Friday the 13 through St Patrick’s Day Spookathon

If I were a television programming director, I would probably be planning a Friday the 13^th and Leprechaun movie marathon this weekend. Five full days are sandwiched between Friday the 13^th and St. Patrick’s Day, what could be more perfect? Well, I’ll tell you what could be more perfect! My birthday – that’s March 20^th – on the first day of spring, the Vernal Equinox just three days later. Guess what there will be then? A total solar eclipse. Are you creeped out yet?

Trilogy of Terror

Even more perfectly frightening? The fact that I have an In Store Appearance with fellow horror divas Crystal Connor and Lori Titus at the largest horror bookstore on the west coast, Dark Delicacies, on Saturday, March 14^th. That’s right! But that is just the middle of a whole weekend full of fun filled frightening activity for the terrible threesome, the Trilogy of Terror, Crystal Connor, Lori Titus and Sumiko Saulson.

All three of us are black women who write horror. I met Crystal Connor when I interviewed her for 60 Black Women in Horror, but this is the first time we will be meeting in person! I am so excited! I interviewed Sunday, March 15^th.

The three of us will appear at $10 or Less Bookstore for a signing and reading in-store event.

Astroblackness

Friday, March 13th we will be down at Loyola-Marymount for Astroblackness where we will meet our friend Kinitra Brooks for the first time and speak with her about her upcoming scholarly work on black women in horror.  She is also interviewing many women from 60 Black Women in Horror.  I will have a limited number of copies of the book with me, in case you want to pick one up and get it signed by some of the women in it who will in attendance.

Somnalia Release Date

You know what else happens Friday the 13^th? The official release of my book, Somnalia! If you are in LA, you can see me in person for the release, or pick up a copy at Dark Delicacies or $10 or Less. If not, join us online on my Facebook author page for giveaways and fun!

Warmth Giveaway

In honor of the Trilogy of Terror tour this weekend with Crystal Connor and Lori Titus, and the upcoming Re-Release date for “Warmth,” June 18, 2015, I am making the current incarnation of “Warmth” available for FREE from Friday, March 13, 2015 through Tuesday, March 17, 2015!

That’s right! Friday the 13^th through St. Patrick’s Day!

Valjeanne Jeffers is working on re-editing the book right now, and is already three-quarters of the way through. Josh Bisher put together new cover art for Warmth. This is a SNEAK PREVIEW of the re-release that is coming out in June.

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The Trouble with Romance

“Will love conquer all, or is the world’s only salvation a god with an iron fist?”

As February comes to a close, we prepare to leave Black History Month, Women in Horror Month, and the cavalcade of hearts and flowers and an insultingly diminished Greek God, Eros, who you may know as Cupid, behind.

I will spend the last days of February editing Somnalia, the sequel to Happiness and Other Diseases, which incorporates all of these things… even president’s day, as you can see in the story’s back cover blurb:

Turmoil consumes the Underworld when the death of a god leaves a power vacuum. Phobetor, the stern and ambitious god of Nightmares seeks to fill the gap at any cost. Murderous nightmare daemons escape to the mortal realm, placing all of mankind in peril. In the midst of the unrest, star-crossed lovers yearn for one another across the void, one disempowered and bound to the earth, the other trapped in the land of dreams by a grave sacrifice. Will love conquer all, or is the world’s only salvation a god with an iron fist?

The Somnalia series, from which Happiness and Other Diseases was birthed is a dark fantasy with a love story running through it. The transgressive tale of the lovers Flynn and Charlotte is not a romance that can stand on its own outside of the earth-shattering, humanity-threatening activities of Charlotte’s immortal relatives, who include among their ranks the aforementioned (and quite meddlesome) Eros. It is more like the River Lethe that runs through the land of dreams, the Demos Oneiroi.

The river runs through the entire land of dreams and nightmares, and casts its sedating effect on those who are near it, especially those who are in it. It makes them forget. It doesn’t encompass all of the land, though. It is a feature.

Love is like that… a calming feature in a tumultuous world.

The stressing factors present in Charlotte and Flynn’s world are a lot more supernatural than ours, but I think their need to find comfort in one another is something we all can relate to.

Fantasy vs. Reality

I wrote first drafts of all three books in the Somnalia trilogy last year. While I was busy crafting Charlotte and Flynn’s epic romance, and quite a few less-epic little love stories that exist in the Somnalia universe, my own love life was rapidly deteriorating.

Almost as if to rub salt in the wound, a half-dozen elated and certainly well-meaning fans interpreted the emotional depth I imbued my characters with as a reflection of some sort of my real life. My writing teacher at Berkeley City College, Mary Webb, quite frequently reminds students not to assume that the works of their fellow writers are autobiographical. Yet, it is a thing many readers do – presume the characters reflect real events in a writer’s life. That is not necessarily the case. In fiction, quite often these very active figments of a writer’s imagination are just a part of her rich fantasy life.

The glue holding fantasies together is sometimes the longing of the daydreamer. I would think that much would be patently obvious, but apparently it is not. This is not always the case in writing, even romance writing. However, it can be… and lack of fulfillment can certainly be a motivating factor.

I am single now. My relationship, with all of its myriad flaws, came to an end.

Now I am floating around in the flawed world of dating and single life. I am flying past guys who associate creativity with drugs, and dudes who think it’s a good idea to start off a date with a half-ass critique of my half-read novel. I am kicking the dust off my shoes, but I am also pouting because a guy I like won’t commit to seeing me on any specific date or time.

If I am honest about my feelings, a dozen strong women will pound their chests in my general direction and chide me for my silly, girlish notions. I will be told that I am a strong, independent woman and I don’t need all of that hand-holding I crave.

Now I won’t even say “a man” here, because it doesn’t have to be a man, just somebody.

I could be like Val Kilmer portraying Jim Morrison in the movie The Doors, talking large shit like, “I’ll be the poet, and you’ll be my muse.” I could be like David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust, making love to my ego. I could quietly lose touch and run away into the Demos Oneiroi with my imaginary lover, but only for a little while.

There will be no one to rub my feet. Hugs and hand holding will be rationed.

When I wake up, there will be tons of editing left to do.

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The latest Eden Royce writing project is Chose Your Own Horror, what do you think of that?

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www.mochamemoirspresss.com

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Crystal Connor, one of the other women in the compilation of biographies and interviews 60 Black Women in Horror, has put together a signing with myself and fellow horror author Lori Titus that will take place in March, when we are all down here for the AstroBlackness 2 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Expo over at at Loyola Marymount University…March 12-13, 2015.

We will be signing at Dark Delicacies, 3512 West Magnolia Boulevard in Burbank on Saturday, March 14 at 2pm.

We also have a reading the following day, Sunday, March 15, at $10 or Less Bookstore. 9054 Tampa Avenue, Northridge, CA 91324 at 5pm – 7pm..

The sequel to Happiness and Other Diseases, Somnalia, comes out March 12 so I will read from it at this event.

Somnalia: Turmoil consumes the Underworld when the death of a god leaves a power vacuum. Phobetor, the stern and ambitious god of Nightmares seeks to fill the gap at any cost. Murderous nightmare daemons escape to the mortal realm, placing all of mankind in peril. In the midst of the unrest, star-crossed lovers yearn for one another across the void, one disempowered and bound to the earth, the other trapped in the land of dreams by a grave sacrifice. Will love conquer all, or will earth’s salvation come with an iron fist?

Lori Titus is from Los Angeles, and started writing stories when she was nine. Titus never stopped writing, but it was a hobby, and pretty much a secret of hers for a lot of years. Titus started submitting short stories, and quite a few of them got published. One editor wrote her back about a short story that she had written for his site, wanting to know if she would like to serialize it. The serial eventually became the basis for her first novel, Hunting in Closed Spaces, about a young girl named Marradith with extraordinary powers.

These days she is always in the process of writing or editing projects, if not both. Titus has always loved horror, but also enjoys paranormal (anything with psychics, telepathy, telekinesis, etc.). Her mother and sister were both horror fans, so she credits them with her early love of anything frightening or outside the realm of the ordinary.

“We used to say that books and movies were supposed to be an escape, so why watch or read something without a sense of imagination?”

http://flashesinthedark.com/2009/01/21/hunting-in-closed-spaces-by-lori-titus/

Washington State native, Crystal Connor loves anything to do with monsters, bad guys (as in evil-geniuses & super-villains.  Not ‘those’ kind her mother warned her about), rogue scientific experiments, jewelry, sky-high high-heeled shoes & unreasonably priced handbags.

When she’s not terrorizing readers she reviews indie horror and science fiction films for both her personal blog and HorrorAddicts.net

She is also considering changing her professional title to dramatization specialist because it so much more theatrical than being a mere drama queen. The End is Now is the 5th book that has been unleashed by Connor’s awarding winning imagination.

Download your free copy of …And They All Lived Happily Ever After! audiobook and see why the name Crystal Connor has become “A Trusted Name in Terror!”

http://podiobooks.com/title/and-they-all-lived-happily-ever-after/

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This has been a busy week. I am in Los Angeles, both because I had a book tour stop at $10 or Less Bookstore in Northridge, California – and because I needed to finish the work I started back in November in terms of setting up distribution for Happiness and Other Diseases (and 60 Black Women in Horror)…

As of this writing, Happiness and Other Diseases is being carried at both BookSoup located at 8818 Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, CA and Small World Books, located at 1407 Ocean Front Walk on the Venice Beach Boardwalk in Venice, CA.

Small World Books also carries 60 Black Women in Horror.

Speaking of 60 Black Women in Horror, Crystal Connor, one of the other women in the compilation of biographies and interviews thus titled, has put together a reading with myself and fellow horror author Lori Titus that will take place in March, when we are all down here for the AstroBlackness 2 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Expo over at at Loyola Marymount University…March 12-13, 2015.

We will be reading at Dark Delicacies, 3512 West Magnolia Boulevard in Burbank on Saturday, March 14.

The sequel to Happiness and Other Diseases, Somnalia, comes out March 12 so I will read from it at this event.

Somnalia:

Turmoil consumes the Underworld when the death of a god leaves a power vacuum. Phobetor, the stern and ambitious god of Nightmares seeks to fill the gap at any cost. Murderous nightmare daemons escape to the mortal realm, placing all of mankind in peril. In the midst of the unrest, star-crossed lovers yearn for one another across the void, one disempowered and bound to the earth, the other trapped in the land of dreams by a grave sacrifice. Will love conquer all, or will earth’s salvation come with an iron fist?

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Live Appearance in Northridge, CA Jan 9, 2015.

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Putting all the cards in your sweet little hands

Committing the lines of your face into memory

Waiting as women are wont to do

Woefully willingly wanting you

To hold you, to touch you

To pay the cost, knowing

Time is a tapestry of love and loss

There is nothing in me that can make you mean less

Or diminish your perfection in memory

Carve your name into my old weary heart

Love is a game made of risk and false starts

You half-change your mind as you walk out my door

I fear that I’ll never see you again

You hold me and kiss me and promise me more

But love is a game and you don’t always win

Sometimes we just can’t make a thing work out

You hesitate, I hesitate… we both have our doubts

In search of a certainty we’ll never know

Having you, holding you and letting you go

I still remember how you gave yourself to me

Generously and completely

Leaving me tenderly with kisses and promises

You just couldn’t keep

Weeping incessantly, eyes swollen shut

Grasping and reaching for I don’t know what

I am a fool

I am your fool, indeed

I don’t want you to leave

And I want to believe

But love is a game of holding

And letting go

Sometimes these things happen

Quickly and sequence

Now if letting you go

Is the best I can do

I just want you to know

This is me

Loving you

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Sometimes I wonder if I made a mistake by pulling it all out and writing it down in the first place. I wonder if I would have been better off leaving all of my girlish notions about what love is in the back of a drawer full of dusty things that you know you’ve grown too old for.

But we do what we do when we deconstruct and reconstruct all of our cumulative life experiences and all of the things we’ve read and seen, the stories we were told, and who we believed we could be when we were still young and the world hadn’t broken our hearts.

Those of us do who write.

We do these things to construct a character.

So you find yourself opening some locked-away room in the back of your mind and bringing out dozens of old photos of love and loss you’ve kept hidden in some musty chest in your cerebral attic. You remember some person you used to be, some passionate person who was so easily affectionate and so entirely unafraid. Then you wonder if you are still that girl. And you wonder what you can do to protect that girl from becoming a dusty old woman who makes safe choices and is afraid to dream.

You wonder where the intersection is between staying safe and dancing barefoot in an empty street skating around the detritus left behind by easy lovers and broken glass, the shattered remains of empty beer bottles and boys that you loved who are now just friends. And boys you loved that you hate now. And boys who became men, sometime long after you kicked them out of bed. And you wonder, could it have ever been different?

But then you look in the mirror, and you know that you’ve spent too long in your worlds. You’ve spent too long with your own words. Now you find yourself alone, holding your own hand. You have finally arrived, to save yourself. To love yourself. To comfort yourself. To reassure your body that you still do and always will love her, and remind her you will probably be the last lover she ever knows. You listen to your stories, and you laugh at your jokes.

This goes back and forth for sometime, until you’ve written a book. It’s a love story you told yourself. You cry when you crawl back out of your world, and you enter the everyday world where you are no one special. You are not its writer, and you do not solely determine its outcomes.

And you’re falling, and you’re hoping, and praying, you’ll land somewhere. Somewhere soft, with a friend.. who knows, and understands.

And you wake up so grateful for both of your fans.

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