Coffin Hopping: How to Scare the Neighborhood Children

It's that time of year again...Yeah, baby! Zombies are coming, as well as vampires and werewolves, witches, ghosts, ghouls, demons and devils (and some pretty things, too, but those aren't nearly so much fun, are they?) In honor of the upcoming holiday, I've joined the Coffin Hop Web Tour again this year. In case you hadn't noticed by all the badges and banners...credit to atrtink for those, obvs I couldn't do something that cool...this is a huge event with artists and authors giving away hundreds of prizes on their sights. So hop on over to the list of horror authors and join us for some scartitivites.
 
As my family debated Halloween costumes this year, I got to thinking about the trendiness that Halloween has taken on. And more generally, the fall season. As soon as October begins, everyone is clamoring to post the first colored leaf photo, Tweeting about their pumpkin spice lattes (#PSL, of course) and instagramming pics of their newly dusted off Ugg boots and flannels. (Don't be offended, I'm poking fun at myself here, too). Fall is the hot new season, and it has been for several years now. Poor summer. So neglected.

When I was a kid, I don't remember adults dressing for Halloween. Perhaps my mom would find an old black skirt and a turtleneck, top it off with a straw hat, and call herself a witch, but the adult costumes were always kept to a minimum, made up of things they already had in the closet. Nowadays, Halloween is an all-ages event, with adult participation and enthusiasm (at least) as high as the kids'.

If you're not going to a party but stuck handing out candy, and you still want to dress up, consider scaring the neighborhood children. Oh yes. It might take a little more work than grabbing something off the shelf, but with the right makeup, face paint, and even items out of your closet, you can piece together a grim and gruesome costume.

You can go above and beyond and spend lots of money, but if you're like me, finances are tight this time of year with the holidays coming up. Zombies are still hot this year, as they have been for the past five or so years, and talk about a cheap and easy costume. Got an old t-shirt, a pair of ripped jeans and some dirt outside your house? All you need is some fake blood and maybe a makeup kit if you want to smear some white and black on your face. Smear the blood around your mouth, grime up your clothes a bit, dribble fake blood down the front of your shirt. Smudge some makeup (Halloween makeup or just regular old eyeliner) around your eyes, then go wait on your lawn. It's even better if you have a whole family or some friends willing to join you in this endeavor. When the kiddos start coming along your walk, begin lurching towards them (someone should also fall and army crawl, that's always a good one) growling and expressing your general desire for brains. If you want to go above and beyond, you could even make a few quick "coffins" out of scrap wood or pallets and have a couple people pop up out of those for effect. Then, watch the neighborhood kids scream in terror...just don't expect to be popular with the neighborhood parents!

 In case you were wondering, I still haven't decided on a costume, but I will definitely be in costume come Halloween night. Until then, I'll be hopping around reading scary stories on some of the author blogs over at the Coffin Hop, as well as giving away free copies of my own books. For the five days before Halloween, The Superiors will be free on Amazon, so pick it up if you like dark vampire stories (no explicit sex). And if you want to read the second book or third, I'll be giving away copies to Coffin Hoppers exclusively. The first person to comment each day this week will receive a free ecopy of any of my books. Just leave your name and contact info (email, twitter handle, fb, etc) and I'll get you a free copy.

Thanks for hopping in my coffin with me.

Edit: for length and relevance to topic.

Read an Ebook Week: Review: The Day the World Ended, by Anna O'Hare

The Day the World Ended by Anna O'Hare

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


4.5 stars

Okay, confession time. I haven’t read many indies. When I first started publishing, I did a few review swaps, but that made me very uncomfortable. First off, I don’t like to write bad reviews, and since I know how hard it is for indie authors, I’m even more hesitant to add a bad review, even if it is deserving. Secondly, there’s the fear of retribution when you’re trading reviews. So, after trading 3 or 4 reviews, I’d had enough. This came about for two reasons, the main one being I received a book that was riddled with typos and just plain bad—it looked like the author published a first draft. I was left struggling to find something nice to say beyond, “I’m sorry I’m not going to review your book because it should never have been published,” or “Please for the sake of other indie authors, hire an editor or bribe an English teacher, or at least learn to use spell check. You’re making us all look bad.”

However, that’s a silly reason not to read indies (though I will not be trading reviews probably ever). Since I’m an indie author, it seems traitorous not to read other indies. So, after seeing a thread on Goodreads asking for reviews, I discovered this little gem (free on Smashwords, and more than worth your time). I will admit, I was a little hesitant to read something that’s supposed to be ya sci-fi (burned out on the genre), but I lost all reservations as I devoured the first chapters without pause. Because the end of the world here is simply a catalyst. It’s not the focus of the story, but what drives each story.

This book is about three groups of kids who are waiting for the end of the world (which is happening in a few days). What would you do if the world was ending in four days? Would you go find an abandoned house and make it your hideout, so you and your friends could hang out there, eat junk food and watch TV, have food fights, and be together? Would you seek revenge on a group of bullies who killed a classmate? Would you formulate a plan to break in to you rival high school and hang your school’s banner from the roof?

Each story drew me in. At first, I liked the story of the younger kids in the abandoned house the most. I liked how they kept their morals and didn’t succumb to anarchy. They had a food fight, but then they cleaned up the house, because if they were going to hang out there for the next few days, they wanted it nice. I hurried through some of the sections about the other kids so I could get back to this group. (view spoiler)[ Then, at the end, when they found the old woman and took care of her, I had all new respect for them. They all wanted to spend the end of the world together, and they did…along with a dead body. I did want to hear a bit about her, but I liked how a bit in each story was never answered.  (hide spoiler)] Their story felt the most complete to me.

The second storyline is about a girl, her little brother, and her cousin, who idolizes her, seeking revenge on some bullies. I would have liked if the boy the bullies killed had been Grace’s friend or crush, so that she had a reason for wanting to seek revenge so much. It seemed a bit odd that she just decided to dole out the punishment on behalf of some kid she’d only talked to one time. This storyline ended up feeling a bit weird to me. Still, it drew me in enough that I’d always want to keep reading to find out what revenge she’d dole out to the next boy, as her punishments grow increasingly alarming as the story goes on, until you realize that Grace is a complete psychopath. I kept waiting for her companions to stand up to her and realize she’s lost it and say no, they’re not going to go through with her escalating terror. Because it soon becomes apparent that Grace is a huge bully herself—not only to the boys she’s seeking revenge against, but to her little brother and cousin, too. (view spoiler)[ But when they finally stood up to her, and her cousin puts his arms around the little brother and says he’ll be there with him at the end, I burst into tears. (Okay, so maybe I have a soft spot for stories about brotherly love, but it was still sweet).  (hide spoiler)]

The third story, about the group of poor high school kids, started out as the one that didn’t grab my immediate interest, but ended up being my favorite. I didn’t like it at first because I didn’t like the main character, who is a teenager who is good at everything, has life all figured out, and is completely at peace. Which I don’t believe exists. But, as the story went on and the characters developed, I really enjoyed it. All the schools have closed, since the world is ending, except the poor kids’ school, because they don’t have anywhere else to go (perfect!) I loved their two teachers, and the weird morose kid, the snarky girl, the perfect couple, etc. All the characters came alive and seemed exactly like real people you’d know at a high school. (view spoiler)[ I was hoping Christian would come to realize he didn’t have life all figured out, but he never does. Still, as they sit on the roof singing, waiting for the world to end, it was absolutely perfect.  (hide spoiler)]

For a grammar nazi like me, I can’t read a book without noticing the mistakes, even in traditionally published books. There were a few in here, but the story was so compulsively readable that they were easily overlooked. I’m so used to editing that any mistake tends to jump out at me. There were a few times when I wasn’t sure if something was a mistake or British slang. Overall, the grammar was fine and the mistakes were few.

The storyline was easy to follow and addictive. I was reading this on my phone as I walked at the track every day, and I’d find myself reading it as I walked to my car afterwards, sometimes sitting in my car reading a few more minutes because I was at an exciting part and couldn’t stop reading.

The characters were mostly well-developed, at least the main players. Since the three stories have different characters, and some have dozens, obviously all are not completely rounded, but every character is unique and wonderful. Overall, this was a fast-paced character focused YA that would appeal to readers of sci-fi as well as contemporary YA. And if you hurry, it’s free on Smashwords (if you aren’t familiar, you should be—they format for download to any device), so grab it while you can, because it’s a steal.

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View all my reviews

Hearts on Fire Blog Hop

Hello everyone!

Today I'm happy to be participating in the second annual Hearts on Fire blog hop!


Here’s how to hop…
1.) Kym, Eve, and Victoria have supplied the first nine items on the list of Top Ten Favorite Valentines/Romantic movies and Top Ten Favorite “pick up lines”. YOU provide #10. Comment with your answers and email to enter for the site prize. My site prize is a digital copy of one of my three books (links on right). You choose which book!


2.) Then go to the next hop site on the list below and repeat. 

3.) Don’t forget to go here to also enter the GRAND PRIZE RAFFLE.
(20 carat lab ruby, signed paperback series of Immortals of New Orleans – Kym Grosso, and signed paperback series of Black Swan - Victoria Danann, plus a fabulous SWAG bag from Eve Langlais.)
a Rafflecopter giveaway


TOP TEN FAV VALENTINES/ROMANTIC MOVIES
1. The Princess Bride – Eve (because I love a giggle with my romantic fairy tales)
2. Pretty Woman – Eve (gotta love a poor girl/rich guy flick)
3. Warm Bodies – Eve (Zombies can be sexy, lol)
4. Sabrina - Kym
5. The Proposal – Kym
6. Forgetting Sarah Marshall – Kym
7. A Walk in the Clouds – Victoria
8. The Notebook – Victoria
9. Made in Heaven – Victoria
10. _______________________ What’s yours?


TOP TEN FAV “PICK UP” LINES
1. Eve’s Corny p/u lines: Did you sit in a puddle of maple syrup? Because you have a swe-e-e-t ass.
2. Eve: Do you live in a corn field? Because I’m stalking you.
3. Eve: Your lips look so lonely. Would they like to meet mine?
Note from Eve: Funny how most pickup lines are from guys to girls, and have to do with sex. lol. Then again, can you imagine a woman going up to a guy and saying “Hey gorgeous, I brought along my ten inch ruler because I’ve got a feeling you’ll measure up.” Hehehe.
4. Kym’s Corny p/u lines from movies: “Do you wash your pants in Windex? Because I can see myself in them.” ~Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery,
5. Kym: “You know, it’s dangerous for you to be here in the frozen food section… Because you could melt all this stuff.” ~My Blue Heaven
6. Kym: “I couldn’t help but notice that you look a lot like my next girlfriend.” ~Hitch
7. Victoria’s fav lines that actually worked on me: (The lifeguard.) “You all might as well go home because this storm isn’t going away. (looks at me) Except you. You stay and we’ll go swimming.”
8. Victoria: “Have you seen Jeff?” “Who’s Jeff?” “Who cares? What’s your name?”
9. Victoria: “You’re my pick for student body president. Run and I’ll make sure you get elected.”
10. ___________________ What’s yours?

Thanks for stopping by. Your next stop on the hop is…

 

  Close Encounters for the complete list.

 

 

Kindle Fire HD raffle with Graham Parke

<center>
<i>“I'm very polite by nature, even the voices in my head let each other finish their sentences.” – from Completely Flappable</i></center>
<center>
<img width=108px src="http://www.grahamparke.com/images/extrefpics/kindlefirehd178.jpg"><img src="http://www.childhelplineinternational.org/media/800/illustration_birdsonawire.png.ashx?width=225&scale=both&mode=crop"><img width=108px src="http://www.grahamparke.com/images/extrefpics/kindlefirehd178.jpg"></center>
Don’t you just hate it when you have a thousand little thoughts rattling around your brain, good for nothing but keeping you up at night? Ideas, worries, mental reminders for the next day? My voices can get pretty insistent, and mostly this is a nuisance, but sometimes it’s okay, when there’s a story idea or two among the ramblings. And rarely, very rarely, I get what I think is a really good idea, but one that I don't know what to do with.
For instance, a while ago it occurred to me that it’s probably not governments or big corporations that wield the world’s greatest financial power. I think it’s us. All the little people together. Then I started wondering what could happen if we all decided to set 1 month of our incomes aside towards fixing this place up a bit. How many of the world’s problems could we actually solve permanently? Half of them, maybe? All of them? That's a pretty cool picture.
But I’m a pretty dim light when it comes to implementing even small ideas, never mind the big ones. So I’m not sure how to get that ball rolling (heck, I'm not even sure where we keep the balls). But I can certainly start with myself. That’s easy enough (I’ve been in close contact with myself for years; I didn't have much trouble convincing myself.)
So, this December, all proceeds of all my novels will go to Child Helpline International. The CHI is pretty cool because they support toll-free child helplines worldwide and they help highlight gaps in child protection systems. They do all this on donations (click the image below for more information.)
<center>
<a href="http://www.childhelplineinternational.org/about"> <img src="http://www.childhelplineinternational.org/media/800/illustration_birdsonawire.png.ashx?width=150&scale=both&mode=crop"> </a></center>
But what does all this have to do with you? Well, I'm raffling off some prizes and giving out some freebees to boost the donation (expenses out of my own pocket, not the donation :P )
So what's in it for you, besides that warm, fuzzy feeling you'll get knowing the Xmas presents you’re buying include an automatic donation? Well, how about I give you the new edition to the award winning No Hope for Gomez saga completely free?
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<img width=70px src="http://www.grahamparke.com/imagesv03/completleyflappable_eb2.jpg"></center>
And how about a Kindle Fire HD raffle ticket with every purchase while we’re at it?
<center>
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00CWQR21A"><img width=120px src="http://www.grahamparke.com/images/extrefpics/kindlefirehd178.jpg"></a></center>
Simply forward your receipt emails to nohopeforgomez@gmail.com to participate.
And now, on to the pitch. This is the bit where I try to convince you, using only my words, that my novels don’t suck (or at least, not too much.) That they won’t only tickle your brain, but they’ll actually make your life better, if only marginally. That they are, in fact, worthy donation material. Here goes (fingers crossed)...
<table cellpadding="10px">
<tr> <td width=130px>
<a href="http://amzn.to/1hvUHBb"><img src="http://www.grahamparke.com/imagesv03/nhfg_pb_sc.jpg"></a>
<a href="http://amzn.to/1hvUHBb">Paper: $6.08</a>
<a href="http://amzn.to/17u3aB5">Kindle:$2.99</a>
(uk <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/No-Hope-Gomez-Graham-Parke/dp/9491919008">paper, </a><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/No-Hope-Gomez-Graham-Parke-ebook/dp/B00G8ISLSG">kindle</a>)
</td> <td width="100%">
<h2>
No Hope for Gomez!</h2>
<p STYLE="font-size: x-small;">
Winner of the Forewords Book of the Year Awards, featured on Kirkus Best Indie List 2011, IBA and USA Book News Award nominee.</p>
It's the age-old tale:
&nbsp;&nbsp;Boy meets girl.
&nbsp;&nbsp;Boy stalks girl.
&nbsp;&nbsp;Girl already has a stalker.
&nbsp;&nbsp;Boy becomes her stalker-stalker.
We've seen it all before, many times, but this time it's different. If only slightly.</td></tr>
</table>
<p STYLE="font-size: x-small;">
"Extremely witty writing containing keen insights into human nature." --California Chronicle
"Challenges the way we think about, and interact with, the world around us." --Kirkus Discoveries
"The antics in this book will leave the reader laughing. Graham Parke is a genius."--Reader's Favorite</p>
<table cellpadding="10px">
<tr><td width="100%">
<h2>
Unspent Time </h2>
Warning: reading this novel may make you more attractive and elevate your random luck by about 9.332%*<p STYLE="font-size: x-small;">
(*These statements have not been evaluated by anyone of consequence)</p>
Permeating the cracks between the past and the present is the realm of Unspent Time. Time that was allotted but never spent. In this realm we find the stories that could have been true. Such as the story of the designer of the color scheme used inside your shoe, or the story of Goki Feng Ho: the Chinese art of decoding the secret meaning of car license plates.</td> <td width=130px>
<a href="http://amzn.to/18VspYV"><img src="http://www.grahamparke.com/imagesv03/cover_unspent_omni_eb.jpg"></a>
<a href="http://amzn.to/18VspYV">Paper: $6.08</a>
<a href="http://amzn.to/1dHixd1">Kindle:$2.99</a>
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/138990">ePub   :  $2.99</a>
(uk <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Unspent-Time-Graham-Parke/dp/9491919024">paper, </a><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Unspent-Time-Graham-Parke-ebook/dp/B007EVPK30">kindle</a>)
</td></tr>
</table>
<p STYLE="font-size: x-small;">
“Captivating. Each story fired up my imagination.” – Alan H. Jordan, author.
"Delightfully mad. Graham's vibrant characters shine from the first page." --Tahlia Newland, author.
</p>
<table cellpadding="10px">
<tr> <td width=130px>
<img src="http://www.grahamparke.com/imagesv03/completleyflappable_eb2.jpg">
<span style="color: #ff0000">Free with this event</span>
</td> <td width="100%">
<h2>
Completely Flappable</h2>
<p STYLE="font-size: x-small;">
“He’s completely flappable!”
“Don’t you mean he’s <i>un</i>flappable?”
“Not really. He can very easily be flapped.”</p>
Gomez has never been on a date. In his 27 years on the planet he’s never been able to quite close the deal. For some reason, circumstances always conspire to make his meet-ups with women less than official dates. But now a blond German girl with freckles has moved into his building and he decides it’s time to get his act together.</td></tr>
</table>
If you've read this far, you're already my hero ;)
I hope you like my idea enough to join me in this fun adventure. Let's see how much we can raise this Xmas ;)
Kind regards,
Graham Parke

Upcoming Book News

As you all know, I'm getting ready to release my third book, The Renegades. I just got my final cover art back today, and I'm doing my last read-through. I'm never satisfied!

I will post a big giveaway on December 3rd, so make sure you check back then for ebooks and paperback copies of all three of my novels as well as some other vampire novels. I will also have a promo spot over at Bit'N Books, and later, reviews on their site. Please check out their page if you're an author or book reviewer. Here's a bit about them.

Bit'N Book Promoters are a team of passionate, friendly and feisty individuals who are here to help you get your books out there. We're all authors and know how hard it is to get books noticed, so we want to give a helping hand to others like ourselves.
We provide book promotions, reviews, author interviews and kindle freebies. Our blog mainly focuses on reviews and author interviews and detailed book promotions. Both our Twitter and Facebook pages provide book promos, updates and links to what we're doing on our blog. We also regularly post kindle freebies only available on our Facebook page, along with pretty book & film quote boxes, which we design ourselves.
If you'd like our help, you can find us here:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/BitnBookPromote
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BITNBOOKPROM...
Blog: http://bitnbookpromoters.blogspot.co.uk/ 

The Renegades Release Party Invite

My latest novel, The Renegades, is coming to the major internet retailers on December 3rd. The paper copy will be available in early 2014, but you can win an advance copy at the release party. You can also win ebooks and swag, as well as paper copies of the first two books in The Superiors series.

I'm excited about this! Doing a bit of last-minute editing and then it's good to go.

Please stop by in a few weeks for the release day!

Cover Reveal Wednesday: The Renegades, Book 3 in The Superiors Series

In honor of my favorite holiday (Halloween, of course) here's a bit of shameless self-promotion for my new vamp/horror novel, coming soon. As everyone knows, self-promotion gets old really fast, so I've tried to stay away from that as much as possible. But I'm a writer, so of course I'm going to get excited and want to share my AWESOME NEW BOOK COVER! I just got it back from my cover designer, the brilliant Casey Siegel, and couldn't wait to share it. It still needs a few more tweaks, but here is the preliminary:

I'm super excited about it, and I love it already. The book, The Renegades, is tentatively scheduled for release on December 3.

REVEAL Wednesday: Book Cover Preview: The Invention of Wings, by Sue Monk Kidd

If you read The Secret Life of Bees and loved it as much as I did, chances are, you read something else by Sue Monk Kidd since then. I read The Mermaid Chair. Good, but not much can surpass Bees, one of my favorite books ever.

So, I was especially excited to have the opportunity to help reveal the cover of Kidd's new book, The Invention of Wings, coming to a bookstore near you on January 7, 2014.

Without further ado...

I cannot wait to read the next novel by this fabulous author! I love the cover already.

Released Today! Troubled Daughters, Twisted Wives (Interview today, review tomorrow!)

Hello, readers!


I'm so, so excited about this book, and about the opportunity to share with you the new release of a collection of stories by some amazing female domestic suspense authors who were, unfortunately, forgotten along the way. Sarah Weinman has compiled a thrilling selection of short stories to remind us of their importance as well as offer some good, exciting reading.

Here's the blurb: 

TROUBLED DAUGHTERS, TWISTED WIVES: Stories from the Trailblazers of Domestic
Suspense (A Penguin Books Original; On-sale: August 27, 2013) is a salute to the real femmes fatales of the domestic suspense genre-and the deceitful children, deranged husbands, vengeful friends, and murderous
wives they unleashed.
 One of today's preeminent authorities on crime fiction, Weinman asks:
Where would today's bestselling authors like Gone Girl's Gillian Flynn,
Sue Grafton, or Tana French be without the pioneering women writers who
came before them and created the psychological thriller?  In this new
anthology, including hair-raising stories by Patricia Highsmith, Shirley
Jackson, Vera Caspary, and more, Weinman brings together fourteen tales
by women who-from the 1940s through the mid-1970s-took a scalpel to
contemporary society and sliced away to reveal its dark essence.

Today I have the wonderful privilege of sharing some of her thoughts about the book.

A Conversation with Sarah Weinman

Q: What inspired you to compile this anthology? Were you working on it before the big splash created by GONE GIRL?

A: TROUBLED DAUGHTERS emerged from an essay I wrote for the literary magazine Tin House. I'd been approached by an editor there to write something for their themed "The Mysterious" issue, and I'd long contemplated why it seemed that a fair number of female crime writers working around or after World War II through the mid-1970s weren't really part of the larger critical conversation. They weren't hard boiled per se, but they weren't out-and-out cozy, either. Hammett and Chandler and Cain, yes; but why not Marie Belloc Lowndes and Elisabeth Sanxay Holding and Vera Caspary? Why Ross Macdonald but not his wife, Margaret Millar, who published books before he did and garnered critical and commercial acclaim first? I knew after writing the essay that I wasn't done with the subject, and when I had lunch with an editor at Penguin on an unrelated matter and started going on, rather enthusiastically, about this widespread neglect, he said, "sounds like there's an anthology in this. Why don't you send me a proposal?" It took a while to organize, but eventually I did, and Penguin bought the anthology. Publishing being what it is, it's taken a little less than two years from acquisition to release date.

To answer your other question, I had just started putting the anthology together when it became clear that GONE GIRL was going to be a massive hit, and that I had a very easy one-sentence pitch for TROUBLED DAUGHTERS: “If you loved GONE GIRL, here's an entire generation of writers who helped make that book possible, and who deserve to be rescued from the shadows.” Flynn clearly tapped into contemporary anxieties about marriage, identity, high expectations, and whether we can really be true to ourselves and the ones we profess to love. So it's fascinating to explore an earlier time when many of the very same anxieties women had manifested itself, even as the very concept of independent womanhood was perceived to be a great threat.

Q: What is “domestic suspense”? What relationship does it have to other kinds of crime fiction?

A: Domestic suspense is a catch-all term for work largely published by women and describing the plight of women -- wives, daughters, the elderly, spinsters, the underserved, the overlooked, and many other phrases used then but thankfully, not so much now -- as World War II was coming to a close and the feminist movement dawned. Without domestic suspense you couldn't have contemporary psychological suspense. Conversely, the work of people like Gillian Flynn, Laura Lippman, Megan Abbott, Sophie Hannah, Tana French, and many more would not be possible without the likes of Hughes, Jackson, Millar, Highsmith, and -- though not included in TROUBLED DAUGHTERS for reasons outside the scope of this interview -- Ruth Rendell, Mary Higgins Clark, Mignon Eberhart, and more.

Q: Which one of the authors in your collection would you like to see get more credit?

A: Bear in mind my answer will change daily, but right now, I'll say Joyce Harrington. She won an Edgar Award for her very first short story – “The Purple Shroud”, included in TROUBLED DAUGHTERS – but she spent most of the 70s and 80s writing stories of equal if not greater excellence. Harrington also published three novels: No One Knows My Name (1981), set in a summer stock theater troupe; Family Reunion (1982), a very creepy Southern Gothic with quite the toxic family; and Dreemz of the Night (1987), a terrific mystery set in the then-contemporary New York City graffiti world. I love that book of hers the best because of the window it unexpectedly opened on a nearly unrecognizable version of the five boroughs.

Q: What was the first domestic suspense you ever read?

Mary Higgins Clark’s Where Are The Children?, back in eleventh grade. That book scared the hell out of me, and only later did I realize what a pivotal book that was.

Q: What is the difference between “classic” domestic suspense and the writing of the new generation (Megan Abbott, Laura Lippman, Gillian Flynn, Tana French, etc.)?

A: Largely the sensibility afforded by contemporary times. But there are many more similarities. For example, Lippman’s most recent novel, And When She Was Good, was about a suburban madam, and the way in which the suspense unfolded and she depicted Heloise’s nose for business and growing internal tensions could have been written by Margaret Millar sixty years ago (albeit with more dated references to technology.) When I first read Megan Abbott I thought immediately of Dorothy Hughes’ In A Lonely Place. The DNA of so many of these earlier writers inserted themselves into those writing today, whether they realize it consciously.

Q: Do you think women write better domestic suspense? If so, why or why not?

A: I'm a big fan of Harlan Coben and Linwood Barclay’s work, both of whom certainly work in the domestic suspense field. Ira Levin’s books work so well because he knew exactly what domestic anxiety buttons to push – Rosemary’s Baby and The Stepford Wives absolutely count as domestic suspense (and, to a certain extent, A Kiss Before Dying.) That said, women are still struggling with the work/life balance, if I may drop in some cliches like “having it all” or “leaning in.” So there are more of them exploring these themes in a fictional universe, and that means more of them are doing so with great success and acclaim. I'd like to see more men write domestic thrillers and more women write traditionally “male” subgenres so that we can blur the lines once and for all. But forty, fifty, sixty years ago, there weren't as many options.

Q: You mention in your intro to TROUBLED DAUGHTERS, TWISTED WIVES that the World Wars, particularly WWII, shaped the lives of domestic suspense writers, and consequently, what they wrote. Is there a similar “seismic event” that might have shaped the new domestic suspense, in your opinion?

A: I think these forces were at work already, but I hope that, twenty years or later from now, someone looks back at the current generation of women writers and edits a fabulous anthology explaining just how much the 2008 Great Recession changed everything. Which is to say, I think it did, and we still don't know by how much.

Q: If this kind of fiction grew out of post-war culture, particularly the idealization of women’s role in the domestic sphere and the anxieties and yearnings hidden behind that glossy picture of the happy home, is there anything analogous being written today?

A: Would that these anxieties could disappear entirely! But it’s pretty clear that any day’s headlines shows how far we still have to go. (Case in point: Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In.) I do think it’s why Gone Girl was such a massive hit, and why publishers are now on the hunt for that “next Gone Girl” (best current candidate: ASA Harrison's debut The Silent Wife, just published as I write this, and released more than two months after her premature death from cancer.) Now we have domestic suspense mixed with the anxieties associated with technology, and there's a great deal of terrain to explore there.

I also don’t want to exclude men unduly here; Harlan Coben and Linwood Barclay also write very gripping domestic suspense tales.

Q: At your companion website, domesticsuspense.com, the tagline is “celebrating an overlooked generation of female suspense writers.” Why have they been overlooked? What influence do you think these women writers had, both on the genre and on culture as a whole?

A: The author Tom Bissell wrote an excellent essay for the Boston Review back in 2000 about his time as an assistant editor at Norton, discovering, and then republishing, the work of Paula Fox, and the tremendous responsibility (and related fear) of being responsible for a writer's renaissance. Fate has a tendency to be cruel and quixotic about who merits posthumous recognition and who does not. I feel much the same way about the 14 writers included in TROUBLED DAUGHTERS. So many of them won or were nominated for awards (like the Edgar), sold many thousands of copies, and were well-reviewed. But it's hard not to think that because their subjects were primarily "feminine" and "domestic" they weren't taken as seriously as the men, even though in many cases, the women wrote with less sentimentality and more subtlety.

Some of the writers included in TROUBLED DAUGHTERS, like Patricia Highsmith and Shirley Jackson, may not need my editorial assistance. But looking at Highsmith’s first-published short story "The Heroine" or Jackson's "Louisa, Please Come Home" in the broader context of what was going on over this three-decade period is what's key, as is seeing the importance of domestic concerns to female noir giants like Vera Caspary, Dorothy B. Hughes, and Margaret Millar.

What I really hope is that the anthology allows readers to sample and be introduced to writers who have fallen by the proverbial wayside. Raymond Chandler held up Elisabeth Sanxay Holding up as his equal. Helen Nielsen is something of an enigma to me, but “Don’t Sit Under The Apple Tree” demonstrates the anxiety of being the other woman-turned-new wife and how it never recedes.  Nedra Tyre was both an avid mystery fan  and passionate about social justice and the poor, stemming from a previous life as a social worker; it’s why “A Nice Place to Stay” packs the punch it does. Barbara Callahan never published a novel during her lifetime, but "Lavender Lady", published early in her career, has the sense of depth and feeling of an experienced practitioner of prose and of emotional stakes.

Writer Wednesday: #poetry Book Review: With Apologies to Mick Jagger, Other Gods, and All Women by Jane Rosenberg LaForge

With Apologies to Mick Jagger, Other Gods, and All Women by Jane Rosenberg LaForge

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I've never reviewed poetry before, so when LaForge contacted me asking for a review, I thought I'd give it a shot. I've certainly read and written my share of poetry and then some.

In one of the many poetry classes I was subjected to in college, a wise professor gave me one of the best pieces of advice I've ever been given regarding the writing of poetry, and it has stuck with me to this day. My dear professor said, "You can write the most aesthetically beautiful line in the English language, but if it doesn't make sense, it doesn't work." I wish I could afford to send LaForge to his class for a semester.

Although her poetry is mostly devoid of the flowery language that so often entraps young poets, she stumbles instead on flaunting her own superior intellect. No doubt she has a fine grasp of the English language and all its intricacies, and surely she is as brilliant as she so ardently strives to convince us, (over and over, pounding it in with her convoluted sentences where meaning is smothered, obscured, and at times completely lost), but often the tangential nature of her writing leads us so far into metaphor and memory amid the soliloquy we can't remember what she's trying to say, if anything. See what I did there? Confusing, eh? Think sentences like that, with a lot more big words.

Amid the confusion, you will find a few gems, poems that make sense from start to finish and do not meander on to different topics or flounder in empty, albeit quite intelligent sounding, rhetoric. She has some brilliant insights and quite memorable lines that ring so true as to be breath-taking. It is a pity that instead of staying with the sparse clarity of those lines, she instead chose to wax overly-philosophical or abruptly change tack and end the poem with some handful of lines completely unrelated to the majority of the poem. Too many times I found myself reading and rereading the same lines trying to find some comprehension, or figure out how they related to the poem or what they meant, only to conclude that they meant little (other than that the poet knew many large words and wanted to string as many of them together as possible).

Okay, so maybe I'm just not smart enough to read this kind of poetry. But I really just want to understand what I'm reading, whatever it is. As my wise professor once told me of writing, I believe to be equally true in my own reading experience. It doesn't have to be beautiful. It just has to make sense.



View all my reviews

Book Review & Giveaway: The Concubine's Gift by K. Ford K.

Today's book review is extra special! I'm done reading this fun novel and thought I'd pass it on so someone else could enjoy it, too. Please see details after review for a chance to win a paperback copy of this awesome book. (Only open to US residents. Sorry for any inconvenience!)

When the author of The Concubine’s Gift contacted me asking for a review, I admit I was skeptical. I’m not much of a romance reader. In fact, most romance novels are a huge turn-off for me, because I either despise the arrogant jerk that the heroine inevitably falls in love with, or I find the whole book unbelievably cheesy and trite. However, I hesitantly agreed to read this book when the author sent me a copy, and I’m glad I made an exception from my romance rule for The Concubine’s Gift.

First and foremost, I have to warn readers that this is not your typical romance. In fact, if possible, this is a romance novel but not a love story. I think that’s why I liked it. A lot of romance novels just don’t convince me. I don’t believe the romance. I don’t buy it. There’s too many clichés, too many overused devices (love at first sight? Oh, please. Love triangle? Sigh. A handsome stranger coming to the rescue? Eyeroll). The Concubine’s Gift avoids all these pitfalls and more. If you’re looking for a novel about a beautiful brainless bombshell being swept off her feet by a swarthy swaggering swindler-of-virtue, look elsewhere. Trust me, you’ll find many, many books that are exactly what you’re looking for. They are a dime a dozen. The Concubine’s Gift is something else, something new and refreshing. It’s a sexy novel about, well, sex, as well as self-discovery.
As we watch Bernice come into her own and accept herself, we can cheer for her because she’s just like you and me. She’s not meeting the hottest guy on earth and falling in love with him the moment she lays eyes on him. She’s working and talking to her friends, trying to seduce her reluctant husband and shopping for antiques. It’s one of these antiques that provides the catalyst for the story when Bernice finds a concubine’s magical face powder, which allows her to see the secret to a happy sex life—for those around her.
Some of the sex scenes are glossed over, while others go into minute detail. I never felt frustrated by lack of detail in the former, or overwhelmed with raunchiness in the latter. The author walks the line between sexy and dirty well, never venturing too far into the obscene. Just when you think she might (lesbian threesome? What is this, a frat-guy fantasy?), instead she breezes right through with minimal detail, focusing on the lasting changes resulting from it, and goes on to a more detailed account of another scenario. The sex scenes were creative and varied, some a bit titillating and some matter-of-fact. I found the varying degree of explicitness made for a more interesting, tasteful read and kept it from sinking to the thrusty and porn-like play-by-play of some romances.
The Concubine’s Gift is sexy, straightforward, and sometimes just a bit silly. I don’t know if I would have made it through Bernice’s story if she had been a typical helpless heroine, or even an butt-stomping, wise-cracking badass. No, Bernice is just your ordinary working woman, trying to be proper, worrying about her disapproving mother, estranged brother, ungrateful children, inattentive husband, and sexually free neighbor. And that’s what makes her such an accessible character who we can relate to so well. After all, who hasn’t wondered at some point, when our kids are screaming in the front yard, or we stop ourselves from telling someone what we really think of their kids screaming in the front yard, WHAT WOULD THE NEIGHBORS THINK?!
I enjoyed reading about those neighbors, the town, its founding and history, and the political struggles surrounding the brothel. The townspeople were also entertaining, although most of them are not developed well enough to get a real sense of their personalities. Most of the book has a light tone, which makes it a quick, light read. A few errors in punctuation (frequent missing commas) were scattered throughout, but nothing glaring.
Although I enjoyed the novel, I did find the whole great-sex-will-fix-your-life theme a bit tiresome. I’m not one to discount the importance of sex in a happy marriage, or to say that it’s something we shouldn’t look for in a partner. However, I doubt that having a good sex life is going to make all your problems disappear. It was implied throughout the book, and really pounded home when Bernice sees her teenage daughter taking one of two paths—having adventurous sex with a boy who will break her heart and then leading a happy, fulfilling life afterwards, or missing out on great sex with her high-school sweetheart and going on to lead a stifled life as an uptight, fearful mouse. Although I’m not much for romance novels themselves (I need more going on than two people falling in love), I do believe that romance, like sex, is important in healthy relationships. I think love is important, and that’s one thing missing from this book. Love didn’t seem to factor into most of the stories. They seemed to all suggest that fulfilling your sexual potential will fulfill your life, and love is either unnecessary in the equation or will inevitably follow. And yes, that is the part I didn’t buy. I can swallow the rest, magic makeup included.

Overall, a well-edited and engaging read that I would recommend to romance readers and other adults looking for some fanciful entertainment.


Today, I am pleased to bring to you not only a review, but also a giveaway! I am passing on the copy of The Concubine's Gift that the author was kind enough to provide for review. This is a paperback, the same one I read. It might show a little wear, but it's in great condition. If you want a chance to read the novel, here it is!
Here's how:
Follow my blog (1 entry if you already follow or become a follower), share this on Twitter (+1 entry), Facebook (+1) and Google plus (+1). Blog this or link it to your blog (+2 entries). Any other form of social media sharing adds extra entries. Please leave me a comment letting me know if you've done any of these and I'll drop your name in the hat.
Become a fan of K. Ford K on Goodreads or add this book to your TBR list here! Bonus entry for that, as well.

Read The Superiors free!

Hey all,

I got in on this late, but Smashwords is having their summer sale this month, so for the next week, The Superiors will be free on that site! If you have an ereader, you can download the book for free in any format. Check it out, and all the other great books you can get free this month.

Also, many more books are half off or more, including my second book, The Vigilantes.

Happy reading!

Lena

Blogger Awards

Hey fellow readers!

As many of you know, I spend an inordinate amount of time on Goodreads. My blog is now up for an Independent Book Bloggers award. If you have a Goodreads account, please take a moment to click on the 'VOTE' button on the right side of my blog. There are lots of wonderful blogs up for awards, so make sure to check them out if you  have time. Thanks so much for your support and for reading my blog!

Have a great day.

Read an Ebook Week--Final Day!

It's the final day of Read an e-Book Week!

If you haven't entered to win a free copy of The Vigilantes, this is the last day to do it!

You can earn entries by sharing my books and pages all over the web.

Leave a comment letting me know what you did this week to celebrate. Did you read an ebook? If so, which one? Did you go to smashwords.com to find free books? What did you get?

If you're a writer, did you participate? Did you give stuff away? Join the smashwords promo? Read an ebook yourself?

If you helped me or another author out this week, let me know what you did. Any other ideas to help make indie books more visible? Share that too!

I look forward to hearing from readers, writers, and followers about what you did this week.

Look for the winner of the ARC copy of The Vigilantes coming soon...I still have to tally up entries!

Hope everyone had a great, successful week of e-reading.

Read an Ebook Week (Day 6)

It's almost over! Congrats to the five winner so far!

If you want to win a free ARC hardcopy of The Vigilantes, make sure you check out all my "Read an Ebook Week" posts to see how you can get extra entries! And don't forget to leave links to what you've done so I can give you credit. To enter to win an ebook copy of The Vigilantes, keep reading.

Today is Friday...Follow Friday! Make sure you've followed my blog, Twitter, and liked my Facebook pages (writer and book).

Here's what you can also do: enlist your friends to follow my blog (+3 entries each) and leave a comment telling me you sent them.

Get your friends to like my FB pages and leave a comment telling me you sent them.

Tweet a #FF post with my name in it: @lenahillbrand....every time you post a #FF tweet with my name, +1 entry. Every time you get someone to retweet it, +1 entry. Every time you get one of your followers to follow me, +2 entries (have them let me know who sent them, of course!) Also, share this post on Twitter, the same retweet rule applies!

Additional ways to enter on this next-to-last day of the contest:

Like, share, or add me as a favorite author on Amazon (+3). If you like The Superiors and The Vigilantes, make sure you let me know on amazon (+2 for each).

Pin one of my books on Pinterest (+3).

Add me as a favorite author on Barnes&Noble. FB like The Vigilantes and The Superiors on Barnes&Noble.


The Superiors is free for 2 more days on Smashwords! Pick it up while you can! Add me as a favorite author on Smashwords. FB like The Vigilantes and The Superiors on Smashwords. Share my books on all the social media sites on the right-hand side of the page a few inches below the FB like button.

If you have a Goodreads account: Follow the link to The Superiors and The Vigilantes. Scroll down to the bottom of the righthand column and you'll see where you can share via FB, Twitter, Pinterest and Google. Do that stuff!
Add me as a favorite author.

(For +10 bonus points, take The Superiors quiz if you've already read the book...you don't even have to get the questions right! Post a comment on the quiz letting me know your score).

As always, bonus entries for sharing this post all over the place! Share buttons below!

Read an Ebook Week Day 3 and 4 Giveaway

Have you picked an ebook to read yet?

If you're looking for free books, check out Smashwords.com and find some free books on promotion this week for free or cheap!

If you want to win a free e-copy of The Vigilantes, I'm giving away one every day. If you haven't won yet, try again. I'm also giving away an ARC hardcopy at the end of this week to the person with most entries for the whole week, so keep trying!

If you haven't entered the contest yet, find tons of ways to get extra entries in yesterday's post.

Here are some new ways today: get somoeone to follow my blog (have them leave a comment with your name on this post so I know who sent them) +5 entries.

Go follow me or get someone to follow me on twitter (again, have them send me a tweet with your twitter name) +1.

Like or get someone to like my FB writer page or book page, and get +2 for every like (have them leave a comment so I know who sent them).

Get someone to pin one of my books on Pinterest (+5 each).

Tomorrow I will post a poetry blog as usual. Share it via FB, blog, twitter, Google+1 for additional entries (as always, post a comment letting me know you did those things so I can add your entries to my random drawing).

Read an Ebook Week (#Giveaway) Day 2

Want to win a free copy of The Vigilantes?

Well, you can. I'm giving away one every day this week. Congrats to yesterday's winner!

You can find the first book in the series for free on Smashwords this week: The Superiors.

ALSO, at the end of the week I will be picking the person with the most entries for the whole week (not random selection like the daily winners) to receive a paperback copy of The Vigilantes. So keep coming back and helping me promote this great event to get people reading Ebooks and independent authors!

Today, to win a copy of The Vigilantes, I've added extra chances to win. Here's how:

Like yesterday, share this post via Twitter, FB, Blog, Google+1. One entry per post, +5 for blogging this. Please leave links in the comments section to your posts. Also, if you ask people to retweet, I will check your twitter post and give you an additional two entries for every person who retweets your post or reposts your FB link!

Additional chances to win if you do these things: Add me as a favorite author on Smashwords (under my picture, it will have a list of people who added me as a favorite author. Below that, there's a link that says "add author as favorite." Also, there's a button on the top left that says the same thing. Click on either one to add me (+2 entries).

While you're on my page, click on, The Vigilantes (or follow these links). On the lefthand side of the book page, there are tons of ways to share that book: Twitter, FB like, Stumbledupon, Reddit, Digg, or bookmark on Delicious. If you have one of these, it's a +1 each time. Tomorrow do the same for my other book, The Superiors. And download it for free while you're there!

Happy ereading!

Read an Ebook Week! (#Giveaway)

Hello fellow readers and writers,

In case you didn't know, this week is "Read an Ebook Week." What does that mean?
It means you should read an e-book!

It also means many other exciting things like:
I'm giving away a free ebook of The Vigilantes every day for the rest of the week!

I'll post with new details throughout the week, so check back often and try to win the free copy for that day.

Here's how you can win: Throughout the week, I will post about Read an Ebook Week. When you see those posts, check out what's going on for chances to win. I will add new ways to get extra entries as the week goes on.

Sunday: Go to the bottom of this post and share it on Twitter (+1 entry), Facebook (+1), Google Plus-One (+1), and your blog (+5), or Pin one of my books on Pinterest (+3). Also, if you link my blog to yours (add it to your list of websites) that's +10 entries. Make sure you leave a comment letting me know what you did, with links to your posts & blog. I will message you on Twitter if you win, or you can leave your email address in the comments if you don't have Twitter.

If you don't win a copy, you can still get The Vigilantes for half price on Smashwords.com for the promotion they're having this week. They are having a huge promotion! Tons of books are 25% off, 50% off, 75% off, or FREE. Make sure to go check it out. If you don't have an account, it's free to sign up, and you can download ebooks in any format so they work on whatever digital reader you have.

ANNNNNDDDD...remember how I said a bunch of books are FREE this week? Well....The Superiors is one of them. So, if you win The Vigilantes and you haven't read the first book in the series, you can get it free on Smashwords all week. And if you get The Superiors free and want a great deal on the second book, it's half off.

Check out the site and see what books you can score all week long. Yay for ebooks!

On a personal note, I will finally be finishing an ebook or two that I've been meaning to read for a long time. Look for an ebook review at the end of the week.

One of my favorite authors talks about getting published

I just wanted to send some attention towards Sara Zarr, an edgy YA writer who published her first novel 5 years ago. I've reviewed a couple of her books here on my blog, so I was excited to hear she's posting 5 blogs about her experience writing Story of a Girl.

Her Blog is here.

Cyber Monday!

Alright, well, while I'm at it, I figured I'd keep my book at .99 through the weekend and Cyber Monday. So if you want to find The Superiors for super cheap, go check it out! And look at all the other great deals while you're there, too. I'm pretty excited about the tote bag I found on amazon!