A Melancholy Humour by DC Petterson, revised edition

DC Petterson and I go a way back. We've been in writers' groups together, and years ago, when I was still editor over at Lyrical Press, I had the pleasure of working on his first novel-length work, A Melancholy Humour. The wheel turns, and Mr Petterson's rights reverted to him, so when I started working through Crossroad Press, I was overjoyed to have him as one of the select authors with whom I still work.

I've edited two of his novels that occur in the same universe. Lupa Bella, though it was released second, is actually a kind of prequel to A Melancholy Humour. You don't need to read either in any specific order, because each stands on its own. Each tracks Petterson's envisioning of the Good Walkers and the Bad Walkers, the Italian legends of the Benandanti and the Malandanti. Flavoured with werewolves and Italian witches, these stories go to some truly dark places, and hark back to classic-era horror in the style of Stephen King.

And I'm not making the comparison lightly. Petterson is a deeply thought-provoking author whose world is dark, tactile and evocative of something wild that lurks beneath the skin. There's a lot more going on here than you'd expect from the average wolf shifter story.

This time we once again worked with the very talented Milan Colovic, who did the cover art for Lupa Bella initially. We feel he's totally in tune with our vision.

Without further ado, the back cover copy:
Monsters walk the streets of Chicago. So do werewolves. 

Violence swirls around a vulnerable street waif caught between sorcery and madness. Vicious murders on Chicago’s near north side pull Vincent Thiess out of retirement as a police profiler. He must untangle conflicting threads from the Church, the FBI, medieval folklore and his own tortured past. 

Behind the facade of an old Italian neighborhood, do werewolves really prowl? As Vincent struggles to separate reality from nightmare, ancient truths from modern deception, he must protect his family and solve the mystery of the young woman at the center of it all—and keep himself from falling desperately in love.

If this piques your interest, the feel free to add the book on Goodreads, or purchase at Amazon or Smashwords.

Luna's Children: Chuck Miller's 'The Beast'

Today's guest is Chuck Miller, one of the Luna's Children contributors. You can pick up Full Moon Mayhem and Stranger Worlds on Amazon.

We share an excerpt from his story, "The Beast" which Miller says was mainly inspired by the old EC horror comics with the double- and triple-twist endings. Also, the old TV series, The Fugitive.

EXCERPT:

People often ask me whatever became of Count Karl von Magnus, the celebrated monster hunter. I suppose they think I might have special knowledge of his doings, since I come from his home town and he and I are approximately the same age. I always tell them that he passed away quietly at his ancestral home, following a brief and utterly mundane illness.
The truth would be difficult for these people to swallow, and they would most likely spit it back in my face. Were I to reveal that I myself was Count von Magnus, I would not be believed.
My name was not really Karl von Magnus, nor was I ever a count. That was the only cloak of fiction I draped about myself in those days. Everything else about me was authentic. I was a monster hunter-- an extraordinarily gifted one. But the trade, I found out early on, is like many others; one's effectiveness is dependent on one's reputation. An amateur monster-hunter called Johannes Meyer, from a nondescript mountain village, will not inspire as much respect and cooperation as a mysterious Count who hails from everywhere and nowhere, whose origins and abilities are obscured by darkest shadows. 

Biography:
Chuck Miller was born in Ohio, lived in Alabama for many years, and now resides in Norman, Oklahoma, for no real reason. He is a Libra whose interests include monster movies, comic books, music and writing. He holds a BA in creative writing from the University of South Alabama.

He is the creator/writer of Tales of the Black Centipede, The Incredible Adventures of Vionna Valis and Mary Jane Kelly, The Bay Phantom Chronicles, and The Mystic Files of Doctor Unknown Junior. He has also written stories featuring such classic characters as Jill Trent: Science Sleuth, Armless O'Neil, The Griffon, and others.

Miller received the "Best Creeping Dawn: The Rise of the Black Centipede was published in 2011 by Pro Se Press. The second instalment in the Black Centipede series, Blood of the Centipede was published in 2012, and Black Centipede Confidential is slated for release in 2014. Vionna and the Vampires, the first instalment of The Incredible Adventures of Vionna Valis and Mary Jane Kelly, was published earlier in this year.

New Writer of 2011" Award from Pulp Ark. His first novel, the critically acclaimed

Links:
Black Centipede Blog; Amazon.

Full Moon Mayhem with Louise Herring-Jones

Today's visitor is Louise Herring-Jones, whose short story "Gooji" appears in Luna’s Children: Full Moon Mayhem, edited by D. Alan Lewis (Dark Oak Press 2014).

She says: "Several trips to a remote island in Southeastern Alaska inspired me to write a contemporary werewolf story set in some of the last of North America’s wilderness areas. 'Gooji' means 'man-eating wolf' in Tlingit, a native language of SE Alaska. What starts as a joke becomes harsh reality when Gooji, Jake’s hybrid wolf-dog, defends her human from an attack by Skinner, a disreputable sled-dog trainer turned were.'

Excerpt:

Gooji growled and placed her body between Jake and Skinner. The ruff rose on her neck and her tail whipped back and forth in ferocious imitation of her normal happy wag. Skinner, now transformed into a giant yellow wolf, leapt off the porch and charged into Gooji’s chest. The werewolf and wolf-dog met in midair as Gooji jumped away from Jake, her jaws locking with Skinner’s fanged maw.
The pair wrestled, twisting and biting as they rolled over the cleared area in front of the cabin. Jake grabbed a thick branch fallen from a mountain hemlock and jerked from one side of the fight to the other, straining for an opportunity to hit Skinner without hurting Gooji. More yellow than gray brindled fur stood out for an instant. Jake attacked, striking at Skinner’s back with the heavy branch.
The werewolf yelped, releasing Gooji, but sprang at the makeshift weapon. He bit into the branch and held when Jake tried to shake him away. When he finally succeeded, he realized he had made a mistake. Abandoning the branch, Skinner bit deeply into the meat of Jake’s forearm. Jake screamed and tried to loosen the grip, but the fangs locked on, stapled into muscle.

Pick your copy of Luna's Children: Full Moon Mayhem here.

Luna's Children: Introducing MR Williamson

Today's visitor is one of my fellow Luna's Children authors, MR Williamson, who shares that his love for days past most influenced his story in the anthology.

He says: "My father, Russell Tandy Williamson, was raised in Drummonds. The river, and its 'Landings' have a great history there.

"Being a good part Native American (Eastern Shoshone), I like just about any story of American Indians.  One of the best, in my opinion, is 'Last of the Dog Men'.  If you notice this part of the opening story, the young boy (from 'The Dog Men') kicked it off pretty well."

Here's an extract from MR's story...  

Ray started the Chevy, eased off on the clutch, and the old car lurched forward. Two more gears and they were lumbering east on the Richardson Landing Road and away from the paddle wheeler. They had barely turned south on Old Drummonds Road when Gabby quickly sat up.

"Slow down a bit, Ray,” he requested as he pushed his black, horn-rimmed glasses closer to his nose. “There’s somethin’ up ahead a ways. I saw its eyes shine in the lights.”

Just as Ray pressed the bright light button on the floorboard, something darted from the scrub on the left and ran through the beams of their lights.

“Geeeze!” exclaimed Ray as he slammed on the brakes, bringing the Chevy to a sliding stop. “What the devil was that?” he added excitedly.

Gabby, pushing himself away from the dash, exclaimed, “I don’t believe my eyes.” Quickly opening the door, the old riverboat man got out, looked up ahead in the lights, and then back to the hogweed just right of the Chevy. “This one don’t belong to the eyes I saw, Ray. What we almost hit was a young boy, and a naked one to boot.”

Buy Full Moon Mayhem here and Stranger Worlds here.

Bio:
After retiring from ‘Ma Bell’ in the year 1999, I seriously took to the pen.  Through E-Bay and various bookstores, my novel collection, The Pragamore Chronicles, eventually reached more than eight countries.

My poetry has won the Editor’s Choice Awards from the International Library of Poetry in 1999, 2000, and 2002. View from the Easley Place, a short story, is on exhibition at Munford Library. My stories are published in such anthologies as Clockwork Spells and Magical Bells (‘Quest for the Dragon Scale-Kerlak), ParAABnormal (‘Spotter’-Sam’s Dot), Stories in the Ether (‘Shelled’-Nevermet),  ‘Unlikely Friend’ (Sam’s Dot), and ‘Apprentice’ (Sam’s Dot).

Added short story features for 2013 include, ‘Hell’s Gate’ (Seven Star Press), and ‘Phagan’s Shadow’ (WolfSinger).  Coming short stories are ‘Cry Wolf’ with Dark Oak and ‘The Ghost of Queen Anne’s Revenge’ also with Dark Oak.  On the front burners for 2014 (and working with the editors) are the novellas, ‘The Moleskin Cap’ with Terri Pray and her Under the Moon Publishing and ‘The Curse of the Monkey’s Paw’ with Tyree Campbell and his Alban Lake Publishing.

In the works are novellas, ‘In the Shadows of the White Owls (Held by Under the Moon), ‘Bedouin’, ‘The Angel of Holloway’, and ‘Ooze’.

The year 2014 promises to be a ‘One-Of-A-Kind’ for me.  It starts out with the publishing two, novellas, two large short stories, and then sours from there.
Keep reading and I’ll keep writing. . .

MR Williamson can be emailed at mwilli44@comcast.net. See pragamorechronicles.com or Imagicopter.com    

Luna's Children edited by D Alan Lewis

While I’ve been writing quite a bit about magicians and vampires, I haven’t given wolves much time, but this was remedied last year when I saw a call for submissions for Luna’s Children – anthologies featuring werewolves. Now, while I’ve edited a fair amount of fiction involving wolf shifters or werewolves, (See Amy Lee Burgess’s The Wolf Within series and DC Petterson’s Lupa Bella), I’ve been itching to write them myself.

A few of my earlier (and mercifully unpublished) stories involved wolf shifters. One was a female monster hunter who had a raven companion. Oh dear dog it was… Okay, it was fun to write, but looking back now I understand why the thing never sold. The other was set in my Books of Khepera universe and told the story of the tall blond bouncer outside The Event Horizon. Yes, he’s a werewolf, and his name is Viking. (Okay that sounds fecking awful summing it up like that).

And that was the sum and total of my werewolves, until I got round to writing for this anthology. I wanted to do something different. Yes, I know we have wolves in Africa (there’s the recently described Egyptian wolf, in addition to the Ethiopian wolf) but I wanted to write about our “painted wolves” AKA the wild dog. Like their lupine brethren, the African wild dog also runs in packs, but in appearance, they are vastly different. They have large, rounded ears and magnificent mottled markings that give them their name.

In conducting my research, I struck upon the fact that the young females of the pack are driven out to find packs of their own – which provided me with the story seed, and where we join our two sisters and litter mates, who’re headed north until they cross paths with an enigmatic wanderer. What follows is my own imagining of what shifter culture would be like in Africa, and I’ll offer you a small taste here.

A small taste...

“Humans have it so easy,” Mariette said. “I sometimes wish we’d been born dull.”
I whimpered. “Don’t say that.” But my words had no force to them. I’d had the same unworthy thought. I couldn’t imagine life without the thrill of the hunt, going days after prey and running with the pack, thinking, feeling, the world alive around us in crisp detail. “But it would’ve been easier if we’d been boys.” Boys never had to leave the pack once they came of age.
Both of us had been living in denial that this day would come.
“Haai! Look!” Mariette pointed as we passed a figure by the side of the road.
Some dude hitching. She slowed the car and gravel spattered against the undercarriage as we pulled to the side of the road.
“We shouldn’t be picking up hitchhikers,” I said even as she shoved the car into reverse.
“It’s like more than thirty-five fucking degrees Celsius outside, sis, the guy’s boiling. Besides, he looks like no one’s stopped to give him a lift in ages. After all, it’s not like we’ve got anything to fear.”
She had a point, and I shoved my misgivings deep where their muttering wouldn’t bother me. Mariette was older than me by five minutes. I deferred to her on most things. Yet we didn’t need to complicate our lives with someone else’s problems right now. But where the hell had the guy sprung from? Like he’d just materialised out of the heat haze on the tarmac and stepped into our reality.

Do go out and support this worthy project. I think the cover art is simply fabulous. Purchase it at Amazon: Full Moon Mayhem and Stranger Worlds.

Forever Werewolf by Michele Hauf #review

Title: Forever Werewolf: Forever Werewolf/Moon Kissed
Author: Michele Hauf
Publisher: Harlequin, 2012

If stock-standard paranormal romance is your kind of thing, then this two-in-one special featuring the writing of Michelle Hauf will most likely be your cuppa joe.

The first novel, Forever Werewolf, is the story of Trystan, whose mixed race means he’s always been considered an outsider among his own kind – werewolves. With a vampire mother, and a half-vamp/werewolf father, Trystan protests a lot that he’s no “longtooth” as his race is wont to name vampire-kind. Enter Alexis, who’s rare for her breed – a female werewolf. Which basically means she and her sister are cosseted to within an inch of their lives, and there’s no way in hell daddy’s going to let her date someone unsuitable.

And due to his heritage, Trystan is very much unsuitable.

Of course the chemistry between the two is undeniable, even though Alexis pulls a spot of tsundere. Throw in a few dark secrets which create minor obstacles for the characters, and a mystery related to solving the illness of the pack leader’s father, and you’ve got the basics for what’s primarily a heated coming together between the two protagonists.

I’d have liked to have seen a little more depth in the world-building with this one. The setting is very much French/Alpine, yet the characters’ names and outlooks are all very much Americanised, which struck me as a little odd, because this was a prime opportunity to add extra dimension with an international flavour.

Moon Kissed brings the werewolf Severo into the up and until then relatively uneventful life of Bella, who’s passionate about dancing. Severo is very much the loner/alpha type, and Bella’s used to living according to her own terms – so to have this overbearing male insert himself into her world is quite an adjustment, to say the least, and a transition that is anything but smooth.

At times I found Severo’s alpha personality a bit too overbearing, and felt that Bella gave in to his attentions a tad bit too easily. [WARNING] Later, some of the sexual encounters went a bridge too far with my sensibilities when it comes to shifted werewolf-on-human intercourse. The fault most likely lies with the reader, but it honestly *did* make me uncomfortable.

If I have to compare the two books, I can see a definite improvement on Hauf’s early writing compared to her newer offering. A concern that I have with both novels, however, is that they’re a bit light on plot development but have to concede for what they are – erotic paranormal romance – that this in all likelihood wouldn’t provide a stumbling block for the target readership. Hauf has populated her world with a large cast of characters and has clearly put a lot of thought into the rules applying to her supernaturals. At times she could do with a bit more developmental editing but overall delivers a perfectly enjoyable paranormal tale for lovers of perennial favourites – vampires and werewolves.