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Blog postLet's just get this out of the way first, shall we? 2021 was mostly a pretty terrible year that many of us will be glad to put in the past.
Understatement of the decade, I know. 2021 was a year of reboots, from Coming 2 America to the new Covid variants. It was a year in which we argued over the sexual proclivities of a cartoon skunk while the company who started that dumpster fire were happy enough to leave characters who were literal rapists in the same film. It was a year where we -
Blog postFriday, November 19th, 2021 marked the release of the final book in the GHOSTLAND Trilogy. Called Infinite, it's over 575 pages long, making it the longest of my novels, and bringing the trilogy's total page count to more than 1500 pages.
I have to admit, I'm both thrilled and sad that Ben Laramie and Lilian Roth's story is over. I grew to love these characters as I wrote about them in the first book, which was why when people started asking "Will there be a sequel?" my firs -
Blog postWIN A WATERPROOF KINDLE PAPERWHITE w/ CUSTOM GHOSTLAND CASE, Preloaded with ALL OF MY EBOOKS + a T-SHIRT OF YOUR CHOICE!
It's Spooky Month, and I thought it would be a great time for a big giveaway. If you follow me on social media or are a site subscriber, you've probably already entered, but if you've just popped by the blog or are reading this from my Amazon dashboard, now's your chance to enter. No purchase necessary, and each entry gives you multiple chances to win!
CLICK -
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Blog postPrologue:
THE FIRST HAUNTED HOUSE
Seattle—1887-1901
The ground was unhallowed long before Oliver Hedgewood stood ankle-deep in muck on the plot of land upon which he intended to build his home. According to local lore, the Duwamish tribe had done battle with a shapeshifting spirit somewhere within these two-and-a-half hectares of scrub and Oregon pine. Oliver had never been one to take tall tales and myth as gospel, no matter how tantalizing, but he did enjoy a good g -
Blog postI'm sorry.
I need to say that, and not just because I'm Canadian and that's something that's ingrained in our DNA. Actually, I'm from Toronto, probably the least apologetic part of Canada. So forget about the Canadian thing. That's not pertinent to this apology.
As an indie author I do practically everything myself, aside from designing the covers (although I've done a few of those, as well). I write the various drafts, paginate, edit, proof, make the various book formats, QC -
Blog postA couple of weeks ago, my wife and I were watching Behind Her Eyes, a miniseries based on the book by Sarah Pinbrough, featuring lucid dreaming and astral projection. At the same time, I had just started reading David Mitchell's Slade House, about psychic "vampires" of a sort who lure their victims into a lucid-dreamlike pocket universe to drain their energy. I was also writing about lucid dreaming and astral projection, in the third and final novel in the Ghostland Trilogy.
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Blog post"Authors, full of evil thoughts, lock up your typewriters." - Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury "I fear for the younger generation of writers," said Kazuo Ishiguro, author of The Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go, in a recent interview with the BBC. "I think I’m in a privileged and relatively protected position because I’m a very established author. I’m the age I am. I have a reputation. Perhaps it’s an illusion but I think I’m protected."
This past wee -
Blog post"How much does it cost to publish a book?"
It's a question that comes up time and again on social media.
I've seen many crowdfunding campaigns for novels over the years seeking (and often receiving) several thousand dollars to produce a single book. I've seen vanity publishers (like ,,these hucksters) claiming it costs upwards of $10K to publish and "launch" a book. I've also read from some successful indie authors who claim to publish their books for absol -
Blog postIt is possible. I've seen it.
You can make a million dollars (or more) selling fiction, good fiction even, on Amazon.
I consistently see many of the same authors in the top 100 in various categories, and the top 100 in the entire Kindle store. You can get there yourself. I've been in multiple Top 100 lists on Amazon throughout my six years in publishing.
The only problem is, you often have to spend a bit of money to get there, whether it's spent on sending out ARCs, va -
Blog postIf you haven't read GHOSTLAND, you might not want to read any further. This excerpt is loaded with spoilers. If you have read GHOSTLAND, this should be a nice refresher for when the book comes out on December 9th, 2020! Preorder set at 99 cents: ,,grab it here.
PROLOGUE: THE TERMINAL MAN Ghostland
April 20th, 2019
Game over, he thought. The entire park was in full meltdown, and the brats had just escaped with that psychiatrist. Now he was broken and probably dying, his -
Blog postRemember in the early 2000s when everyone hated Lars Ulrich for coming out against Napster? Were you one of them? Or did you side with the 300,000 users Metallica outed in their case against the company?
Here's why I ask: file sharing has existed for over two decades now. It's been around almost as long as the lifespan of the cassette tape.
An entire generation has grown up with free access to movies, television and books. They were born into piracy. What I'm saying is that tr -
Blog postThe other day, the horror website Bloody Disgusting posted an article written by one of my favorite horror directors, Mike Flanagan (Doctor Sleep, The Haunting of Hill House), titled ",,Facing Fear in Times of Uncertainty." In it he speaks about how he acclimatized himself to horror movies as a child, the importance of the genre during times of crisis, and how it can help us get through our own legitimate fears.
Reading this brought to mind something I'd been thinking about -
Blog postBefore I get started with all these free and cheap horror links, I have a quick story about an epidemic we went through in Toronto and elsewhere nearly 20 years ago. Feel free to skip it, if you like.
I graduated college for Television Broadcasting the year SARS happened. It was the same year Arnold Schwarzenegger, as governor of CaleeFORnya, tried to terminate the Canadian film and TV industry. With this one-two punch, I ended up working as a baker at Tim Hortons for a year while pla -
Blog postMy parents live in a small island community out on the Georgia Strait. There's a path from their house down to a beach littered with oyster shells from the leases that run just offshore on their side of the island. The steps going down the hill are old and rotten but serviceable.
During one visit I stepped on a stair which was apparently home to a nest of angry wasps. I got stung on my head, my back, my arms and legs before I was able to make it to safety. I guess I had an allergic re -
Blog postWhile plotting the next installments in the Ghostland trilogy, I've been finishing off a complete rewrite of a novel I first wrote back in 2012. This was technically my first completed novel. What writers often call a "trunk novel." The original manuscript is collecting dust in a box in my closet and will hopefully never see the light of day. (Unless someone Go Set a Watchmans me after I'm dead, which is frankly unlikely given that I am no Harper Lee.)
The Midwives was an id -
Blog postOkay, I apologize for that clickbaity title. Of course 3 stars hasn't transposed 5. But I do want to talk about the 3-Star Review and why I generally like them.
This started last week when I received a couple of 3-star reviews for my new novel, Ghostland. Both were great reviews. (Just so I'm not mistaken, I appreciate all of my reviews and the readers who provide them, whether they liked the book or didn't think much of it.) The first of these reviews was critical and made several ex -
Blog postThis is the fourth and final (?) installment of the Rex Garrote Mystery posts. If this is the first you've heard of Rex Garrote, for context read Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.
"People are always asking me if I know Tyler Durden." - Narrator/Jack, Chuck Palahnuik's Fight Club So... who is Rex Garrote?
By now you've heard more than enough about him from me - and if you've been paying attention, you've likely figured out that he's a figment of my imagination. You may also -
Blog postMy first brand-new horror novel in - has it been two years already? - well, however long it's been, the book has finally arrived! GHOSTLAND is finally out today. Short synopsis, "Jurassic Park meets The Shining," or "Jurassic Park but with ghosts." But for those of you requiring more, here's the full synopsis:
1. The SynopsisPeople are dying to get in. The ghosts will kill to get out. Be first in line for the most haunted theme park in the world - GHOSTLAND! Discov -
Blog postIf this is the first you've heard of cult horror author Rex Garrote from me, read this post first, then this one. None of this will make any sense unless you've read the previous posts.
For those of you who've been following along with me as I dig into this bizarre mystery, something extremely interesting happened today on Twitter - where nothing interesting ever happens. *wink wink* I was going about my day when I got tagged in this tweet.
For clarification, @userbits is me. -
Blog postWell, things just got a lot weirder.
This is an update to last week's post, which you should read here before you go any further. Last week I posted about my experiences with the Mandela Effect/false memory phenomenon, specifically in reference to the apparently obscure horror author Rex Garrote, who may or may not exist. I spoke with many of you about it on social media.
Some people thought I was trolling, for obvious reasons - what's another harmless lie to a guy who makes stuff
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