What time is it? Christmas O'Clock!

A couple of years ago, I sat down to write some of the sequel to Sin.  As usual I had no idea what I was going to write, but I knew Sin would be 'strutting his stuff'.

 

1,000 words later, I discovered I'd written the beginning of a story which came to be titled 'Rudolph Saves Christmas'!  In the story, Rudolph (you’ll never guess) had to save Christmas!  No, really.

 

Anywho.  I have no idea how venturing into the world of an escaped lunatic who kills people with his mind could morph into a children’s Christmas story, but that’s pretty much how I work.  I just write.  I’ve just read an excellent blog post by Connie J. Jasperson, the author of the equally excellent Tower of Bones series on how she’s forcing herself to work to an outline to ensure things happen in her books the way she wants or needs them to.  I wish, sometimes, I could do that.

 

It appears I can’t.  Hence Santa from Sin.

 

I’m a member of the Myrddin Publishing Group and, under their banner, published my anthology Dark Places.  A number of the talented authors from the group, including Connie, have lent those talents to a very seasonal collection, with all of the proceeds going to charity.

 

The collection is called Christmas O’Clock and contains two books and six stories with subjects ranging from Magic Coal, a girl who has to face the North Pole courts to clear her name from the Naughty List and playing Scrooge in a school play.

The charity we’ve chosen is Water for Life, an international project aiming at helping people develop safe and sustainable water sources for their communities.  The charity’s website is www.waterforlife.org.

 

I join forces with such authors as Alison DeLuca, Nicole Antonia Carson, Connie Jasperson, Irene Roth Luvaul and Mary K. Mitchell in the collection, each of whom have successful books in steampunk, fantasy and more.

 

You can find Christmas O’Clock at the following places:

 

Amazon US:

Ebook: http://amzn.to/CoCusE

Print: http://amzn.to/CoCprint

 

Amazon UK:

Ebook: http://amzn.to/CoCukE

Print: http://amzn.to/CoCprintUK

 

Anyone who buys a copy of the book is welcome to a free copy of either Zits’n’Bits or Rudolph Saves Christmas, my own children’s books.  Just contact me through either my website or my Facebook page and leave me a message and I’ll be in touch!

 

 

Kelly Samarah - Expand Your World...

This interview lark can be almost as much fun as the actual hijacking of this blog.  Not only do I get to oust That Shaun Allan bloke from his chair, but I also get to meet people almost as strange as me.  Speaking of which...

 

What’s your name?

Kelly Samarah

 

Hi Kelly.  Where are you from?

Molalla, Oregon, a little logging town nestled in the foothills of the Cascade Range and just a hop away from the Mt. Hood National Forest. I grew up here, moved to Salem, Oregon for ten years, and just came back a little over a year ago. It’s still small and close-knit.

 

Salem?  Did you have roads there, or does everyone fly on broomsticks?  Molalla sounds great.  I’d love to live somewhere like that.  Do you like living there?  If not, where would your favourite place to live be?  Is yes, where would you least like to live?

Some days you love it, other days you want to lock all your doors and pretend every other person who drives by your house really doesn’t know you. I love living in Molalla, so close to the river and the woods, but if I wish my house was further out in the country and not right in the middle of town. I hate being a “town dweller”. When my siblings and I were growing up, we always lived way out in the middle of nowhere, and it’s still hard for me now to be so close to civilization. I don’t suppose that will ever change.

 

When you’re in an asylum, there’s a lot to be said for ‘civilisation’.  If you’re a writer, is this your ‘day job’?

I am a writer, and no, it is not my day job. I still work full time. I never want to think of my writing as my “job”. If ever I am able to make a living off of what I love to do, it would be a dream come true, because writing, for me, isn’t because I want to be famous or become rich. I have stories twisted up inside of me, and I want to share them.

 

Good point.  Writing should be a ‘must’, not a ‘have to’.  Tell me about your latest project.

I will be releasing a book of short horror stories on August 25th, 2013, titled: Beneath the Blood Moon. I love to give people goose bumps. These stories were born from the late night “what-if” conversations commonly held with my son and my brothers. The best story ideas come to me after one of those sessions.

 

I love short story collections like that.  It’s good to be spooked in different ways.  How do you feel about bacon?  A crazy person once said it was the food of the gods.  OK, I admit that person was myself...

Bacon should be at the top of the food pyramid. I especially like it in vanilla fudge at Christmas.

 

Welcome to the asylum!  No, really.  Bacon and vanilla fudge...?  What is your favourite film?

I have to pick just one? Okay, I am a huge eighties movie fan, and my all time favorite is Ferris Buller’s Day Off. I know, cliché, but it really is, with Pretty in Pink running a close second.

 

Good choice.  The 80s are responsible for some of my favourite films.  The Goonies.  Labyrinth.  The Lost Boys.  I could go on and on!  Have you always wanted to be a writer, or is it something you found yourself doing one day?

I always have been a writer. Reading and writing go hand in hand. I am a lover of books. No, let me rephrase that. I am in love with books. In kindergarten I was reading chapter books and getting in trouble for skipping ahead in our reader books. In second grade my teacher made me read all of my short stories aloud in class. Same thing in fourth grade. In junior high I tried my hand at poetry, and discovered I am not a poet. Fast forward to a couple years ago: Life had chewed me up and spit me out. I found myself a single mom, very little money and no future. Writing had been on the back burner for a long time. I decided to go back to school - for Criminal Justice of all things - and took a writing class as an elective. My teacher told me I was cheating myself if I didn’t focus on my love for the craft. I took his words to heart. How do you explain the feeling when you have finally come back to what you were meant to do? Complete? Not a strong enough word, I think. Maybe it’s unexplainable.

 

That’s wonderful!  It’s clearly a real part of you.  Do you have so many ideas they dribble out of your nose if you don’t get them down, or do you have to hunt around the floor and the back of your sofa to find where your Muse is hiding?

I have so many ideas I carry a small notebook around with me. I want to get a voice recorder, but the thought of listening to myself talk to me is unnerving. I would much rather write it down.

 

Phillip, in here, believes that, if he talks to the TV, it answers him back.  Have you ever seen someone argueing with a music video?  If you were in an asylum, what would your particular delusion or psychosis be?

Demons, monsters. I would see them everywhere, but would it really be a delusion? I also think bouts of rage would fall in there somewhere. I can lose myself in my emotions.

 

Well, we have darkness and madness in each of us.  We must do battle with our own demons.  So that Shaun Allan guy tells me.  What genre(s) do you write?

Hmmm, I always hate this question. I write. I lean toward the horrific side of the spectrum, but not always. I have several ideas and story lines brewing from all over the board.

 

I know a guy who writes horror and children’s stories too.  Variety is the spice of life, so they say.  What genres(s) do you read?

A lot of horror, fantasy, and sci-fi. Crime thrillers are starting to interest more as I get older. One genre I just cannot get into is erotica and romance. Just not my thing. I guess I’m too cynical.

 

Cynicism/realism – it’s a fine line.  If these are the same, what attracts you to them.  If they’re different, why do you think that is?

It’s not as simple as I love to be scared. A good horror writer can get into your mind and turn your doubts into beliefs. Think a monster can’t live in your closet? That’s impossible right? Then you read that book and suddenly you’re padlocking your closet door at night.

 

As far as Sci-fi and Fantasy, is the expansion on your world, the idea that there is more than what you see around you. How can someone not love that?

 

I completely agree.  Some things are darker than just the night with the lights out.  Bacon – just cooked or crispy?

Definitely crispy, but not burnt.

 

Too right.  Now you’re in the asylum with me, how do you aim to get out?  Do you have an escape plan?

Kill them all and run.

 

Oh, good luck with that.  You’d probably get a queue of people wanting to shake your hand.  Difficult, though, with your strait jacket on...

Kelly Samarah grew up in a small town located in the Willamette Valley of Oregon. When she isn't busy working on a new story to share with her readers she enjoys cooking, music, painting and of course, reading. She also enjoys spending time with her dog, cat and two children.

An excerpt from The Edge...

....You want to remember? He hisses in my ear. I pull away from him as his face begins to change. His glasses melt into his skin as the color begins to change from a healthy peach glow, to gray, creased with ooze. His eyes become hollowed depths of black, his teeth jagged bits of metal waiting to slice my skin. I am frozen in fear as he wraps his once normal hand - now a gruesome claw - around my head. I scream and try to pull free. Rashelle’s voice reappears, encouraging me. No, Joe…it’s alright…I try to focus on her, but Dr. Gilson - the monster - begins pushing down on my skull. The pain is unbelievable. So white-hot I can’t utter a sound. My body jerks and contorts into positions it shouldn’t be capable of, and I think, This is it, I’m going to die…but she is there again, her voice weaving through the madness…remember…

Blog: www.kellysamarah.com

Facebook:http://facebook.com/kellySKnobf

Buy links:

Smashwords:https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/332184

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Thorns-Glass-Kelly-Samarah/dp/1482622254/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1376311404&sr=8-1&keywords=Thorns+of+Glass

Smashwords:https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/291615

Twitter: @kellysamarah

Enter a Dark Place...

My latest book is Dark Places, a collection of thirteen short stories and thirteen poems, all with a dark theme. I’m not sure why I like to write this type of story, to be honest. I’m generally an upbeat, happy sort of person – too laid back to let things get to me. I’m always making jokes and having a laugh. Perhaps it’s because I write such things? The darkness is vented in my work so there’s only light left?

I doubt it, but it’s a thought. I’m normally a very positive person. I call Sin my ‘Dark Half’, so maybe he’s writing them!

The poems contained therein were, actually, written during a time where I wasn’t so positive. Things weren’t going well in my life and various things prompted various poems. The memory of how I was treated by my natural father. Loves lost. I’m sure everyone has these twilight periods to battle through. I didn’t exactly find solace in the words, but I couldn’t seem to write anything else at the time. The stories are different. I can be at my happiest (as I am now) and still produce a piece with shadows and death. I find poetry to be much more personal and so it reflects how I feel at that moment. With a story, I follow the path of the characters, and they have their own moods unencumbered by my own.

As I’m meant to be working on the sequel to Sin, my Muse thinks it mighty hilarious to put all sorts of other ideas into my head and I need to give them form to clear the mist for Sin to continue with his adventure. Hence, I wrote I Am Death. Like a lot of my work, it grew from just the first sentence. I don’t necessarily have any idea what the story will be as I’m writing. It turns out however it turns out. This happened with Sin and with the majority of his blog posts (he has his own diary at http://singularityspoint.blogspot.com).

I Am Death began with, simply, ‘I think...’ and the result was a tale of Death contemplating life as he prepares to take his next soul. My wife saw a writing competition in one of her magazines and said I should enter. The Last Dance was written for this. It didn’t win, but, when my wife read it, it brought a tear to her eye. A friend of mine told me that, when she was 9, her cousin said the sink overflow was where the dragons went in. I used her exact words for the beginning of ‘There Be Dragons’ without any idea of how it would go.

So, it can take very little to inspire me. I go with the flow, caught up by the current of something I’m not entirely in control of.

The idea of the collection came from a fellow writer. She asked me to look at something she’d written ‘while in a dark place’. I suddenly HAD to write using that title, and the collection came together soon after, with the addition of stories that I couldn’t stop writing. I had the bit between my teeth and was being led along at a real pace. The themes of darkness becoming real, of reality and surreality being intertwined, of the helplessness of being pushed to events you can’t control, were almost a whirlwind of words that were finding an outlet through my fingers.

If you know what I mean...

A friend at work created an original watercolour inspired by the stories, and this is featured in the book. It’s between the contents and the first poem and acts as a doorway to the darkness within.

I had started to write a prequel to Sin, intending it to be nothing but a short. I wanted to include it in Dark Places but was asked ‘what about Joy?’ I was halfway through what was to become Prelude, then, and stopped. They were right. What about Joy? Joy is Sin’s sister, and appears in the book as a ghost – either to help or hinder him. She disappears just when he seems to need her most and is unable to give him real information, so has to resort to guidance that frustrates and angers her brother. Suffering a mirror image of Sin’s ‘talent’, Joy has committed suicide. But what of her origins? I wrote Joy to give her that voice, that chance to tell it from her side.

Fittingly, I think, Joy became the final piece in the collection, a place she deserves.

The reaction to Dark Places has been wonderful, with comments such as: “The descriptive passages create fabulous imagery,” and “The author's portrayal of death could lead you to believe he'd actually experienced it.” I’m hoping it has the same success that Sin has enjoyed but, either way, I sincerely enjoyed creating it.

Dark Places can be found on Amazon at:
US: http://amzn.to/DarkPlacesUSEB
UK: http://amzn.to/DarkPlacesUKEB
And at Smashwords at: http://bit.ly/ShaunAllanSW
And in paperback form at: http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/shaunallan

The ebook and signed copies are available from the bookstore on my website: http://www.shaunallan.co.uk/bookstore.php