Roxanne Dent is a full time writer who lives in Haverhill, Massachusetts. She has sold nine novels, including her most recent, The Janus Demon, an urban, paranormal fantasy which is on Amazon in book and e-book form. Roxanne has also sold a number of short horror. Her latest, “Bug Boy,” sold to Great Old Ones Publishing, and will be out this year. In addition to fiction, Ms. Dent has co-written plays with her sister, Karen, produced at the Firehouse Theater in Newburyport MA. Her screenplay, “The Pied Piper” a thriller, won first prize in Fade in Magazine. Check out her blog tour on www.sistersdent.com When did you know you wanted to be a writer? I was always an avid reader. From ten to thirteen I moved to a section of Florida that was very bleak. When I couldn’t get to the library, I would visit the Food Fair and in the book section, I’d read until the manager caught me and threw me out. The next day, I would return and pick up where I left off. During this time, I used to pretend I wrote novels and was on a talk show discussing my latest. I would hold up a thick, Readers Digest Book and make up characters, setting and plot. When I was in high school, my poem, “The Devil’s Disciple,” was accepted into a state-wide anthology and I consciously made up my mind that was what I wanted to do but it wasn’t until years later, when I wrote my first Regency as a Christmas present for my sister Karen, that I began to believe my dream could come true. How did you pick the genre/setting/era you usually write in? I write in all genres. Regencies, Victorian mysteries, Fantasies, Horror, Sci-Fi, YA, and Middle Grade. I love history, particularly English Regencies, and Victorian times. Writing a story that takes place in the past is challenging and fun. I’ve also written Westerns and stories that take place in other countries. Research is not difficult for me and with the advent of the Internet it’s much less time consuming. Through the years, I have collected a lot of information which I place in binders and acquire books on subjects like poisons, famous murders, clothing and customs. I like to dive into the era I’m writing about and feel what it would be like to be alive then. But I am equally comfortable writing about my own era. You write mysteries. Does your inspiration begin with the crime, the detective, the setting, or some other place? That depends. Usually, it begins with either a crime or the detective. The setting usually falls into place after the other two are set. How did you come up with the idea for your story in History and Mystery, Oh My? I had already developed the character of Sarah Wyndom as an older, independent woman detective in the Victorian era in “The Case of the Missing Wife.” The Victorian era was a time of both restriction and budding freedom for women. For the first time, they left home to work in factories, entered professions like nursing, became doctors and owned their own businesses. Sarah Wyndom comes from a privileged background but rejected her role in society to do something she loved. Do you have a favorite historical period you enjoy reading or writing about? Besides the Regency and Victorian periods, I am an avid fan of English mysteries in general whether they take place in the past or present. But I am especially fond of the Medieval Cadfael series, the Sister Fidelma series set in ancient Ireland, and the Navaho mysteries by Tony Hilerman. Cultures and times that are different than mine fascinate me and add to my enjoyment of the mystery. In addition to mysteries, I love reading paranormal fantasy from such authors as Jim Butcher, Charlaine Harris and Kate Daniels. What are you working on now? I just finished “The Haunting of Jemima Nash,” a short story I was invited to write for the John Greenleaf Whittier Museum based on one of his poems. At the moment, I am finishing up a Steampunk story called, “Re-Inventing the Future.” Grey Gate Media which purchased The Twelve Days of Christmas, a Regency novel I wrote, has sadly closed and my next project is to look it over and put it up on Kindle myself or sell it to another house. I am, however, never without projects, including Beyond the Iberian Sea, Book II of The Janus Demon, and The Boy in the Green High Tops, a YA prequel. I’ve written three chapters on another Regency, The Wager, and plan to edit a Victorian mystery, “The Poisoned Pen Murders.” History and Mystery, Oh My! can be purchased in ebook format at Amazon and Smashwords. The print version will come soon.
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Logan Zachary (www.loganzacharydicklit.com) lives in Minneapolis, MN and has over a hundred erotic stories in print. Calendar Boys is a collection of his short stories. Big Bad Wolf is an erotic werewolf mystery set in Northern Minnesota and its sequel GingerDead Man is due out in January 2015. His stories can be found in several collections, including: Beach Bums, Sexy Sailors, Black Fire, Brief Encounters, Biker Boys, Rough Trade and The Spy Who Laid Me. Just so everyone knows, Logan's story in Strangely Funny II has erotic overtones, but it's not X-rated. I'm sure some of you are disappointed by that news. In "Catting Around", a meeting takes place where neither party is what he seems to be at face/fur value. From "Catting Around", by Logan Zachary: I came home late one night from the bar and saw the big tomcat standing by my back step. There was a patch of blood along his right side, a dark crimson/black slash across his yellow tiger-striped body. There was a bare spot on top of his head and a nick was taken out of his left ear, clotted with blood. The night was close, and the day’s heat still radiated off the concrete. My T-shirt and cut offs clung to my skin from my sweat and humidity. “You poor guy”, I said as I saw him. “Are you okay?” I bent down to scratch his neck. The cat arched his muscular back and rubbed up against my hairy leg, sending shivers up my leg, all the way up my spine. What was this strange reaction? I know I didn’t drink much at the bar. I looked up at the moon, almost full but not quite. Two days to go. I could feel my nerves raw under my skin in the moonlight, itching, prickling wherever it touched me. I knew how this poor fellow felt. “Did you need something to eat? Drink?” I dug into my pocket and pulled out my keys. I unlocked the back door, and the cat darted into my house. I grew up with dogs my whole twenty-five years on this earth, and after my camping accident, I haven’t owned a pet. I flipped on the light to check on where my guest ran to. The golden tom sat in the middle of the kitchen looking at the refrigerator. I opened the door and pulled out the bottle of milk and a cold beer. A bowl dried in the rack by the sink, and I poured some milk into it and set it on the floor. The cat raced to the bowl and lapped up the milk. His pink tongue dipped into the cool liquid, and he drank quickly. I opened the cupboard and found a can of tuna and opened it. I tipped it over onto a plate and set the plate next to the bowl. The cat stopped drinking and eyed the pink cylinder of fish. He slowly approached and took a small bite. He looked up at me and gobbled the rest down. I filled a glass with cold water and drank it as I watched the cat eat. I kicked off my shoes and set them by the back door. The tom cat looked over at me as I bent over. He watched me intently. I looked back at him as I lined up my shoes. I could feel my tight shorts cling to my backside and I looked back at the cat. His green eyes glowed in the kitchen light. His pupils dilated. Was he checking me out? I looked underneath him and noticed he was a big old tom. He must know which way I swung. Check out the rest of Logan's story for yourself! Strangely Funny II is now available in print and Kindle formats on Amazon, plus several other e-book formats on Smashwords!
We're also giving away three copies on Goodreads - deadline is August 31st! Anna Taborska is a British filmmaker and horror writer. She has written and directed two short films (Ela and The Sin), two documentaries (My Uprising and A Fragment of Being) and a one-hour television drama (The Rain Has Stopped), which won two awards at the British Film Festival Los Angeles in 2009. Anna also worked on seventeen other films, and was involved in the making of two major BBC television series: Auschwitz: the Nazis and the Final Solution and World War Two behind Closed Doors – Stalin, the Nazis and the West. Anna’s short stories have appeared in various anthologies, including Best New Writing 2011, Best New Werewolf Tales Vol.1, The Best Horror of the Year Volume Four, The Best British Horror 2014 and Year’s Best Weird Fiction Volume One. Anna’s short story "Bagpuss" was an Eric Hoffer Award Honoree, and the screenplay adaptation of her story "Little Pig" was a finalist in the Shriekfest Film Festival Screenplay Competition, 2009. Anna’s debut short story collection, For Those who Dream Monsters, was released by Mortbury Press in 2013, with a novelette collection (working title Bloody Britain) to follow. When did you know you wanted to become a writer? I come from a film-making background. The process of making a film is lengthy. It starts with writing a screenplay and, if funding is not forthcoming, often ends there – with an unproduced screenplay that only a handful of people ever read. While trying to find a producer for my film projects, I started writing horror short stories and, in November 2013, Mortbury Press (home of The Black Books of Horror) published eighteen of them in my first book, For Those who Dream Monsters. How did you pick the genre you write in? The world is a cruel and terrifying place, and, if art is supposed to hold a mirror up to nature, then horror is the art form that does it best. Plotter or pantser? I’m a pantser aspiring to be a plotter. I usually know how my story will begin and end, but my characters often surprise me by doing and saying things that I wasn’t expecting. Usually when I write, I enter what I think of as “the zone”, where I lose time and the words seem to write themselves – that’s my favourite part of the writing experience (I can’t really call it a process, as I frequently don’t have much conscious control over it). I do realise that I need to get my act sorted, take control and start to plot, scheme and outline in a much more orderly fashion. What do you enjoy reading? I enjoy reading any type of horror – particularly short stories by my fellow writers. I love the horror classics too, including those by ladies of horror, such as Mary Shelley and Shirley Jackson. Future plans In terms of future plans, I am working on a screenplay based on a novelette which will hopefully be published next year in my new UK-based collection. The working title is Bloody Britain, but this might change. Anna's contribution to Strangely Funny II, "Dirty Dybbuk", is one of the stories from For Those who Dream Monsters. It's the tale of a straight-laced Jewish girl who is possessed by a spirit with nymphomania. If you like it, check out the rest of the collection. For Those who Dream Monsters is available on Amazon and directly from Mortbury Press in the UK (where you can also view her trailer for it): http://mortburypress.webs.com/forthosewhodreammonsters.htm You can view Anna’s full résumé here: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1245940/, watch her films and book trailers here: http://www.youtube.com/annataborska and learn more about her short stories and screenplays here: http://annataborska.wix.com/horror .
When she reads a good story, my cohort at MAHLLC usually tells me that I should take a look at it. When she read "Bedroom Bureau", though, Gwen told me I should go ahead and send a contract. I did read it, of course, and I saw what she meant. Today, we interview its author, Gwendolyn Kiste. How did you come up with the idea for your story in Strangely Funny II? Just before writing “Bedroom Bureau”, I had watched “The Sentinel”, a 1970s film about a portal to hell. It’s an underrated horror classic, but it’s also very dark. I thought it might be fun to take a similar premise, but inject humor and levity—including a whole lot of silly bureaucracy—to demons arriving in the human realm. Evil spirits aren’t usually sporting passports and making appointments, so the absurdity of the concept appealed to me. Plotter or pantser? I’d like to say plotter all the way, but if I’m being completely honest, my writing incorporates a bit of both. Plotting does help to keep me focused, but I enjoy the spontaneity from just writing on the fly and seeing where it goes. Which author do you most admire, and why? Shirley Jackson. Her ability to perceive darkness in the mundane of everyday life was so astute and ahead of her time. Plus, her language and characters are so richly imagined. I return to “We Have Always Lived in the Castle” again and again just to visit the Blackwood estate. Though there’s nothing overtly supernatural at play, it’s the most darkly magical novel I’ve ever read. I want a best friend like Merricat (though I’d be careful never to take sugar in my tea). Also, if you look into Shirley Jackson’s life, she had to deal with a lot of adversity in her family’s hometown, including injustice not so dissimilar from the townspeople in “The Lottery”. It’s always inspiring to see writers transform their personal hardships into indelible stories. Which place that you haven’t visited would you most like to go? Loch Ness. Although I doubt Nessie would make an appearance, it would be fun to have a picnic there and just watch. You never know! I could get an awesome blurry image! Okay, so you're an author. What do you enjoy reading? Twentieth century horror stories are my favorites. Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, and, of course, Shirley Jackson inspire me every single day. Thanks for talking with us! With parents who married on Halloween and read her Bradbury stories long before she started kindergarten, Gwendolyn Kiste considers horror, fantasy, and all things strange to be her birthright. Her genre editorials appear regularly on sites such as Horror-Movies.ca and Micro-Shock, and she is the resident “weird wanderer” for the travel-centric Wanderlust and Lipstick. With a background in cinema and theatre, she has written and directed several feature-length and short horror films, and her plays have been produced as part of the Big Read, a program of the National Endowment for the Arts. An Ohio native, she currently resides in the wilds of Pennsylvania with her husband, Bill, and cat, McQueen. Check out Gwendolyn's story for yourself in Strangely Funny II, plus twenty other hilarious stories! Strangely Funny II is now available in print and Kindle formats on Amazon, plus several other e-book formats on Smashwords! We're also giving away three copies on Goodreads - deadline is August 31st! Jason Norton is a lifelong fan of comic books, sci-fi and monster-under-your-bed stories. He is a certified personal trainer and massage therapist. When he’s not playing volleyball, he studies wilderness survival skills. Honest. Not even he could make that up. Jason and his wife live in Powhatan, Virginia. He has a son, two cats and two dogs. He prefers the son. His contribution to Strangely Funny II was "Seven Minutes", a tale of young people living in that idyllic time of good music and nutritious food... the Seventies. The story reminded of my own youth, except for the ending. Then again, no one invited me to play Spin the Bottle. I didn't realize there was a low survival rate. When did you know you wanted to become a writer? I've wanted to write ever since I was a kid, but I never pursued it seriously until 2012 (save for some incomplete comic book scripts). When I was six, I wrote a story called "Murder at the Mausoleum" or something to that effect--it was way too macabre for a kid that age, whatever the case. I folded up sheets of white paper and wrote and illustrated the whole thing in pencil. Sadly, it never became a best-seller. Later, one of my friends and I created fictional lab reports about cryptids and unexplained phenomena. Incidentally, I don't think I got a date till my senior year of high school. How did you pick the genre/setting/era you (usually) write in? I am the product of comic book literacy; I'll never be accused of aping Shakespeare, that's for sure .I usually write horror; I have always been a fan of EC's Tales from the Crypt comics and love the dark humor and wicked twists those books were famous for. I do a little sci-fi and pulp as well and am currently working on what I hope will be the first in a series of two-fisted pulp stories in the vein of Doc Savage. How did you come up with the idea for your story in Strangely Funny II? I was washing dishes when the first line hit me. I'm not sure why I was thinking about Spin the Bottle--I definitely had no personal frame of reference for seven minutes in heaven. But once I had that first line, it sort of just took off on its own. The story wasn't written specifically for Strangely Funny II--in fact I wrote it months before the call for submissions was even announced--but I felt like this anthology would be the perfect home for it. I got it in just under the deadline and was amazed that it was accepted. Plotter or pantser? A little of both. Sometimes I have a concept and then work around it. Sometimes I've got the whole thing worked out before I ever sit down at the laptop. And a lot of the time, a first line hits me and I have no idea what I'm going to do after that. But if I think that first line is good enough, I'll do everything I can to work it out. Which author do you most admire, and why? Richard Matheson. He could take ten pages, give you the barest bones of description and detail and haunt you for days, weeks--sometimes years afterward. If you don't believe me, just go read "The Edge" in his Steel anthology. Out of respect for potential young readers, I can't write the phrase that came out of my mouth when I finished that story. Thank you for talking with us! Jason's work has appeared at/in Bewildering Stories, Fiction Vortex, Gothic City Press, Daylight Dims, e-Horror, The Horror Zine, Inner Sins, Dark Moon Digest and Pro Se Productions. He currently has stories awaiting publication at Nightmare Illustrated, Horrified Press, and Pro Se Productions. His story "Creeper" is slated to appear in Angelic Knight Press's upcoming Demon Rum and Other Evil Spirits anthology. Jason Andrew's short fiction has appeared in markets such as Shine: An Anthology of Optimistic SF (Harper Collins), Frontier Cthulhu: Ancient Horrors in the New World (Chaosium), and Coins of Chaos (Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing). In 2011, his story “Moonlight in Scarlet” received an honorable mention in Ellen Datlow’s List for Best Horror of the Year. His most recent project is The Future Embodied: Evolution of the Human Body, a collection that explores how science and technology might alter our bodies in years to come. We host his story, "Victory of the Dark Lord", in Strangely Funny II. It gives the reader a real behind-the-scenes look into the world of sword and sorcery. We would like to give you a behind-the-scenes view of the writer as well. When did you know you wanted to become a writer? There is a legend in my family about that very moment when I was around five years old. I loved to watch the Creature Feature. My grandmother loved Perry Mason. We had a difference of opinion about what to watch on television. She won and so entertained myself by writing a picture story about the werewolf eating Perry Mason and thus canceling the show. It caused a reaction. I never looked back. How did you pick the genre/setting/era you (usually) write in? I tend to wander a lot between genres and settings. I have a special place in my heart for fantasy. I think it was because my first love was The Hobbit. How did you come up with the idea for your story in Strangely Funny II? I always wondered about the secret lives of the comedic sidekick and then a question occurred to me. What if the villain conquered the hero by tricking him into being his best friend? Do you think certain genres lend themselves to a humorous twist? I think you find the funny in things that you love. I tend to write horror so this was a fun twist for me. Plotter or pantser? Typically, I am a plotter, but it is strange to try to plan for humor. Which author do you most admire, and why? Neil Gaiman can do it all and you always know a story he wrote just by the style. Which place that you haven’t visited would you most like to go? I’d love to visit Scotland. One day! Okay, so you're an author. What do you enjoy reading? I read everything from biographies, history books, and novels. I devour anthologies like crazy. Thanks for talking with us! Read "Victory of the Dark Lord" for yourself, along with twenty other amusing tales in Strangely Funny II, now available in print and Kindle on Amazon. It's also available in a wide array of e-book formats on Smashwords. Anyone who's ever read our personal blogs knows that we both like Marian Allen. She has one of the most inventive minds I know, and a sweet personality to boot. She writes fantasy, science fiction, mysteries, and characters that defy genre. Rather than interview her about one of her previous novels, I interviewed my favorite character, Uncle Phineas. This is a special double interview. We are interviewing both Marian Allen and Mr. Sugar, the hero of "Mr. Sugar vs. the Cake Thief". Mr. Sugar is a white Persian cat. To Mr. Sugar: You repelled an alien invasion? Tell us more about that. Did you do it single-pawed? I must give credit where credit is due. I couldn’t have done it without Mrs. DiMarco and the unwitting help of my ex-beloved Stallone. You can read all about it in “Mr. Sugar v the Martians” in Marian Allen’s short story collection, LONNIE, ME AND THE HOUND OF HELL. It wasn’t an invasion, really; they were taking samples. I didn’t mind their taking people, but they started taking cats, and I couldn’t stand for that. To Marian: Your writing skills appear to be cross-genre and species. Very impressive. Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing? Plots are very difficult. There are always so many possible stories, given any situation and any collection of characters, it’s always hard to choose the one that works best. To Marian: What is your current project? Tell us about it. I’m currently working on a couple of short stories. One is a Middle Grade story for the Southern Indiana Writers’ 2014 anthology. In my story, a boy buys and hides a graphic novel of the book of Genesis from the Bible (nudity, violence) in some luggage in the attic, only to come home from school to find his maiden aunt visiting so she can borrow some … you guessed it: luggage. The other is for an upcoming anthology from Three Fates Press with the theme of silver screen monsters. I called dibs on The Creature From The Black Lagoon. I haven’t begun it yet, but I’m looking forward to it. To Mr. Sugar: What makes you so sexy? I think it’s my having been neutered. Sex without procreational responsibility is very liberating. To Marian: Castle or Firefly? Firefly, no question. Young Nathan Fillion, Jayne, six-guns on spaceships, the crew, the ever-present possibility that Simon Tan will get spaced or, alternatively, grow a sense of humor.... To Mr. Sugar: Grumpy Cat or Simon's Cat? Oh, Grumpy Cat, dear! Simon’s Cat cuts much too close to the bone! To Marian: Tell us about Three Fates Press. We began when our former press had to cut back. Several people we knew were being “liberated” from good small presses at the same time, and we had been doing various bits of publishing ourselves, so we said, “Hey, gang! Let’s do a press right here in the barn! Sure, we can do it!” So far, we and our authors are pleased. As you know from starting Mystery and Horror LLC, it takes a while to get going, but we’re on track. We’re presenting our first Author’s Fair on March 1: Saturday, March 1, 2014 4:30pm Big Woods Brewery SR135 North, Nashville, IN This is the first annual Author's Fair to be held at Big Woods Village, hosted by Big Woods Brewery, 3 Fates Press, and Line By Lion Publications. Come, drink great microbrews and sample some wares by micropresses! Special message from Mr. Sugar: Stallone, if you’re reading this, I want you to know I don’t blame you for your disappearance. I understand a cat needs to go where his family takes him. I do wish you had taken the time to tell me they were moving, perhaps to say goodbye, but you didn’t, and that’s that. I do miss you, but that will pass. There are plenty of fish in the sea. Mmm, fish! Excuse me, I think I hear the can opener. Thank you both for visiting with us! "Mr. Sugar vs. the Cake Thief" is featured in Mardi Gras Murder, MAHLLC's latest anthology. Thirteen tales of crime inspired by Mardi Gras - its celebration, traditions, and, of course, the food. Now available in print or Kindle format at Amazon.com! If you are a Kindle Prime member, you can also borrow the book. To learn more about Marian and her wonderful writings, check out her page at MarianAllen.com . Her blog entries are a treat all in themselves. |
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Mystery and Horror, LLC, is an indie press interested in what the name suggests. Contact us at: mysteryandhorrorllc@gmail.com
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