Haunted South Alabama

I've been a little slow in blog posting this week because I have been working on my next History Press Book, Haunted South Alabama.  The journey I take in writing a collection of ghost stories is always interesting.  I begin with an outline I submit with my book proposal package, but as I bury myself in research, I often discover ghost stories are not what I expect them to be.  For example,  all the internet sites and stories I'd heard about the haunting of Space Camp said there was some kind of explosion there that lead to a haunting.  After I went to Space Camp and did my research for Haunted North Alabama, I learned this couldn't have been further from the truth.

With Haunted South Alabama,  I thought I would be focusing on the ghost stories in old forts along the beaches and in Montgomery.    What I've discovered is that there are enough ghost stories in Selma alone to fill a book.  I didn't know much about the history of Selma, Alabama.  It was one of those rural Southern towns I could have passed by entirely without noticing, but now that I've heard its history and learned more about it, it is filled with enough ghost lore to keep me there for weeks.   I've found the ghosts of Bloody Sunday and a wonderful headless lady ghost.  I've found an old mill with dark spirits and the lady who told me these stories is willing to tell me more.  I'm thrilled.   Hopefully, I will be traveling to Selma to collect more stories and I'll be even more busy over the next month or so.   I really can't wait to keep writing, but sadly my book adventures do keep me from the blog.   Hopefully,  I'll have something else to post here soon too. 

A Horror Novel for Halloween!

My first novel was my darkest.   I think I was having a dark night of the soul when I wrote this one.  It was littered with sex, violence, and old gods.  I've changed a lot since I wrote this novel, but the novel itself has remained the same.   My inspiration for this bit of horror was the state hospital where I did my internship, Searcy State Hospital.  As soon as I stepped into this old, battered hospital with its dark history and old ghosts I knew something had to be written about it.  So I wrote Circe.   Even though this was my first book written, Circe is my fourth book to be released.   It was released in ebook format today.   If you read ebooks and you like sex, violence, and old demons that grab hold of the world through the voices of the insane,  this might be a good book for your Halloween reading!

I will be celebrating the release of this book with giveaways and fun once I have all the details!  I'm thinking I should give away something fun for this book like a Cthulhu hand puppet or a collection of Lovecraft short stories, since Lovecraft strongly influenced me when I wrote this book.  What do ya'll think?

Buy Now At:
http://lachesispublishing.com/proddetail.asp?prod=Circe

Haunted Chattanooga

I have spent the last week or so struggling with a lot of drama around this book, but I have to say now that it is in my hand, I can forget the drama.   The book is out and that is all that matters.  My new History Press book, Haunted Chattanooga, was released today and is now available at amazon.com.  The first shipment has arrived at Barnes and Noble and Books a Million and will be shelved soon.   I'm overjoyed.  A lot of work and stress went into this one and I think it is lovely.   I have to confess that much of that loveliness is due to my coauthor, Amy Petulla.    Her chapters introduced me to some amazing new ghost stories.   The chapter on the Black Aggie is particularly riveting.   She certainly knows the dark side of Chattanooga.    Now it's time for me to put my feet up and celebrate.   I'm thinking I may even be bad and have a beer.  Thanks to all of you who supported me through the writing of this book and supported me through last week's drama.  You all were part of making this book possible.

  

Buy Haunted Chattanooga Now!

The Death's Dream Kingdom Free Book Winner!

A few weeks ago, when my book came out in print,  I had a little party. For this party, I said I would give away a free copy of my new book to one of my readers.  I had a few entries and it is time to announce the winner.   In order to select the winner,  I used an ancient selection technique that most of us have been using as long as we can remember.   I used the inny miny miney moe technique and selected Adsila as the winner of the free book!  Adsila is well known for her beautiful blog Above the Norm (http://above-the-norm.blogspot.com/).   I will be popping by her blog to let her know she won today.

Thank you to everyone who entered and thank you to all of my readers and those who have helped me spread the word about my new novel.  You are all wonderful and deserve many more prizes than I can afford to give you. 

My Book is Out in Print!

In all my travelling and craziness, I forgot to announce that my novel, Death's Dream Kingdom, is now out in print.  Death's Dream Kingdom is my first novel and is completely swamped in ghostly lore and otherworldly adventure.  For those of you who have been following me for a while, you've read about this book as I've gone through the many steps to publication.  For me,  this is the most exciting step.  I actually got to hold a copy of the book in my hand.  It just didn't seem real until I held it.   The book came out on Kindle in May, but since I don't own a kindle that seemed vague and out of reach for me.    Hopefully, this will be the first of many haunted novels for me.  I've posted a synopsis and a link to the book below.  Since I already have the cover art up on this blog, I have my favorite image from the book below.    I will be giving away an autographed copy of the book to celebrate!  If you are interested in receiving a copy, let me know below.  I will do a drawing next week to see who gets the free book!

But Death's Dream Kingdom in Print Now!



Cera is an ordinary wife and mother who enjoys the simple things in life, until the night she is murdered. In death, Cera finds herself trapped in a shadow land somewhere between the land of the living and the land of the dead, where demons, ghosts, and old gods roam the streets preying on the living. It is up to Cera to find out why the line between the living and the dead is fading and how the rift between worlds can be mended. Pulled into a quest that takes her to hell and back and into the arms of an ancient, demon lover, she finds that she is a child of the Fates and that she alone can challenge death himself for dominion over his kingdom.

Holy Smoking Monkies I Am Excited! I Have to Give Stuff Away to Celebrate!

When I started blogging last December,   I was just happy to think that someone out there would be reading my stories.  I wasn't overly ambitious about the blog.   I was just happy to have a few people reading my writing.  I never once imagined  someone would like it enough to ask me to write a book.  However,  this is exactly what happened in February of this year.   An editor of the history press asked me to write a Haunted America book for him.  I was, of course, thrilled.  I really had no idea what I was in for, however.  I write fiction.   Nonfiction is an entirely different beast.  I drove all over the state.  I chased people around and struggled to get interviews.   I spent late nights up researching supposed haunted locations to find out if  the stories behind them were true.   Sometimes,  the stories were just legends, which actually just made them more interesting.    It was a journey and I learned more about Alabama history in the 4 months it took me to write this little book than in the fifteen years I'd lived here.

And now here it is.  The book that this blog made is now available for preorder on amazon.  I am dizzy with excitement.   I'm putting together a party and a give away to celebrate.  Keep your eye on this blog!  Over the next week I'll be giving away over $200 in cash and prizes to celebrate my book!   I really am thrilled. 
My blog book is now available for preorder!!!!!!!

Haunted North Alabama Cover Art: The Cover For My First Book

I am travelling and unable to do much on the internet right now.  I'm lost in some kind of twilight zone where the internet no longer exists and cell phone signals are few and far between.   I call this twilight zone the woods.  They are beautiful and I've found many ghost stories, but I won't be able to share anything until I get back home to the real world on Saturday. 

I was, however, able to upload the cover art for my new book today!!!  Yay!   Thank you to the wonderful team at History Press for the wonderful presentation.  Thank you to my editor for his patience with me.  I'm so happy I had to post the cover art today despite having to drive to McDonald's free wi-fi zone to do it.   So here is the cover art for my first book.  I couldn't be happier.

Passing the Beautiful Blogger Award Along to Some of My New Favorite Blogs!

Last Friday, Courtney from Haunt Jaunts stopped by to let me know she’d named Ghost Stories and Haunted Places among one of fifteen other blogs she was passing along a Beautiful Blog Award to.  She had listed many of my favorite blogs in her top 15.  I would like to mention that although they didn't make the list, Para-blog and Above the Norm would have been on my list if Courtney hadn't already grabbed them.    She has a great eye for good blogs and I'm honored to be on her top 15.


THANKS, Courtney!

BEAUTIFUL BLOGGER AWARD RULES

1. Thank the person who gave you this award.
2. Share 7 things about yourself.
3. Pass the award along to 15 bloggers who you have recently discovered and who you think are fantastic!
4. Contact the bloggers you’ve picked and let them know about the award.

15 BLOGS GHOST STORIES AND HAUNTED PLACES PASSES THE BEAUTIFUL BLOG AWARD TO:

1. Labrynthian Creations
2. Magikal Seasons
3. Dark Destinations
4. Beyond the Wire
5. A Haunting We Will Go
6. Poetic Zombie
7. Giardian Diner
8. The Ghost Lounge
9. Zen and the Art of Zombies
10. Frog on a Pumpkin
11. Zombie Zadie
12. Illiteration Nation
13. Court’s Corner
14. Lady Lovecraft
15. Allison Gregg

7 Things About Myself:

1.  I have two books coming out at the end of this year.  Both are ghostly.  One is a Haunted History book and the other is a horror novel set in a haunted institution.

2. During the day,  when I am not writing,  I work on the psychiatric floor of a hospital.  I run psychotherapy groups, do individual therapy, and do intakes. 

3.  I always try to see the best in every situation.  Life is hard and the world can be horrifying, but every tragedy has a ray of light and every dark place hides beauty.   I travel to find this beauty and I work to find this beauty in the most broken and lost of human souls and I hope that I can help these people find the beauty in themselves.

4.  I love the outdoors.  I've hiked most of the Appalachian Trail and I have climbed Mt. Kilimajaro.  I'm a den mother for my's son's cub scout den and I love taking the boys into the woods to hike and discover nature.

5.  I have a lot of pets.  My sister and I breed corgis.  I have two corgis, 1 cat, 1 snake, and 2 frogs.  My sons also fill the house with all kinds of bugs in jars and plastic containers.

6.  I have an interesting family.  My father is Filipino.  My brother is a concert pianist and composer of some repute in the classical music world..My parents spent much of my early childhood travelling from place to place with their band.  My 2 sisters and 1 younger brother grew up  in a boat with my father.  My mother's family has had a haunted house that has been in the family for 150 yrs and her mother had a love affair with a ghost via the ouijia board.  We are a strange lot, but we are never boring. 
7.    I love reading.   I read almost every kind of book,  but my favorite will always be history.  I love historical fiction like Bernard Cornwell and  real history and everything in between.

Long Nights at the Morgue

My husband and I used to spend the night at the morgue.  It wasn't a morbid fascination.  It was an easy part time job.   The job didn't require much.   You just had to be there.   If a body came in when the day staff was gone,  you had to check it in and move it to the freezer.   Many nights, nothing at all happened.   There was a room just for night staff with a little bed and a television with a VCR.  You could lay on the bed, watch TV, and sleep.  The only thing is,  you were alone in the morgue.

My husband has many interesting stories about his nights in the morgue.  He worked there very regularly.  As a med student,  it was only part-time job he had the time to work. He also wanted to be a pathologist for a while.   He spent inumerable night sitting on that crappy little bed with stained sheets in that closet of a room looking out at the door to the freezer.  The nights were long there.  You would try to sleep, but no sleep would come.   It didn't help that every night around midnight,  the fire alarm outside of the freezer where the bodies were kept went off for about five minutes and then suddenly stopped.   It also didn't help that your imagination could absolutely run wild in the confines of that tiny room.

My husband described his worse night at the morgue to me.  It was the night after on of the many hurricanes we got at regular intervals in Mobile.   A body had been found in a flooded out road after the water receeded.  The body was bloated and half rotted and he had to check it in. It smell terrible and he felt sick.   He almost past out.  Several bodies came in that night and the alarm went off one time for each body.

Terrifying Toilet Paper

I can wander cemeteries alone at night and sleep alone in haunted hotels. I can wander through medieval castles in the dark on ground where blood soaked battles have been fought, but I am absolutely terrified of bathrooms. I'm ok if the bathroom has been cleaned recently, but public restrooms can induce panic and I have to keep Clorox wipes in my bathroom to make sure it is sterilized at least 3 times a day.

That is why this is the perfect item of terror for me. My aunt sent me this toilet paper. She saw it in some curio shop in New York and thought of me. This ghostly toilet paper is a horror novel by Japanese Author, Suzuki Koh. The title of the Novel is "The Edge". The wrapping is the cover of the book and when you open it up, each sheet of toilet paper is a page of a terrifying, blood drenched horror novel. Ideally, every time you went to the bathroom you could read a sheet and be gripped with fear right before you wipe and flush. This might serve a cathartic affect. You can toss the terror away after each page.  Unfortunately for me, I can't read Japanese, so all the wonder and horror of this toilet paper novel is entirely lost on me. But the idea of it is wonderful and it will always sit on the back of my toilet reminding me that there is more to fear in my bathroom then my 7 year-old forgetting to flush the toilet.