vampires

*****

Excerpt from “Sweeter Than Wine.”

When the bedroom door closed, Marie let her shoulders slump with fatigue, glad for a couple of hours to rest before her dinner reservation at the restaurant attached to the winery. She hadn’t taken a weekend off since Frank’s death. She’d poured all her energy into the bed-and-breakfast because running it had been a dream they’d shared. She suspected he’d succumbed to a premature heart attack mainly from juggling innkeeper’s chores with his day job. Frank’s insurance had paid off the mortgage, but if she wanted the inn to thrive, she’d have to do more than pass out brochures. She needed an angle to set it apart from all the other B&Bs in the historic district of the colonial capital.

Today would have marked their thirtieth anniversary, as good a time as any to wake up and get on with her life. To include a new man? Not likely. She smiled wryly at the idea. Having enjoyed a long marriage of solid happiness, she didn’t expect to hit that jackpot twice. As for a passionate fling, her fantasies ran along the lines of somebody like Gordon MacBain, probably an extinct breed.

What she needed right now was a snack, not a fantasy lover. She chose a peach from the fruit basket and started to peel it with a paring knife. “You can be my inspiration, Mr. MacBain,” she said to the portrait. If the son of Scottish immigrants could transform himself into a rich landowner, surely she could transform herself into the hostess of a flourishing historic inn. Too bad she couldn’t find the hidden stash of the smuggler’s lost treasure, which tradition claimed was hidden somewhere in the Williamsburg house.

A masculine chuckle sounded in her ear. At the same instant, a gust of wind ruffled her shoulder-length hair and blew her denim skirt up to her waist.

The knife in her hand slipped and nicked her left index finger. Blood dripped on the brick hearth at her feet. With a muttered curse, she sucked the wound. She’d either picked up a stray sound from outside or started hearing imaginary voices. And where had the wind come from? The half-open window let in the mild air of a late afternoon in September, but no breeze stirred the lightweight, ruffled curtains.

Shaking her head, she set aside the knife and fruit, then took the wineglass from the mantel in both hands. The cut on her finger smeared a drop of blood on the rim. Before she could raise the glass to her lips, something pinched her bottom.

With a yelp, she spun around. Nobody there. At the same instant, the goblet slipped from her hand.

Instead of hitting the floor, it hung suspended in midair.

“Okay, no reason to freak out. This is a dream. I must have lain down and dozed off.” She glanced at the canopied bed, half expecting to see herself asleep on top of the quilt.

She scented a vagrant aroma of pipe tobacco. “Nay, Mistress, you are awake.” The rich bass voice, tinged with humor, vibrated under her breastbone. The glass tilted, and the ruby wine began to drain into nothingness.

-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, e-mail me to request the desired issue, and I’ll send you a free PDF of it. My e-mail address is at the end of this newsletter. Find information about the contents of each issue on this page of my website:

Vampire’s Crypt

A complete list of my available works, arranged roughly by genre, with purchase links (gradually being updated as the Amber Quill and Ellora’s Cave works are being republished):

Complete Works

For anyone who would like to read previous issues of this newsletter, they’re posted on my website here (starting from January 2018):

Newsletters

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):

Fiction Database

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

Welcome to the June 2023 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

You can subscribe to this monthly newsletter here:

Subscribe

For other web links of possible interest, please scroll to the end.

In May my Lovecraftian paranormal romance, WINDWALKER’S MATE, was re-released by a new publisher after several years in limbo. Shannon’s little boy Daniel has disturbing psychic powers. He talks to the wind–and it listens. Shannon wants to forget the cult of the Windwalker, a dark god from another dimension, and the terrifying night when her child was conceived. But her first love, Nathan, son of the cult leader, contacts her for the first time since that horrific ritual. He claims his father is stalking Shannon and Daniel. Whose child is Daniel, Nathan’s or the Windwalker’s? An excerpt from the first chapter appears below. The publisher’s page for the novel:

Windwalker’s Mate

This month I’m interviewing paranormal fiction author Terry Segan.

*****

Interview with Terry Segan:

What inspired you to begin writing?

In short, an overactive imagination! Over the years I’d come up with the beginning of a story but lacked the follow-through. I guess it wasn’t the right time for me. About a decade ago, I began taking myself seriously and threw myself into writing a full-length book. Time travel and paranormal happenings have always fascinated me, so it made sense that my first book, Photographs in Time, would involve time travel.

What genres do you work in?

At present, everything I write is paranormal fiction, usually a mystery as well. My most recent release, The Jelly Bean Jump Project, is a little bit of a departure from what I’ve written before. While it involves time travel, it’s also a Happily Ever After. Spoiler alert—nobody dies in the end. I’d have to say, tying the plot line up with a sugary sweet bow took great effort on my part, but I’m proud of the results and think readers will enjoy it.

Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?

I am a pantser. If you look closely, you may even see it tattooed on my forehead. Usually, I have a beginning and end in mind. Everything else spills out onto the keyboard as I go along. When I create minor characters, they want to stick around longer, and sometimes I let them. Occasionally I write myself into a corner and need to backtrack or move in a different direction. At that point, I say to myself, “What unexpected antic can I throw at my main character now?” From there the storyline twists in ways I’d never imagined.

What have been the major influences on your work (favorite authors, life experiences, or whatever)?

Many of the settings in my books are places that I’ve either visited or lived. I love it when I can incorporate details of fun trips into my writing. Obviously, I haven’t traveled to the 1950’s (yet) when The Jelly Bean Jump Project begins, but the setting of Oregon is someplace I’ve traveled to many times. Some of my favorite books are those with a dual timeline, like The Eight by Katherine Neville. In my recent release, the story is told from two viewpoints, Keira and Grayson, and at times they’re in different decades.

What sparked the unusual combination of jelly beans and science fiction in THE JELLY BEAN JUMP PROJECT?

The initial idea was inspired by the publisher, The Wild Rose Press. They created a new line of novellas released over the spring months called Jelly Beans and Spring Things. With my science fiction brain shifting into gear, I decided jelly beans as the catalyst for the characters’ leap through time to be unique. The exact moment of travel each year takes place at the Spring Equinox. As stated earlier, the concept of writing simply a romance conflicted with my tendency to write mysteries with a paranormal twist. I chose to combine the two and created an inventive story with a satisfying conclusion.

In your time-travel fiction, how do you deal with the familiar paradox that if the protagonist changes the past (and therefore its future, his or her own “present”), he or she will then have had no reason to go back in time and change the past?

For the purposes of this book, the characters are constantly leaping forward in time, so no paradox is created. In my first book, Photographs in Time, the characters went back and forth in time using an old sepia camera. If a character changed the timeline in the past, only those who had time traveled would be aware of it. They would then have an opportunity to go back and put things right or let it ride. I try to keep deep concepts such as paradoxes to a minimum, so my head doesn’t explode trying to resolve them. While I love science fiction, concepts of pure science elude me, and I can live with those limitations. Math isn’t high on my list either. That’s why I write!

Your bio mentions that both you and your husband work from home. Do you have any tips for people working from home or hoping to do so?

First of all, lock the liquor cabinet and hide all the knives. That will eliminate the need for police tape, chalk outlines, or alibis. If those do come into play, and you’re a writer, you may want to erase your browsing history. Beyond that, if you and your partner both need work space, set up in separate rooms. As we are full time RVers, that becomes a challenge. Investing in noise-cancelling headphones goes a long way to having an environment where I can still be creative if he is on a conference call. Since we’re both dedicated to what we do, we make it work.

What is your latest or next-forthcoming book?

My next book, Manatee Soul—The Marni Legend Series Book 2, releases October 16th. It’s a paranormal mystery in which Marni Legend assists lost souls to resolve their issue and move on. She’s from Long Island, as am I, and sarcastic humor is part of her genetic makeup.

What are you working on now?

I’m just beginning the third book in my Marni Legend Series. I’ve got a beginning and an end. We’ll see where my characters lead me.

What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

Join a critique group and don’t be afraid to share your work. While every writer loves to hear how great their stories are, it’s just as valuable, if not more, to hear constructive advice on what can make your writing stronger. A new set of eyes (or several) goes a long way to perfecting your writing voice.

Thanks so much for allowing me to visit and chat about my writing, Margaret!

What is the URL of your website? What about other internet presence?

Author Website
Facebook
Instagram
Twitter
Amazon Author Page

*****

Some Books I’ve Read Lately:

NOBODY’S PRINCESS and NOBODY’S PRIZE, by Esther Friesner. Friesner is best known as an author of humorous fantasy. I’ve enjoyed her novels and stories in that subgenre as well as anthologies she has edited, especially the “Chicks in Chainmail” series. The “Princesses of Myth” YA novels depart from that pattern. This duology, comprising the first books in the series, imagines the youth of Helen of Troy when she was still Princess Helen of Sparta. At the beginning of NOBODY’S PRINCESS, she hasn’t yet become a legendary beauty, a role to which she doesn’t aspire anyway. She wants training in the use of weapons like her two brothers. After persuading the arms master to accept her as a student, she becomes proficient enough to trail after the participants in the hunt for the ferocious Calydonian boar. She meets and learns from her idol, the famed warrior maiden Atalanta, makes friends with the current Delphic oracle, and frees a slave boy who becomes her best friend. Helen takes a dim view of the legendary exploits of heroes such as Hercules, which she realizes are exaggerated or outright invented. For example, the hydra was really a nest of oversized swamp snakes. Nor does she place much credence in tales of divine parentage, including her own. In NOBODY’S PRIZE, she sneaks onto the Argo to join the quest for the golden fleece. The voyage is complicated by the need to stay as far as possible away from her brothers, in case they recognize her despite her being disguised as a boy. Once the ship arrives in Colchis, Helen assumes the identity of Atalanta. Although these novels contain moments of humor, they also include dangers, sorrows, and some deaths. As for fantasy elements, everybody believes in the gods and their occasional intervention in mortal affairs, but onstage magic is mostly limited to the powers of oracles and the reality of visions. These two books deal strictly with Helen’s youth; the only hints of her future as “Helen of Troy” come in said visions. She’s an engaging first-person narrator, and since the story involves events not covered in classical mythology, readers can enjoy plenty of suspense as to the outcome of Helen’s adventures. Other duologies in the series feature Nefertiti, Maeve, and the third-century Japanese princess Himiko.

ANNE FRANK REMEMBERED, by Miep Gies and Alison Leslie Gold. Viewers of the TV miniseries A SMALL LIGHT will find this autobiographical work interesting, since it covers the actual events on which the screenplay is based. Contrary to the implication of the book’s title, it doesn’t focus on Anne Frank herself, but on the life of Miep Gies, Otto Frank’s secretary and close friend, and her role in hiding his family from the Nazi occupying forces. Along with a few other people in on the secret, she protected the Franks and their companions in the hidden annex, supplying them with food and other necessities. Originally published in 1987, this edition includes an afterword added in 2009, the year of the author’s hundredth birthday. Having outlived everyone else who endured the wartime ordeal with her, she reveals the real names of people for whom she herself and Anne Frank originally used pseudonyms. Miep also points out some inaccuracies in stage and film adaptations. Comparing her book’s account of the historical events with the new miniseries, we can notice places where the TV adaptation makes minor departures from real-life chronology for dramatic effect. Moreover, some episodes briefly alluded to in Miep’s book are expanded in the series, while the script adds many incidents not in the book at all. Everything in the film that can be confirmed from the 1987/2009 book, however, seems to be accurate, and events that were probably invented for the screen feel true to the historical background. (After all, doubtless nobody was keeping exact notes of private conversations between Miep and her husband, for instance.) One of my questions isn’t answered: Who betrayed the Franks to the Nazis? Otto Frank (Anne’s father) didn’t want to investigate, and the police never made an arrest. Miep concludes that we’ll never know. With both the TV series and the book, we’re aware in advance that the story will have a sad ending. As is well known, of the people hidden in the secret annex, only Otto survived the war. Nevertheless, ANNE FRANK REMEMBERED is ultimately a moving, uplifting account of quiet heroism.

A TEST OF COURAGE, by Mary Lou Mendum, Jacqueline Lichtenberg, and Jean Lorrah. As the third volume in the “Clear Springs Chronicles” trilogy, this wouldn’t be a suitable entry point for a reader new to the Sime-Gen universe. The trilogy as a whole, however, explains the basic premise and background of that series well enough to serve as an introduction. As established fans know, many centuries in the future humanity has split into two “larities” (short for polarities). At puberty, every person becomes either a Gen, a producer of life-energy called selyn, or a Sime, who must drain selyn from a Gen once a month to survive. Simes have tentacles on their arms, while Gens look like us (Ancients, who are extinct). The cause for this catastrophic development is lost in the mists of history. Until the events of FIRST CHANNEL, an early book in the series and chronologically first in internal order, it was believed that Simes had to kill Gens to extract selyn. The discovery of Channels, who can harmlessly take selyn from Gens and transfer it to ordinary Simes, constituted a crucial breakthrough. At the time period of the Clear Springs Trilogy, this society has developed technologically as far as ours in some ways but lags behind in others. Generations after Unity (I don’t remember exactly how many, but not a terribly long time), the treaty that ended the long border war between the Simes and Gens of North America, the two protagonists run a Sime Center in Clear Springs, a college town in Gen Territory. Rital comes across as a typical earnest, driven, compassionate Channel. Den, his cousin and Companion (personal donor), is a delightful character with a passion for researching and recreating Ancient technology, especially powered flight. During their tenure in Clear Springs, they’ve acquired substantial cohorts of both enemies and allies, the latter especially recruited from the university’s student body as well as a few reasonable local officials who recognize the benefits of having a Sime Center in town. In A TEST OF COURAGE, the community faces a virulent, previously unknown disease informally named the Creeping Need, after a horrifying Sime urban legend. The way they cope with the plague eerily foreshadows the real-life COVID-19 pandemic (which didn’t begin until around the time the authors finished the first draft). Meanwhile, Den and his student assistants continue their undaunted quest to duplicate the Ancients’ early-stage flying machines. Naturally, at the climax these plot threads intertwine as the newly constructed light aircraft plays a vital role in the fight against the epidemic. If you’re a fan of the Sime-Gen universe, you probably know of this book already. For new readers, the previous novels, A CHANGE OF TACTICS and A SHIFT OF MEANS, would make an excellent gateway to this far-future SF series.

EMILY WILDE’S ENCYCLOPEDIA OF FAERIES, by Heather Fawcett. This isn’t a reference work, but a novel set in an alternate-world Edwardian era, specifically 1909. On this variant of Earth, fae beings of many different types exist openly, and the title character, a professor at Cambridge, is an authority on them. During research for her monumental encyclopedia, a project spanning years, she travels with her dog, Shadow, to an invented far-northern Scandinavian country. The novel, in the form of Emily’s journal, chronicles her exploration of the nature of the Folk, especially the Hidden Ones—the euphemistic term for any aristocratic, dangerous high-elven race—of this little-studied land. In the midst of adjusting to the primitive conditions of the cottage she’s renting and learning to navigate the social customs of the easily offended local villagers, she finds that her colleague, rival, and frenemy Professor Wendell Bambleby has unilaterally decided to join her. Typically, he brings along a couple of student assistants to relieve him of any manual labor. Not only physically attractive, he’s both exasperatingly annoying and irresistibly charming. The academically brilliant Emily, on the other hand, has minimal social skills and gets along better with the Folk than with human beings. For instance, she befriends a timid faerie creature who frequents a spring near the village, who later reluctantly gives her vital information. It’s not much of a spoiler, considering the revelation occurs early in the book, that her suspicion about Bambleby’s being one of the Folk himself proves correct. In fact, he’s a faerie prince in exile. In the course of Emily’s research, she records several local folk tales. Some of this material proves important to solving the trouble she gets into with Bambleby. She recognizes that it wouldn’t be wise to pursue their mutual attraction, which of course the reader notices before she does; romantic liaisons between mortal and fae seldom end well. Once she gets back on good terms with the local people, she becomes entangled with the search for a child abducted by the Hidden Folk and the quest for a certain tree that may hold the key to Bambleby’s fate. When she ends up a “guest” imprisoned in the faerie king’s court, she discovers to her surprise that her new human friends care enough to take risks for her. Incidentally, a certain magic word she has assumed to be of only academic interest becomes unexpectedly useful, as often happens in fairy tales. Her unwilling stay in the faerie realm is convincingly both enchanting and frightening. I found her narrative voice, characterized by intellectual analysis even in moments of crisis, with frequent academic side remarks and occasional footnotes, delightful. The cover blurb describes her with perfect accuracy as “curmudgeonly,” and watching her open up to human neighbors as well as to Bambleby complements her external predicament with internal growth. Although the story comes to a satisfactory conclusion, a sequel is promised.

For my recommendations of “must read” classic and modern vampire fiction, explore the Realm of the Vampires:
Realm of the Vampires

*****

Excerpt from WINDWALKER’S MATE:

Sometimes a gust of wind is just a harmless breeze.

Shannon clutched at that belief when she caught sight of her son in the lobby of the Little Stars preschool and day care center. Ms. Ginelli, the teacher of the four-year-olds’ class, gripped him firmly by the hand. His curly, reddish-blond hair looked as if a gale had swept over it. The question, “Oh, no, what did he do now?” leaped into Shannon’s head. She bit her lip to keep the words from bursting out.

“What’s going on?” she asked instead.

Ms. Ginelli’s frown hinted at perplexity rather than annoyance. “We had a little accident, Ms. Bryce,” she said, “but I’m not honestly sure what happened. I wasn’t in the room when it started. Paige said Daniel and Jacob got into an argument in the block corner. When I got there, she’d already separated them.”

Paige, the aide for Daniel’s class, appeared behind the reception desk at that moment. Her hair, not confined in a tight bun like Ms. Ginelli’s, bristled as if she’d run her fingers through it—or she’d stood in front of a fan. “Jacob has a small bruise on his arm, but he’ll be okay. And don’t worry, Daniel didn’t hurt him. I was holding your son on the other side of the room when it happened.”

Shannon locked stares with Daniel, who gazed up at her with his lower lip quivering.
“What happened?”

Paige shook her head. “I’m not sure, either. It was over so fast. The wind rushed in and blew the blocks around. I mean, not just scattered them, lifted them off the floor. Hard enough that one of them bounced off Jacob’s arm.” Obviously mistaking Shannon’s gasp of alarm for worry about the other boy, she said, “No biggie. They’re soft plastic. It wouldn’t have left a mark at all if it hadn’t hit him so hard. It’s weird, though. The wind just sprang up all of a sudden, like a mini-tornado, and stopped a minute later.”

“It’s true,” Ms. Ginelli said. “I came in just in time to see the end of it.”

Shannon didn’t doubt the story for a second, though she couldn’t explain why freak winds surrounding her son didn’t surprise her. She flashed on a memory of him on the backyard swing set, at the age of three, swinging back and forth without pumping his legs, a breeze ruffling his hair while no wind blew anywhere else. She thrust the image back into the compartment where she stored all the impossible events she wanted to forget.

-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, e-mail me to request the desired issue, and I’ll send you a free PDF of it. My e-mail address is at the end of this newsletter. Find information about the contents of each issue on this page of my website:

Vampire’s Crypt

A complete list of my available works, arranged roughly by genre, with purchase links (gradually being updated as the Amber Quill and Ellora’s Cave works are being republished):

Complete Works

For anyone who would like to read previous issues of this newsletter, they’re posted on my website here (starting from January 2018):

Newsletters

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):

Fiction Database

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