Archive for the ‘News’ Category
Welcome to the May 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:
For other web links of possible interest, please scroll to the end.
My contemporary fantasy in the “Jelly Beans and Spring Things” line, “Bunny Hunt,” was published in early April. After Melanie, a professional doula, rescues a wild rabbit from a runaway dog and the animal seemingly changes into a heavily pregnant, human-size rabbit woman, Melanie convinces herself she saw only a woman in a costume. But that same night she hears a desperate plea for help inside her head. “Bunny Hunt” was featured on Vicky Burkholder’s April 13 blog:
She left a lovely 5-star review on Goodreads. (As she mentioned, the story isn’t actually a romance, despite how it’s labeled.):
There’s an excerpt from “Bunny Hunt” below. You can find the story here:
Bunny Hunt
I’m interviewing another “Jelly Beans and Spring Things” author, multi-genre writer D. V. Stone.
*****
Interview with D. V. Stone:
What inspired you to begin writing?
I’ve always been a huge bookworm. Several times over the years, I’d attempted to write a book, but life got in the way. Then after being laid off from a long-term job, I had the opportunity. That time it took. The book is still a work in progress, but I hope to publish it one day.
What genres do you work in?
I’m all over the board. When I began writing, I thought I would be a fantasy author. However, the first book picked up by my publisher was a Romantic Suspense. But I continue to write in multiple genres. Romance, suspense, fantasy, paranormal, mid-grade, and recently historical. My latest release is contemporary with light paranormal elements titled Sophia’s Magic Beans.
Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?
I found my preference is to be a pantser, aka wing it, but that doesn’t work for the second books in a series. These days my writing is the in-between.
What have been the major influences on your work (favorite authors, life experiences, or whatever)?
My fantasy is undoubtedly based on the influences of Tolkien and CS Lewis. My Impact series, which is about EMTs and First Responders, comes from my past. I was an EMT for many years and worked in medical facilities for probably 30 years on and off.
Please tell us about your Shield-Mates series and the Mortar & Pestle series.
The Shield-Mates are independent fantasy books. Felice was the first book I ever published. Kisa was released in Dec. of 2022, and I’m working on Orsolo as we speak. The stories are about Darrian sisters. Darrians can shift, and the royal house is all big cats. The books are fantasy, but up in them are the importance of family and friends, loyalty, duty, and hopefully, the reader will enjoy my tucked-in humorous side.
The Mortar & Pestle series is a cooperative effort between seven authors who began as a sounding board for the writing process. It ended up with a series that spans time, genres, and styles but held together by a mystical Mortar & Pestle. Sea Hunter was the fourth book in the series and was based in post-WW-II. It was my first historical and a hoot to write. I loved penning Zahra and Jack’s story, which is romance, paranormal, and action/adventure
Is your Lake Unami setting based on a real location?
Northern NJ is where I call home. I live at a lake and often visit a nearby lake with a boardwalk. I’ve combined the rural areas where I live and developed the town of Lake Unami. I do mention Branchville, which is an actual nearby town.
What do you see as the major differences between writing adult fiction and writing for middle-grade readers (aside from the ages of the audiences, of course)?
Not as much as you might think. Most of my books can be read by, say, twelve and up. There are no language or heat issues though they are romance, and the violence is not graphic. I try not to talk down to my mid-graders. Kids are smart. I try to treat them that way.
What sparked “Sophia’s Magic Beans,” your “Jelly Beans and Spring Things” story?
When my publisher, The Wild Rose Press, called for the series submission, I jumped in. I wanted to go back to Lake Unami, and this was the opportunity. What’s a boardwalk without a candy store? I also dedicated the story to my son, who survived this single mom. Calliope is a single mom.
What is your latest or next-forthcoming book, and what are you working on now?
I’m working on several projects. Remember Doug from Up? Squirrel! I mentioned Orsolo above from the Shield-Mates. I’m fleshing out the story now. Another hot project is a novella with some of the characters from Rainbow Sprinkles and Sophia’s Magic Beans.
What advice would you give to aspiring writers?
Don’t let fear hold you back. I still sometimes think, “Who do you think you are, and why would anyone want to read your books?”
Hire a professional editor. The best you can afford. It’s so important.
Covers are SO important. Same as above, get the best you can.
What is the URL of your website? What about other internet presence?
D. V. Stone
Universal link to Social Media: Social Media
Margaret, thank you so much for letting me have the space to talk about one of my favorite things. Books. My dog Hali keeps poking me to ask if she can insert her two cents?
Hali says, “Woof, woof.” (translates visit shelters and adopt pets from there. They need you.)
*****
Some Books I’ve Read Lately:
THE WAY HOME, by Peter S. Beagle. These two stories, “Two Hearts” (a reprint) and “Sooz” (original to this book), are spinoffs from THE LAST UNICORN, set decades after that novel. Although the volume is labeled “Two Novellas,” the much longer of the two, “Sooz,” could qualify as a short novel. When we first meet the title character of the latter, the narrator of both adventures, she’s nine going on ten. The king has sent a succession of many knights to save her village from a marauding griffin, but none has survived. Sooz impulsively decides to go on her own, with the faithful dog who’s been her lifelong companion, to appeal to the monarch himself. Setting out with only a general idea of how to find the royal castle, instead she comes upon Schmendrick the magician and his life-partner Molly Grue, both now mature and confident yet recognizable as the quirky characters from THE LAST UNICORN. For fans of the novel, it’s a delight to see what they’ve become. When they guide Sooz to the king, the former Prince Lir, they find him pathetically changed, lethargic and verging on senility. Mention of the unicorn’s name awakens him to something like his true self and reminds him of his duty to defend his people. Even a king can’t defeat a griffin easily, though; the story climaxes with a scene of dire peril, the reappearance of the unicorn herself, and a conclusion that mingles triumph with loss. Before parting, Molly gifts Sooz with a magical song she must sing only on her seventeenth birthday, when someone or something will come to her in response. “Sooz” begins with that song. She hopes to see Schmendrick or Molly; instead, she meets someone unimagined—Jenia, the sister who disappeared before she was born. Her father tells Sooz the truth: Jenia was taken by the Dreamies, as their culture calls the Fae. Shocked by this revelation as well as another that comes with it (too much of a spoiler to state here), Sooz determines to save her sister. Surely Jenia must want that, or else why would she have appeared? But what if she doesn’t want to be rescued? Soon after entering the forest, Sooz herself faces attack from ordinary human “monsters.” Afterward, she gains an unusual protector and companion, a woman of animated stone who’s seeking Death (both the condition and the anthropomorphic personification). She and Sooz develop a close bond as they travel through the phantasmagoric, unstable landscape of Faerie. The Dreamies stalk them, offering both allure and threat. When the seekers find the elusive Jenia, their danger doesn’t cease, nor is it certain until the very end whether Jenia will choose to return to her human home or embrace immortality with her Fae “family.” Beagle’s lyrical prose descriptions of the enchanted realm in all its glamour and terror are enthralling, and he does a masterful job of keeping the reader in doubt as to whether Sooz’s quest will succeed. Again he leaves us with a bittersweet conclusion.
A HOUSE WITH GOOD BONES, by T. Kingfisher. This author’s newest horror novel, a Southern Gothic incongruously set in a suburban tract house, doesn’t captivate me quite so strongly as her first three, but I’ll still reread it multiple times. A theme of return and/or reunion to find unsettling or outright shocking changes pervades this book, like the previous ones. “There was a vulture on the mailbox of my grandmother’s house.” How could any fan of dark fantasy resist an opening line such as that? Narrator Samantha (Sam) receives a message from her brother that their mother seems “off.” Since Sam has been temporarily furloughed from her job as an archaeoentomologist (a scientist who studies insects in archeological digs), she travels to North Carolina to check out the situation. Her mother owns the house where she and her two children spent an impoverished period during Sam’s childhood living with the late grandmother, Gran Mae. Upon arrival, Sam finds the usual cheerfully eclectic, cluttered décor replaced by a “sterile” ambience more reminiscent of her grandmother’s taste. The walls have even been repainted off-white. Her mother acts nervous, as if she feels watched or overheard. Sam sees the environment in terms of ecology in general and, of course, arthropods in particular. In the house’s monoculture rose garden, she immediately notices the lack of insects aside from ladybugs. This phenomenon and the flock of vultures roosting in a neighbor’s tree, however, are the least of the strangeness. For instance, a swarm of ladybugs invades Sam’s bedroom at night. We gradually learn about her childhood and her grandmother’s oddities, including strictness verging on abuse, while Sam unearths buried family secrets—literally, in one case. It takes a while to reassure herself that her mother isn’t sinking into senility, but the alternative is almost worse. She discovers her great-grandfather, Gran Mae’s father, practiced dark magic. No wonder Gran Mae was obsessed with “nice and normal.” Furthermore, the “underground children” she warned her grandchildren about turn out to be real, not imaginary boogeymen. And the rose bushes are sentient. I feel the climax, when the house collapses into a sinkhole, besieged by the underground children, requires a certain amount of suspension of disbelief, but I enjoyed it anyway. Gran Mae’s sort-of return, however, strikes me as believably, deeply disturbing. Sam’s witty narrative voice, the vulture lady and local “witch” Gail, and the friendly gardener Phil, who grounds the whole story in the mundane milieu of a “cookie-cutter” housing development, irresistibly draw the reader into the experience. Kingfisher has an enviable talent, through Sam’s chatty yet sometimes sardonic tone, to feed backstory to the reader with never a sense of info-dumping. Amid the mainly happy ending, Sam’s unease with the idea that she might have inherited her grandmother’s magic causes the supernatural danger to linger in the reader’s mind after the final page. In Kingfisher’s afterword, she mentions her own battles with roses and the fact that this is her second novel to portray rose bushes as evil, the first being her “Beauty and the Beast” retelling, BRYONY AND ROSES. The section headings (labeled “First Day,” “Second Day,” etc.) enhance the theme with a brief description of a different rose variety for each one.
THE WITCH AND THE VAMPIRE, by Francesca Flores. I’m ambivalent about this dark fantasy YA novel. It has an intriguing alternate-world setting, and the two teen protagonists are sympathetic characters with a strong connection, even though fraught with hostility because of circumstances that destroyed their earlier friendship. On the other hand, it’s told by both of them in alternate first-person chapters—perfectly okay and an effective device for creating suspense—in present tense, not so okay (in my opinion). Moreover, the two girls’ voices read, to me, exactly the same and not very convincing as teenage-girl speech. If they were presented as writing their narratives in past tense, their rather formal language wouldn’t feel so distancing. Sometimes I had to glance back at a chapter heading—each helpfully titled with the name of the viewpoint character—to remind myself which narrator was speaking in a given scene. In this world, vampires openly exist, with hunters trained to track and slay them. Witches, whose powers fall into various categories such as flame, root, healing, and others, also help to defend the human community. The protagonists’ town is protected from the vampire-infested forest by a magical barrier. (Although the book reveals nothing about the wider world, there doesn’t seem any reason to assume other areas don’t face similar threats.) Ava, a root witch, deriving her power from contact with the earth, has been turned into a vampire by her mother. Her mother, a leader of the community, keeps her own vampirism secret and confines Ava to the house, supposedly for her safety. Ava’s abusive stepfather performs experiments on her, adding to her misery. When Ava accidentally discovers that her mother—for a reason never totally clear or convincing to me—plots to take down the protective barrier, Ava escapes, determined to reach and warn the legendary vampire queen who dwells in the middle of the forest. Meanwhile, her former best friend Kaye, a flame witch, mistakenly thinks Ava killed Kaye’s mother. On an expedition into the forest, hunter-trainee Kaye runs into Ava and captures her. Circumstances force them to travel together and cooperate, tentatively and grudgingly on Kaye’s part. She believes all vampires are irredeemably murderous and possessed by uncontrollable bloodlust. Gradually, the girls overcome their misconceptions about each other and repair their friendship. This slow process, believably complicated by mutual suspicion, impresses me as the strongest feature of the novel. Their childhood best friend, a hunter-trainee named Tristan, also plays a major role. Encounters in a human-occupied city deep in the woods enlighten them to the truth that not all mortals are heroic and good, just as not all vampires are evil. The world-building constitutes the novel’s other main strength. And like Catherine Yu’s DIREWOOD, the core of THE WITCH AND THE VAMPIRE has a fairy-tale atmosphere, with a quest through a forbidden forest.
For my recommendations of “must read” classic and modern vampire fiction, explore the Realm of the Vampires:
Realm of the Vampires
For other reviews of older vampire fiction, posted on the fifteenth of each month, visit the VampChix blog: VampChix
*****
Excerpt from “Bunny Hunt”:
Melanie hurried toward the woods after the dog and rabbit. They’d already vanished into the trees, but she had Kiki’s continuous yapping to guide her.
She raced along the narrow trail. Judging from the volume of the barking, the dog hadn’t gotten far yet. Melanie sprinted toward the noise, hoping to sight the runaway around the next curve in the path. What if she chased the rabbit into the underbrush?
No need to worry about that problem until she caught up with the animals. Rounding a bend, she forced herself to a burst of speed. She didn’t see her quarry, but the yapping grew still louder. After the second loop in the trail, she almost tripped over Kiki’s leash and skidded to a stop.
Not far off the path under the trees, the dog stood with her front paws pinning the rabbit to the ground. She kept barking but didn’t move otherwise, as if she had no idea what to do with her thrashing, kicking prey. The wild animal appeared to weigh at least ten pounds, barely smaller than the dog herself.
Panting and sweating from the run, Melanie lifted her ponytail off the damp nape of her neck while she seized a loop of the leash with her other hand. If one of those kicks connected, Scott’s pet could get seriously hurt. “Kiki, drop it!”
The pup didn’t even glance at her. That must have been a command she either hadn’t learned yet or chose to ignore. Melanie gave the leash a firm jerk. Startled, Kiki tumbled off the flailing rabbit and struggled to land on all fours.
The rabbit sprang upright. Melanie retreated a couple of steps, hauling the dog with her. To her surprise, the rabbit turned its head and gazed up as if assessing her. Kiki, already recovering her balance, strained at the leash.
“Well, what are you waiting for, bunny? Get out of here.”
I’m talking to a wild rabbit. Unless maybe it’s an escaped pet? That possibility would account for how little fear of humans it showed.
Staring straight at her, it reared up on its haunches. Its amber eyes gazed at her with an expression of unnerving attention.
What’s it thinking about me? Melanie shook her head. Whoa! Now I’m giving it credit for human intelligence.
A bright shimmer dazzled her vision. When it faded, the animal was standing on its hind legs—and growing. It expanded to person-height. Kiki emitted an alarmed yip and huddled against Melanie’s leg. Melanie simply froze, her mouth gaping open.
When the glow faded, a human-size bunny stood before her. It—no, she—displayed the same cinnamon-brown fur and long ears. Her face had the general shape of a woman’s, but with whiskers, amber eyes, a button nose, and rabbity incisors. Her leg joints bent at an angle suitable for hopping. Most striking, two vertical rows of nipples, four and four, adorned the front of her body, and her belly bulged with an obvious pregnancy.
Now I’m even getting baby reminders foisted on me by hallucinations!
To cap off the impossibility of this apparition, the rabbit-woman spoke. “Thank you.” Her voice chimed like a silver bell, its echo lingering as she turned and hopped into the woods. Before she’d gone far enough for the trees to hide her, she seemingly vanished into thin air.
Fighting a wave of dizziness, Melanie sagged against the nearest tree trunk and closed her eyes. When her pulse and breathing steadied, she looked down to find Kiki shivering as if in fear. “Girl, I don’t blame you a bit.” She leaned over to pet the dog until Kiki perked up and yipped to announce she wanted to get moving again. Melanie led her back up the path toward the playground.
Her mind churned as she covered the distance at a brisk walk. Okay, get a grip. I did not see a rabbit turn into a person. I haven’t fallen down a hole into Wonderland. The actual rabbit, obviously, had scampered away while she’d been distracted, and a pregnant woman in a disturbingly realistic costume had coincidentally shown up. Not so unbelievable on the day before Easter. Maybe she’d been recruited as entertainment for the kids.
-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:
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):
For anyone who would like to read previous issues of this newsletter, they’re posted on my website here (starting from January 2018):
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Facebook
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Barnes and Noble
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Carter Kindle Books
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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):
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Goodreads
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My Publishers:
Writers Exchange E-Publishing: Writers Exchange
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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 April 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:
For other web links of possible interest, please scroll to the end.
Happy spring holidays! “Bunny Hunt,” my story in the “Jelly Beans and Spring Things” line from the Wild Rose Press, will be published on April 10. The Amazon preorder link:
https://www.amazon.com/Bunny-Jelly-Beans-Spring-Things-ebook/dp/B0BTCH4MCW/
Meanwhile, below is an excerpt from TENTACLES AND WEDDING BELLS, a pair of humorous, steamy Lovecraftian paranormal romances in which the heroine learns her fiance’s family secret. In this scene, he takes her to meet his twin brother, who looks more like the father than he does.
Kindle edition:
Tentacles and Wedding Bells on Amazon
Versions from other retailers:
Tentacles and Wedding Bells on Draft2Digital
This month I’m interviewing a fellow “Jelly Beans and Spring Things” author, Vicky Burkholder.
*****
Interview with Vicky Burkholder:
What inspired you to begin writing?
My father. He wasn’t highly educated, but he was never without a book in his hand or nearby. And he was a poet—always writing something.
What genres do you work in?
Futurist Romances, Fantasy, and Paranormal Romances. There’s always something “out there” in my books.
Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?
Something in between. I know where my story starts and ends, and do a very loose outline to make sure it gets there. I create my main character, then treat her as an interview for a newspaper article and her answers become my outline.
What have been the major influences on your work (favorite authors, life experiences, or whatever)?
Favorite authors? There have been so many over the years. Too many to really put them all down, but I will say Anne McCaffrey, Vonda McIntyre, David Eddings, Nora Roberts all had some sort of influence. I have to have a HEA in my books, but adding in something not necessarily of this world is what makes it exciting for me.
How have your other writing-related jobs (for newspapers and magazines, writing policy manuals, editing textbooks, etc.) affected your fiction writing?
Long ago, I wrote human interest stories for our local newspaper so I learned quickly about the “who/what/when/where/why/how” questions that get asked and I use them to help plot out my stories. Writing Policy and Procedures manuals for businesses help me keep everything logical, and being an editor for various publishers for thirty years has helped me improve my own writing – in correcting others, I (sometimes) see my own mistakes.
Please tell us about your series.
Right now, I have one series called “Galactic Danger” which are futuristic romances. There are currently three books in that series with a fourth coming next year. “Revenge Among the Stars”, “Lost Among the Stars”, “Searching Among the Stars”, and to come “Found Among the Stars”.
What inspired RAINING JELLY BEANS, your “Jelly Beans and Spring Things” book for the Wild Rose Press?
Actually? A rainstorm and a bag of jellybeans! Honest! Plus, this is a connected book – it’s connected to my “The Gingerbread Lodge” that came out last Christmas – same setting and some of the same characters. I just took the setting and put it in spring in the mountains where my family is from and thought “what if…” and it went from there.
What is your latest or next-forthcoming book?
“Raining Jelly Beans” will be out in April but later in the year, “The Cane, the Puzzle, and Magic” will be coming from The Wild Rose Press – an urban fantasy set in rural Pennsylvania.
What are you working on now?
The next book in the Galactic Danger series “Found Among the Stars”
What advice would you give to aspiring writers?
Two things: Grow a thick skin. This is not a career for someone who can’t take bad news like bad reviews or rejections. It is definitely not easy on the ego. Also, learn the business end of publishing – marketing, promoting, etc. That is essential these days.
What is the URL of your website? What about other internet presence?
Vicky Burkholder
I also have a spot for reviews and writing tips: Sparkling Book Reviews
Amazon Author Page: Amazon
Goodreads Page: Goodreads
BookBub: BookBub
*****
Some Books I’ve Read Lately:
ONE EXTRA CORPSE, by Barbara Hambly. Sequel to SCANDAL IN BABYLON, with the two novels featuring doppelgangers of the major characters from BRIDE OF THE RAT GOD, but in non-supernatural mysteries. In the silent film industry of 1920s Hollywood, young, English war widow Emma Blackstone serves as paid companion to her charming, generous, but flighty sister-in-law Kitty Flint, known to her fans as movie star Camille de la Rose. Emma fetches and carries, cares for Kitty’s three Pekinese dogs, and tries to keep her out of trouble, usually in vain. On the side, Emma writes scenarios for movies, struggling without much success to avoid blatant historical errors (for instance, informing the director that Christian martyrs didn’t exist in Julius Caesar’s lifetime). Kitty parties all night (with numerous men besides her official lover, the studio owner), drinks copiously, takes cocaine, and yet manages to maintain a grueling film schedule, regardless of her limited acting ability. Level-headed Emma, an Oxford graduate and daughter of a classical scholar, occasionally wonders what she’s doing in this modern Babylon. Although she still grieves for her late husband, brother, and parents, she has fallen in love with kind, steady cameraman Zal. ONE EXTRA CORPSE begins with her acceptance of the temporary gift of a diamond bracelet and rejection of a marriage proposal from actor Harry Garfield. This very public drama, staged for the benefit of the media to deflect attention from Harry’s same-sex relationship, sets the tone for the glamorous, fantastically artificial milieu of the cinematic subculture. In a classic mystery trope, director Ernst Zapolya phones Emma, insisting he must speak to Kitty about a confidential matter that may put many lives at stake. Naturally, he’s murdered before he can reveal the secret. His body turns up on the set of an adventure movie, in the kind of situation—with live ammunition and many other hazards—where injuries are common and deaths not unknown. However, the bullet that killed him isn’t the type fired by the professional sharpshooters on the staff. Who wanted to eliminate him? His estranged, soon to be ex-wife? Her mother? A romantic or professional rival? Stalinist agents? (Surprisingly, communists do come into the story near the end.) Zany predicaments alternate with potentially lethal chases and confrontations. Emma and Kitty narrowly escape death more than once. Are they targets because somebody mistakenly thinks they have incriminating knowledge? Emma and Zal display courage and resourcefulness, while at crucial moments Kitty proves less featherbrained than she seems. The murderer and his or her thoroughly credible, poignant motive, for me, came as an unexpected yet logical revelation. From the beginning, foreshadowings—hints, but not exactly clues—twine through the action and dialogue. In my opinion, few or no readers are likely to unravel the solution before it’s revealed, since we don’t learn about the critical puzzle piece until Emma does. Yet when the truth comes out, one is likely to think, “Oh, of course.” Like SCANDAL IN BABYLON, this novel vividly portrays the physical and social landscape of Los Angeles in the 1920s, when the famous Hollywood sign still read “Hollywoodland,” the FBI was called simply the Bureau of Investigation, and bootleggers and their customers openly defied Prohibition. As in SCANDAL IN BABYLON and the Benjamin January series of antebellum Louisiana mysteries, Hambly’s witty style is delightfully on display. I only wish she’d included an afterword elaborating on the historical background of the story.
A SPINDLE SPLINTERED, by Alix E. Harrow. A contemporary, metafictional take on “Sleeping Beauty.” The narrator, Zinnia, suffers from a chronic, ultimately fatal disease caused by industrial pollution local to her home town. Despite intensive treatment, no victim has survived past the age of twenty-one. Zin has a best friend, Charm (Charmaine), who doesn’t treat her as pitiable, fragile, or impossibly brave. Zin embraces self-imposed “dying girl rules”: (1) If you like something, like it hard, because you don’t have much time; (2) move fast (she graduated from high school early and attended college at an accelerated pace); (3) no romance (although Charm would have happily violated that rule with her). On Zin’s twenty-first birthday, Charm and some of her friends throw a party in the watchtower of an abandoned penitentiary decorated like Sleeping Beauty’s tower bedroom, complete with an antique spinning wheel, in homage to Zin’s lifelong obsession with that tale and its numerous variants. At midnight, alone with Charm, on a dare Zin pierces her finger with the tip of the spindle. At this point, the story crosses over into fantasy. Falling through an interdimensional warp, Zin finds herself in the superficially Disney-perfect castle of Princess Primrose, cursed to prick her finger and sleep for a century. The princess, too, has just reached her twenty-first birthday. The lethal spinning wheel has mysteriously appeared, bearing a fate she considers hardly grimmer than marrying the conventionally heroic but boring and rather dim prince to whom she’s betrothed. Determined to save Primrose and perhaps herself, Zin persuades the princess to seek the wicked fairy who cursed her. They flee the royal palace and head for the villainess’s dark castle, while Primrose fights against the force trying to lure her to her doom. On the quest, Zin comes to realize Primrose is more than a stereotypical Disney-style princess. They find the “evil” fairy also to be not what she seems, and the prince’s single-minded insistence on “saving” Primrose backfires. Each turn in the plot comes as a surprise and yet perfectly right. When Zin reaches across worlds, with her cell phone (which still works until its battery runs out) as well as a magical meeting of minds, she makes contact with not only Charm but potential Sleeping Beauties from multiple dimensions. In the midst of the climactic scene, romance ensues, but not the kind ordinarily expected in a fairy tale, while Zin gets an ending that’s satisfactory but far from unrealistically ideal. She also matures through the ordeal of her quest, as a coming-of-age heroine should. In the sequel, A MIRROR MENDED, Zin has become an interdimensional rescuer of innumerable Sleeping Beauties throughout the multiverse. She’s getting tired of the role, however, as well as troubled by an inexplicable—from her viewpoint—coldness on the part of Charm. When Zin gets pulled through a mirror by the Witch Queen from “Snow White,” a fresh cycle of adventures ensues. In this tale type, also, the villainess reveals unexpected dimensions. I find the exploration of folklore variants in these books delightful and Zin’s own personal growth absorbing (even though she does constantly pepper her first-person narrative, to a tedious degree, with words that used to be labeled unprintable).
THE IRON PRINCESS, by Barbara Hambly. I haven’t read much of Hambly’s high fantasy, in contrast to her vampire series and her mysteries. This new novel, though, struck me as gripping and ultimately satisfying despite its dire premise and tragic elements. On a mountaintop in another world, constant screams of agony reverberate, rumored to be the cries of a god in eternal torment. Like Prometheus, he’s chained to a rock where birds of prey tear his body to shreds all day. During the hours of night he heals, only to face the same torture after the sun rises. He’s not a god, however; he’s an old wizard, Ithrazel, sentenced to this punishment for destroying an entire city in an instant, although his own wife and son lived there. For seventy-five years he has suffered, not aging any further and apparently immortal. As the story begins, Clea, the “princess” of the title, arrives through a portal from the wizard’s home world. With the help of Graywillow, a member of an order of Sisters serving a goddess, and Hamo, a local shepherd enlisted as a guide because he has visited and tried to help the wizard in the past, Clea frees Ithrazel from his chains—all except the wrist shackles that largely suppress his magic. Given his resistance to her demand that he return with her to their world and aid her self-appointed mission, she naturally doesn’t trust him. Since his banishment, the ruin of the land by intensive mining for adamis, a substance that enhances magic, has accelerated. Clea, daughter of a noble house, has a love-hate relationship with her father, who has disowned and reinstated her twice. She’s determined to discover why the magic of all the wizard orders except the Crystal Mages is failing and overthrow the tyranny of the latter. She also wants to rescue her little half-brother so that he won’t be forced into the role of a mage while a mere child, as so many highborn boys are. Furthermore, strange monsters have been emerging from underground and under water to attack people and devastate the land. The Sisterhoods retain some of their divinely bestowed powers, and Clea has other allies among the underworld denizens who taught her the arts of a thief and assassin during her periods of disgrace. Hamo, sticking with her because a love spell (cast by Graywillow) binds him, offers additional help. Ithrazel’s support for her world-saving project shifts from grudging to merely reluctant to wholehearted as he realizes the grim condition of his former home and starts to regain nightmarish memories of what actually happened when he cast the lethal spell that doomed him to perpetual torture. All the seemingly unrelated elements of the story come together by the end, revealing the dark secret of the Crystal Mages’ power. Both Clea and Ithrazel change in the course of their battle against the evil forces. Her “heart of diamond” softens, beginning with repentance for having a love spell inflicted on Hamo. The old wizard, although a flawed person who has made grave errors, turns out not to be the wicked sorcerer rumor claims. Few, if any, characters are wholly good or wholly evil. One refreshingly different aspect of this book, in contrast to many high-fantasy novels, is that the protagonist has no magic of her own. Dungeons & Dragons would probably classify her as a multi-class rogue and fighter. In another realistic touch, breaking the power of the Crystal Mages doesn’t grant the world instant healing. Scars remain on the people and the land, and some characters can’t be saved. The conclusion, however, includes enough hope and reconciliation to presage fulfilling lives for Clea and her companions.
THE GHOST QUARTET, edited by Marvin Kaye. An anthology of original novellas, published in 2008. “The Place of Waiting,” by Brian Lumley: In this atmospheric tale set in Dartmoor, the protagonist, a lonely artist, encounters strange men on the moor, and we can’t tell until near the end who the ghost is and what it wants. “Hamlet’s Father,” by Orson Scott Card, my favorite, since I’m a big fan of retellings of myth, folklore, and classic fiction: The story adheres to the “facts” of Shakespeare’s play but puts a very different, shocking interpretation on them. If the ghost is lying or mistaken about the identity of his murderer, who did kill him and why? “The Haunted Single Malt,” by Marvin Kaye, told in a breezy, colloquial style and set mainly in an Edinburgh pub, therefore basically a “club story”: The narrator and his friends meet regularly to share ghost stories. One such gathering leads to a terrifyingly real incident driven by revenge for long past as well as recent wrongs. “Strindberg’s Ghost Sonata,” by Tanith Lee, set in an alternate-world Russia: A homeless student, rescued from freezing or starving to death by the friendly inhabitants of a sort of tenement-dwelling commune, discovers he’s being held prisoner, albeit benevolently. He finds out why when he meets the beautiful specter who’s bound to the location of the building. Since each story differs from the others in tone, plot premise, and (so to speak) theory of haunting, the anthology offers intriguing variety as well as delightful chills.
For my recommendations of “must read” classic and modern vampire fiction, explore the Realm of the Vampires:
Realm of the Vampires
For other reviews of older vampire fiction, posted on the fifteenth of each month, visit the VampChix blog: VampChix
*****
Excerpt from TENTACLES AND WEDDING BELLS:
“We have to go upstairs.” Blake led Lauren to a door where the hall dead-ended and opened it to show a narrow flight of steps. He flipped on a light switch.
“Your family makes him live in the attic?”
“He likes it up here. It’s arranged to suit his special needs.”
Still barefooted, she followed Blake to the top of the stairs, where a bare bulb on the ceiling showed a long, well-swept room lined with stacks of boxes, miscellaneous furniture, and the gable windows she’d noticed from outside. At the far end a wall with a closed door blocked off part of the space. “Hold on, does that lead to the window that’s boarded up?”
“Yeah.”
“So you don’t keep a wife locked in the attic, just a brother.”
“Before you go all ballistic about how we’re mistreating him, wait until you’ve seen the whole picture. His room is customized for him, and part of that involves covering the window.” Knocking on the door, he said, “Wilbur? I’ve brought Lauren to meet you, the way I promised.”
A whistling noise, like wind howling through a cavern, emanated from the other side. “Well, here goes.” He clasped her hand and opened the door.
Splinters of rainbow light, like the inside of a kaleidoscope, struck her eyes. After blinking a couple of times, she realized she was seeing the colors through a shimmering curtain of mist. Blake stepped across the threshold, pulling her with him. A chill shuddered through her at the moment she entered the room. The floor tilted, then straightened. She clutched Blake’s arm and waited for the vertigo to fade.
Why did the room seem to stretch twenty feet or more ahead of them? “There can’t be this much space up here. Is it some kind of optical illusion?”
“This room isn’t exactly all here. All in this world, I mean. That’s one reason we covered the window. People got too curious about the weird lights.”
She stared at the—object or creature?—that occupied the other end of the chamber. A translucent mound of rainbow-colored bubbles filled the space, emitting blue and violet sparks whenever its surface rippled. A pseudopod oozed outward for a second, then withdrew into the mass, leaving a glittery trail on the floorboards.
“What is that? Is it alive?” The thing struck her as beautiful in an alien, mind-wrenching way. Maybe the family secret was that the mysterious Wilbur performed mad-scientist illicit DNA experiments.
Blake put his arm around her waist. “That’s my brother.”
“What?” she yelped. “Where?”
The mammoth rainbow-bubble cluster extended six tentacles like the tendrils of a jellyfish, and four eye-stalks popped up at random spots on its surface. “Welcome, Lauren.” The voice vibrated through the floor and resonated in the pit of her stomach like organ music. “I’m so happy to meet my new sister.”
-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:
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Carter Kindle Books
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“Beast” wishes until next time—
Margaret L. Carter
Welcome to the March 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:
For other web links of possible interest, please scroll to the end.
My erotic paranormal romance novella “Romantic Retreat” was published by the Wild Rose Press on February 22. When Gail’s husband, Matt, retires from the Navy, she looks forward to romantic interludes and long-postponed travels to rekindle the spark in their marriage. But Matt is fixated on finding a high-paid—and high-stress—civilian job. If only she could get him alone long enough to seduce him into listening to her concerns. Then she acquires a curious antique, a miniature house with the magical power to transport its owner into an enchanted space, the perfect setting for a romantic getaway. Cloistered there together, Gail and Matt have twenty-four hours to settle their differences:
Amazon page: Romantic Retreat on Amazon
The Wild Rose Press page, with links to all major retailers:
Another excerpt appears below. Gail doesn’t believe the “magic spell” on the model house, created by her favorite obscure Edwardian author of fantasy novels, will really work, until. . . .
Also, I’ve self-published TENTACLES AND WEDDING BELLS, comprising two linked stories originally released by Ellora’s Cave, “In the Tentacles of Love” and “Weird Wedding Guest.” These steamy, humorous paranormal romances feature a pair of half-alien hybrid twins, one of them mostly human, the other looking a lot more like their father. The duology contains many allusions to Lovecraft’s fiction, which I had a lot of fun with.
The Amazon Kindle page:
Tentacles and Wedding Bells on Amazon
The Draft2Digital page, for links to other vendors:
Tentacles and Wedding Bells on Draft2Digital
In this issue I’m interviewing mystery author Jo A. Hiestand.
*****
Interview with Jo A. Hiestand:
What inspired you to begin writing?
As a teenager and a young adult, I wanted to replicate the books I read and loved – The Hound of the Baskervilles, Jane Eyre, Scales of Justice, Message From Hong Kong… I was engulfed by the books’ locations and the feelings of mystery and emotions they produced. But I wanted to fill them with my own characters and storylines, yet retain the overall mood of those authors’ novels. I always had that in my mind as something I needed to do, but I didn’t attempt it until later in life.
What genres do you work in?
I write mysteries, of which I have two current series. The McLaren Mysteries are a British “classic” series in that there is a main protagonist (a former police detective) who investigates cold cases on his own. I also write The Cookies & Kilts Mysteries, which are a US-based cozy mystery series in the amateur sleuth vein.
Do you outline, “wing it,” or something in between?
Oh no, I have to outline. I begin by building a mind map of the characters. First, I create a victim and plop him in the center of the map. For example, he’s a 21-year-old musician, wanting to turn pro, but his father is against it and says the lad needs to spend his time working on the farm, not singing, and should take over the farm when it’s time. But the victim loves music more than farm work. He has a slightly older female singing partner. They get local gigs but want to branch out and appear at larger venues. Okay, that’s his basic info. Then I figure out friends and associates and family who he would have in his life: a girlfriend, his singing partner and her husband, a rival musician, a former school mate, a parent, etc. Right here with the mind map I have set up possible friction between the girlfriend and the singing partner, between the victim and the husband, between the victim and his father. There will be more, of course. This is good because these character personalities drive the plot instead of the plot driving what the characters should do. I like this! I give them all personalities and names. Then I figure out who among the group has reason to hate the victim and hate him enough to kill him. This makes the people “alive”, and I create the story around this: jealousy between the two women, the rival musician’s envy of the victim, anger between the father and victim, etc. I write the plot in chunks of paragraphs and mark them into days on a timeline. A lot of ideas come to me after this initial flurry of brain activity – sometimes wakes me up at night – so I add the thoughts to the outline. The whole plotting process is very fluid; I can change ideas and delete things and add/delete/change characters. Basically, just tweak it all. I have to have it written down so the timeline makes sense, and I can refer to what happened at what point in the storyline.
What have been the major influences on your work (favorite authors, life experiences, or whatever)? Who are your role models as writers of mystery fiction?
Well, Ngaio Marsh, one of the four queens of the Golden Age of Mystery writing, is my absolute favorite mystery author. Her characters are marvelous, and her plots are also excellent! Other authors I like include Daphne du Maurier, P.D. James, Josephine Tey, Mary Stewart, and Mignon Eberhart, to name a few. The moods and landscapes are great, adding to the feel of the books.
I don’t know if I have a role model. I think I write in my own style, although I have read so many books by the aforementioned authors that some of them may have influenced my voice.
What kinds of background research do you do for your novels?
I do a LOT of research. Having lived in and vacationed in Britain, I am familiar with a great portion of Derbyshire and Lancashire. And a bit of Scotland, although not as much as the two places in England. Many of those places appear in my novels. But unfamiliar spots need research. I look on YouTube for videos of the villages or surrounding countryside. I consult maps to see nearby villages and especially roads and motorways. I look up moon phases and sunrise/sunset times for the dates of my story, so I don’t say it was still sunny at 6:30 pm during the winter in Edinburgh when the sun actually sets at 4:30! If someone in the story is fishing, I need to check if the fishing season is open or closed, the types of fish found in that river, are permits needed or is it strictly fishing via a fishing club. I have a book on British wildlife (birds, mammals, trees, plants) and I see what’s growing where my story is set so I don’t say McLaren pulled some burdock from his shoelaces when burdock doesn’t grow on the moor, or state that a certain bird is seen in the summer when it only frequents that section of Britain in the winter. In my book Related By Murder I had to research the beginning age restriction for serving in the British Army, what medals were given out for a specific conflict, and why these medals would be given to the recipient. I also needed another conflict or war that was going on near the same time as the Falkland Islands War and those dates and what regiments were involved in that. I’ve looked up what school badges for school uniforms look like and the equivalent school grades for various pupils’ ages, what sorts of ranks and jobs exist for cooks on submarines in the Royal Navy, police terminology and differences between the English and Scottish police. I research just about everything. I hate mistakes and try to avoid them. If some author does write that the sun was shining at 6:30 pm in Edinburgh in December, for example, that’s a sign of a lazy writer, in my opinion. It’s easily looked up. Many readers won’t know about summer/winter birds or ranks of seamen in the Royal Navy, but if I have it wrong and if a reader does know, the mistake pulls him out of my story, and he wonders what else is incorrect in the book. Of course, I will still make mistakes, despite my best efforts, but I try to whittle down the possible faux pas for my novels by looking in reference books or online, or asking questions of my English police friends.
Please tell us about your various series.
Well, the McLaren Mystery series takes place in Britain and features Michael McLaren, a former Detective Inspector with the Staffordshire Constabulary. He’s now residing in Derbyshire, England and repairing dry stone walls for his living. He quit his job due to a great injustice and he now investigates cold cases on his own – usually when a friend or family member of the victim asks him for help, because he has a great passion for justice (stemming from his own experience). To date, the books have been set in Derbyshire, Cumbria, Cheshire, and Scotland. In a few books, however, McLaren is asked to solve current mysteries (such as in Hide and Seek, when a murder occurs during a party at the home of his best friend), but the bulk of the stories deal with cold case mysteries. That’s the main focus of the books in that series, of which I have seventeen at the moment.
I have a second series that is amateur sleuth cozy mysteries. These are set in a fictitious town in Missouri. This is the Cookies & Kilts Mysteries and revolves around Kate Dunbar, who owns a pet bakery. She, of course, gets involved in solving mysteries. There is either a dog or cat in each book. For instance, the second book (A Trifling Murder, revolving around Robert Burns’ birthday celebration) features a Scottie dog who gives Kate some clues to solve the mystery. The third book (A Drizzle of Trouble) features two cats; a Scottish Fold and a Siberian Forest provide the solution help. These aren’t “talking animal” books, nor are they cutesy. They are a bit edgier than the usual cozies, but they aren’t blood and gore. The murders, as in the McLaren series, happen off stage. The Cookies & Kilts are lighter than McLaren but hopefully as entertaining, although there are light scenes in McLaren when he and his best mate, Jamie, kid around during their chats, for instance.
How did you come to design a mystery-solving game, and what’s it like?
Wow, I can’t believe you know about that! Years ago (more than I will relate), a friend and I got the idea, but I can’t recall how (my memory doesn’t stretch that far back). We both loved to read mystery novels. Pirates and treasure hunting were really big at the time, so we devised a game where players would hunt for treasure by reading a short account based on an actual pirate or event from the pirate’s life. We fictionalized a segment of the account in order to develop our mystery story. We named the game P.I.R.A.T.E.S., which stands for People In Research and Treasure Exploration Society. Game players are “members” of this society whose goal is to rescue historical treasures for placement in museums and to keep them out of the hands of private collectors. The players have resource people they can go to for information – a librarian, an archaeologist, a diver, a lighthouse keeper, etc. – but not every person will have information for that particular case, so the players have to choose the resource people wisely because they are allowed only so many people to help. There is a wealth of actual physical objects they can look at: song lyrics, poems, maps, scraps of fabric, photographs, etc. Again, not every object pertains to that case which the players are working. From the information gleaned from the one-page story, the resource people, and the physical objects, the players must discern what the treasure is and where it is located. Each of these little pirate stories is a “case” that players get from the Society and must interpret and solve. There are six cases in this first series, each one based on a real pirate.
We then developed a second series of the game – still called P.I.R.A.T.E.S., due to the Society, but it centers around real British things such as the history behind a nursery rhyme, Mary Queen of Scots’ casket letters, a medieval musical instrument, the architecture of an old castle, and so on. There are different resource people and different physical objects to consult, and eight cases in the second series.
What is your latest or next-forthcoming book?
I just completed book #17 of the McLaren Mysteries, Overdue. It came out at the end of January. It’s a slight departure from the norm in that McLaren is asked to help solve a string of current on-going murders happening in Derbyshire. All the crime scenes look very similar, and the murders occur a month apart. Time to nab the killer is running out if they want to stop him (or her) from the presumed next murder — unless he’s overdue with his normal schedule. So, McLaren’s trying to solve three murders that have happened (not really cold cases, but they haven’t been solved yet) as well as hoping to uncover the killer’s identity in order to prevent a fourth murder. And of course, some personal problems are thrown in to cause more tension!
What are you working on now?
Since I’ve finished Overdue, I’m in the midst of plotting the next McLaren mystery, most likely titled The Cottage. McLaren drives up to Cumbria, to the home of Melanie, his lady love, to help her pack for her move down to his village in Derbyshire. He’s asked by one of her friends to look into a cold case involving a relative who was found at a deserted cottage – what was the person doing there? He reluctantly agrees to look into it, and is busy with that investigation while helping Melanie pack up her belongings and get the house on the market. Of course, other things happen to throw a wrench into the timeline, but that’s the gist of it at the moment.
What advice would you give to aspiring writers?
About the best thing I can tell anyone is to keep trying. Be in this for the long haul. Don’t get discouraged by rejections or lackluster sales. It takes time to get your name known. Very few authors are overnight successes, so please keep writing and getting your books out.
What is the URL of your website? What about other internet presence?
I have a website: Jo Hiestand and it shows short summations of all my books, gives lists of my audiobooks with actual audio samples so you can hear a portion of the book prior to purchase, and has a section of links to my book trailers on YouTube. I’m rather fond of the trailers!
I’m also on Facebook,
Instagram,
and on Pinterest.
I post regularly to all three of these sites, as well as have a bi-quarterly newsletter that I email to subscribers. You can sign up for that on my website, if interested.
I have a YouTube channel. I think it’s fun because it not only has book trailers of all my books but also has short videos of the five main characters of the McLaren Mysteries: Mystery Author on YouTube. Those are great to watch, I think, because you get to learn a bit about the characters and how they interact. I also think it gives them greater depth and you might enjoy the series more by knowing about Melanie or Charlie Harvester, for example.
I guess that’s it. Thank you for giving me this interview time, Margaret. It’s been fun. I hope your readers find my ramblings interesting. Jo
*****
Some Books I’ve Read Lately:
THE HOUSE AT THE END OF THE WORLD, by Dean Koontz. I like this book more than some of Koontz’s other recent novels. Although his obsession with the theme of society going to perdition because it’s dominated by a cabal of narcissistic sociopaths is present, that preoccupation doesn’t dominate the story. The widowed heroine, Katie, lives alone on a private island, meeting nobody except on her rare trips into the nearest town. Keeping her promise to her late husband that she’ll go on living, she’s content with her books, the gourmet meals she cooks for herself, and the artwork she creates. So far, she hasn’t needed the protection of her fortress-like house or the guns she owns. Her illusion of safety shatters when drones fly over her home and an explosion, possibly a depth charge, roils the river. She knows these developments must have something to do with the nearby larger island, Ringrock, site of a shadowy government installation. But why do two men from an agency she’s never heard of come around to question her? Who or what are they searching for? Meanwhile, we meet the other viewpoint character, fourteen-year-old Libby, whose parents hold high positions in the secret lab on Ringrock. Bright and athletic, she’s aware they don’t love her; she and they share only mutual respect. Unlike Katie, she knows a bit about the Ringrock project, since she has sneaked looks at her father’s journal. Flashbacks skillfully reveal, little by little, the heartbreaking events that drove Katie to become a recluse and the truth about the entity confined on Ringrock. An alien organism brought back from the International Space Station, if not eliminated (as the scientists and military personnel in on the secret are trying to do, although with scant consideration for civilians who might be endangered in the process) it may place the entire world at risk. After a terrifying home invasion, Libby, left alone on her parents’ island, courageously makes her way by boat to Katie’s island. They flee together, pursued by a government agent, and bond over their shared danger. They’re accompanied not by a golden retriever, as one would usually expect in a Dean Koontz novel, but by an inexplicably tame fox who tags along everywhere Katie goes. The suspense is absorbing, the balance between down time and acute danger well structured, the body horror scenes gruesome, and the warm connection between the two main characters emotionally strong. The antagonists, a rarity in a Dean Koontz book, have believable motives instead of aspiring to destroy the universe for their own gain (like the villains in a certain vintage cartoon). Libby’s father sincerely believes the quasi-Lovecraftian, protean creature code-named Moloch has incomprehensible but possibly benign purposes. The other bad guys are either obeying orders or trying to save their own lives. A fast-paced but not frenetic thriller with a satisfying conclusion for Katie and Libby’s “found family.” One complaint: For no apparent reason, the whole thing is narrated in present tense, including the flashbacks. One of the few legitimate uses for that device (in my opinion) is to distinguish present action from flashbacks, so Koontz is pointlessly confusing the reader.
DIREWOOD, by Catherine Yu. This YA novel elegantly deconstructs the tropes of teenage vampire romance. Yes, the vampire is seductive, but he’s also clearly dangerous. Even in full awareness of that truth, the narrator, Aja, has trouble resisting his blandishments. As a child of the only ethnically Asian family in their upscale suburban neighborhood, she feels she doesn’t fit and can never quite measure up. Her older sister, Fiona, on the other hand, assimilates smoothly and excels at everything. Bizarre signs portend the advent of evil in their town—ominous fog, parasitic caterpillars, and flocks of strange butterflies. Teenagers disappear. A hypnotic voice calls to Aja in the night. However, it’s Fiona, the “perfect” daughter, who vanishes. Surely she can’t have run away from home, so the adults assume she’s been kidnapped or murdered. Deciding the vampire, Padraic, must have ensnared her, Aja decides to let him lure her to his lair, where she hopes to find and save her sister before it’s too late. Deep in the forbidden forest outside of town, he takes her to an abandoned, decaying church. There he dwells with a cruel female vampire, Kate, and the missing kids, who adore the monsters and compete for their attention. The flesh-eating caterpillars infest the site with an atmosphere of skin-crawling body horror that serves as a concrete symbol of undead corruption. The enthralled victims claim they haven’t seen Fiona, but Aja finds evidence that suggests they’re lying. And does something that horrifies even the vampires lurk in the cellar below the church? Amid the darkly Gothic atmosphere, Aja struggles to maintain her perspective, tempted to believe the often charming Padraic retains some trace of humanity but aware she mustn’t let down her guard. An unexpected ally joins her, opening her eyes to the nature of true friendship. She also discovers she never really understood Fiona. In the end, Aja survives, as implied by her first-person narrative perspective, but far from unscathed or unchanged. Although the forest and the clearing where the church now stands as a crime scene soon heal from the supernatural infestation, the town must grieve and the survivors deal with the aftereffects of the trauma.
THE SCARLET CIRCUS, by Jane Yolen. This story collection follows her earlier volumes THE EMERALD CIRCUS and THE MIDNIGHT CIRCUS, this time with an overall theme of “love,” although, as Yolen’s introduction acknowledges, the contents may stretch our familiar concepts of that term, and it’s not always romantic love. Some highlights: “Dusty Loves,” the woes of a faerie man who keeps falling in love with mortal women, as told by his long-suffering sibling. “Unicorn Tapestry,” embroidery and magic used to save a hunted unicorn. “A Ghost of an Affair,” a fresh take on time-crossed lovers. “The Sword and the Stone,” an Arthurian tale with the variation that Merlin presents the sword in the stone as a challenge for Arthur after he has already become king, along with a twist on the trope of the aspiring young knight in disguise. “The Sea Man,” in which a seventeenth-century Dutch ship captures a merman. “The Erotic in Faerie: The Footnotes,” exactly what it says, consisting entirely of a list of footnotes, from which the reader must infer the contents of the “lost” document; I love this kind of meta-fiction. As a delightful bonus feature, the book ends with author’s notes on the writing of each story, accompanied by a poem associated with the subject of each one.
For my recommendations of “must read” classic and modern vampire fiction, explore the Realm of the Vampires:
Realm of the Vampires
For other reviews of older vampire fiction, posted on the fifteenth of each month, visit the VampChix blog: VampChix
*****
Excerpt from “Romantic Retreat”:
As soon as she heard Matt’s car pull into the driveway, she hurried downstairs to meet him at the door. His rib-squeezing hug sent the usual pleasant sparks along her nerves. She ordered herself to ignore the potential distraction. If his interview had produced positive results, they’d have serious matters to discuss.
Even before asking, she could tell from his relaxed smile that the day had gone well. “Everything’s great,” he confirmed as he strode up to the bedroom, shedding coat and tie on the way.
She trailed after him. “So they want to hire you?”
“Ninety-nine percent sure.” He retreated into the bathroom and emerged a couple of minutes later with his shirt off. He tossed it into the hamper, replaced it with a polo shirt and changed his black leather shoes for loafers. “They said they’d call next Monday with the final decision. If they make an offer, of course I’ll accept.”
“Of course?” Leaning against her dresser, she folded her arms. “Did I miss the part where we talked this over first?”
Seated on his side of the bed, he glanced up at her, his eyebrows arching. “What’s to talk about? Didn’t we decide this was the logical next step?”
“What’s this ‘we’? You decided. Maybe I’m not thrilled with the idea of moving to D.C. Or moving at all, for that matter.”
His faint frown looked honestly puzzled. “All the other moves have turned out fine. You’ve always been okay with each new place after we’ve adjusted, haven’t you?”
“That’s different. I signed up for the military moves when I married you. This time we have a choice.”
“What’s to choose? You want me to turn down a good job with a great salary?”
She unfolded her arms and forced her hunched shoulders to relax. “Salary isn’t everything. At least let’s think it over instead of jumping right in. I bet they’d want you to start immediately, wouldn’t they?”
“Sure, why not?”
“Don’t you want to relax a little before you plunge into a new career? What about that trip to Scotland and Ireland we’ve talked about?”
“There’s plenty of time for that later.”
“Time? What if ‘later’ never gets here?” Catching herself almost screaming, she lowered her voice. “When was the last trip we took that wasn’t a change-of-station move or going to see relatives?” Their most recent “vacation” had been a visit to the final surviving member of the older generation in her family, her aunt in Baltimore, who had died the previous year. Gail picked up the miniature cottage, reminded of the romantic getaway fantasy that didn’t seem likely to materialize anytime soon.
He walked over to her and placed a tentative hand on her shoulder as if soothing a restless pet. “Well—I don’t exactly remember.”
“Imagine that. Neither do I.”
“Hey, what’s this?” He ran his fingers over the model in her hand. “Amazing craftsmanship.”
“It’s a replica of a house in one of my favorite books, a retirement gift from Javonne. As if you’re retiring in any real sense of the word.”
The sarcastic edge in her voice provoked him to another frown. “Be reasonable. We’re nowhere near Social Security age. You knew we wouldn’t be embarking on a life of leisure.”
“And you know I don’t expect that. Don’t twist my words. I just want you to consider the options.” Hopeless—he’d made up his mind. If only she could whisk him away to that magical retreat where he’d have no alternative but to listen. Seized by a mad impulse, she picked up the slip of paper she’d left on the dresser. She curled the fingers of her other hand over his. With both of them grasping the model, she read aloud: “Aperio, ineo, ingressio, remaneo, fruor.”
“Say what?”
Just as she opened her mouth to answer him, the floor shuddered. Her fingers went limp, dropping the paper and the miniature. The walls and furniture faded to mist. She threw her arms around Matt. A shriek escaped her as everything went gray. She closed her eyes while the house rocked as if hit by an earthquake.
“What the hell?” He hugged her tightly to his chest, his heart pounding under her ear.
Seconds later, the dizzying motion stopped. She ventured a peek. Their bedroom had disappeared. They stood in the middle of a parlor with wood-paneled walls, a bearskin rug on the floor, and the antlered head of a deer over the fireplace.
“Oh, my God, it worked!”
-end of excerpt-
*****
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“Beast” wishes until next time—
Margaret L. Carter