Tip O'Day #460 - Break Out of Your Funk

Guest blogger John Grover on "Finding Inspiration and Keeping the Spark."

For about twenty-five years, I’ve been having a love affair with writing horror. I’ve been writing for as long as I could hold a pen but I really took it seriously around the age of eighteen and wrote my first serious horror story. After that I wrote a novel. The short story was picked up by a magazine that went out of business soon after and the novel still sits in my closet, unpublished. Did that stop me from writing? Not in the least!

I love writing. It’s part of who I am; it makes me infinitely happy and I’ve written horror since I was able to read the likes of Mary Shelly, Bram Stoker, Edgar Allen Poe, Shirley Jackson and H.P. Lovecraft. I never have a lack of ideas or the ever-growing list of projects but sometimes I discover that what I truly lack is time and energy.

There never seems to be enough time to write everything I want and there are days when I’m just too tired to care, too tired to put in the time and think to myself where did that young guy go that wrote every single day no matter what?

He is still there. He just needs a little inspiration, something to keep the spark alive. There was a day not too long ago where I was about to embark on a new project, a new book series about the supernatural and I sat stared at a blank computer screen. Nothing would come. There was no desire, no energy, no spark. I knew right there that I was in a funk. I wanted to write. I loved the idea of the story and its characters but I just couldn’t.

So I turned to what I loved most about writing my favorite genres and getting lost in their worlds. I took a break and read horror books and horror stories, read my peers online, put in my favorite horror DVDs, browsed horror art online, and immersed myself again in the passion and emotion of my genre.

I was carried away by words, by sight, by sound, riveted by the emotions these things stirred, no longer reading or watching but becoming a part of it. This was what I wanted to give my readers, but not just that. This was what I wanted to give myself. I broke out of my funk and wrote that book and fell in love with my characters. I think it’s one of my better books. This is the kind of inspiration I try to surround myself with every day.

When I write and get involved in the world of my story, I get into the feeling that I am trying to inspire. I collect horror and fantasy art, scouring all around the net for the frightening, the macabre, the gothic, the wondrous and I keep it in a folder on my desk, like an artist does with swipes from magazines and books. I use them as screensavers and wallpaper and I take them out to get into the mood and to add a visual to the story I might be writing. It really helps me flesh out plots, characters and entire worlds.

Not only do I collect inspirational art but I listen to music in my genre, ambient sound, creepy movie themes, gothic bands and so on. I collect movies and TV shows and have them running in the background as I write. I put my favorite authors in stacks of books beside me on the table. All of these things inspire me every day and sometimes I feel like I never left my childhood and the little boy who told stories in books made of construction paper that were bound together by some staples.

So whenever you may feel like you just don’t want to write or that you’re burnt out or in a funk, take a break, recharge and do what you did when you were young, do what it was that drew you to writing in the first place. Reread that classic book you read in school, put on that music that gave you the best feeling when you finished writing that masterpiece. These things keep that spark alive and keep those creative juices flowing.

You never know when those things may inspire your current project or inspire you to give something different or unique to your readers. Ever thought of including a recommended play list in one of your books — a list of songs that would go perfect with your book that your reader could download? Or how about interior art to go with your fantasy book, concept art that you can keep on your desktop or share on your social media? Cover art that could be made into t-shirts, bookmarks, coffee mugs or some multimedia in your eBook — book trailers, video clues to a murder mystery or sound bites.

Whatever it is you write try to find a little inspiration every day and you’ll keep that creative spark alive and your writing fun.

John Glover is a horror, fantasy and sci-fi author from Massachusetts. He’s been published in various magazine and anthologies and has a few horror novels out on Amazon. His most recent horror novel, The Fetch, was released last month. For more information, check out www.shadowtales.com.

Tip O'Day #455 - The Scary Part about Horror Films

Guest blogger Michael Laimo on how to land a movie deal.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve been involved in getting two of my novels filmed as NBC/Chiller original films. The number one question I am being asked right now is, “How did you do it?”

In a nutshell, I pretty much tell everyone, “I got lucky.” There’s a lot of truth to that. To be honest, I also like to think that I told the right story, and hooked up with the right producer at the right time. Yes, there was a bit of luck, but there were many other factors involved in this success.

It all started with an email from Synthetic Cinema’s executive producer, Andrew Gernhard. It was a basic ‘hello’ letter asking me if my novel Deep in the Darkness was available for option. At the time, it had been optioned three times, and was in the middle of a one-year agreement with independent filmmaker Jeven Dovey. Some of you know that Mr. Dovey had filmed my short story 1-800-Suicide, and was looking to film a feature. He loved Deep in the Darkness, and gave it a stab. Since I could not give Mr. Gernhard the rights to that, I asked if he’d be interested in either The Demonologist, or Dead Souls. I’d also asked him how he came across my work, and he told me someone in his crew recommended me. (Thank you Jason!). Andrew optioned three of my books, and pitched them to Chiller, who at the time was just getting into original films.

Then I waited. And waited. Almost a year passed before I heard back. Chiller decided to go with Steve Niles’ Remains. I had been the runner up with Dead Souls. It was a great honor to have been in the running, but I was equally disappointed.

But…Chiller still liked the story in Dead Souls and the option was renewed. A year later, I discovered (months after Chiller gave Dead Souls the green light), that it would become a Chiller original film. As a matter of fact, mere weeks after being told the good news, I was on set filming my cameo. In the meantime, the option lapsed on Deep in the Darkness, and I went to Synthetic Cinema to see if there was still interest. Apparently there was, because while on the Dead Souls set, I was told that DITD was in the running. That was a GREAT week!

Fast forward to the night of the Dead Souls premiere — I had about 30 close friends and family at my home, all geared up to watch the movie. A text came in from Andrew Gernhard telling me that DITD had been green lit. Another spectacular night! So now, it’s a year after the filming of DITD, and I await all the post-production goodies, like the film’s poster, the trailer, etc. It will be a fun ride leading up to DITD’s premiere in May 2014, this time in theaters.

Many of you have asked…will there be more? The answer to that is MAYBE. There are some irons in the fire, but nothing set in stone yet. In the meantime, pick up a copy of Dead Souls on DVD, or read Deep in the Darkness while you wait for the film’s release.

As a reviewer of one of Michael Laimo's books put it, his writing is not the place to find rainbows and unicorns. Learn more about this horror author at www.laimo.com.

Tip O'Day #445 - Ignore the Rules

Guest blogger Franz McLaren on “I write wrong.”

Over the years I have been told by English teachers, grammar teachers and a smattering of writing instructors that I should outline, I should write proper sentences, I should never use contractions, and so on. I listened, I learned, I wrote as I was told, and I produced dozens of stories that bored everyone who read them. Friends and family delicately suggested I should seek another career.

That is when desperation set in. Another career? I already had a day job that writing was supposed to free me from. Was I supposed to change my dreams and find something, anything, which gave me as much pleasure as writing?

However, the truth was, writing had become a chore. I did it because I had to. For as long as I can remember, writing was what I wanted to do.

In frustration I sat and wrote without thinking about rules, word patterns or structure. I let my mind wander and fingers pluck keys as they chose. A few hours later I had the rough draft of a story that I liked. I liked it because it was a story only I knew, one that I told myself as I was writing, one that carried a small part of my soul.

When I started that tale, I had no idea what I would write. I had not tried to outline. I did not know my characters or setting. I just wrote a story I wanted to hear.

Did I dare let others read this stuff? Should I put a bit of me out there and risk ridicule? Not yet.

I wrote a few more stories, each without knowing anything about them before I started and each revealing a little more about me than I felt comfortable with. Eventually, people noticed I was spending time at the keyboard not game related. Tentatively, I presented one of my new stories to a friend.

After a few comments about how it was unusual and they would not have phrased this passage that way, this reader asked whether I had any others. No trumpets blared from heaven, no pompoms were waved by ecstatic cheerleaders but in that instant, I knew I really was a writer.

Years later I sat down to write my first novel. I intended it to be a horror. How did I know that, since I had no idea what it was going to be about? Because, every short story I wrote was horror. Obviously I have a dark soul seeking release through writing.

Only the story did not cooperate. In a few chapters, my characters found themselves in a land of fantasy. My fingers put them there, but the characters were dictating the story. It felt as if I was coming home. I was finally in lands I had never seen, having adventures I could not have conceived.

I have been a fantasy writer since. I have business cards that say so and hundreds of fan letters that tell me I am not the only person who needs visions of other worlds.

When I finished the first book of the Clarion of Destiny series, my sons asked to see the outline. I decided enough time had passed since I gave up trying to write right that maybe I should give structure another try. I managed to produce fifteen lines that roughly represented the first book and wrote, "Leena has adventures on the way to the castle," as line sixteen. Then I was stumped. I had no idea what I should add next. The outline ended there. Seven books and more than 500,000 words later, Leena made it.

Not once during the writing of the series did I fire up the keyboard with an inkling of what I would write. Each day I spent time in Leena's world, learning as she learned and feeling as she felt. Each day she told me a new portion of the story.

I am writing a new serial character now and learning more about him and his exotic worlds daily. I do not know in-depth biographies of my characters. I do not have an outline. I do not choose the rhythms of their words. I should. Hundreds of books and articles tell me these things are necessary. However, when I tried to follow their advice I failed.

I know now that I write best when I write wrong.

You can learn more about fantasy author Franz McLaren at his website or on his Amazon author page.

Tip O'Day #420 - Don't Wimp Out

Guest blogger Jeff Mariotte on keeping in shape.

You write with your writing muscles.

Like any other muscles, you've got to use them, exercise them, keep them in shape. If you let them atrophy, they won't be there when you need them. If you take care of them and work them out regularly, they will.

So write.

A lot.

It doesn't necessarily make writing any easier, but it almost invariably makes your hard work turn into something better.

Jeff Mariotte has written over 45 novels and numerous comic books, mostly in the supernatural thriller, horror, western and suspense thriller genres, as well as nonfiction works about serial killers, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the like. You can find the paperback of supernatural thriller Season of the Wolf here.

Tip O'Day #411 - Where's the NF Horror?

Guest blogger Anthony Servante visits from the Servante of Darkness blog to discuss “The Flowering Roots of Horror: Criticism and Creativity."

Ann Radcliffe was the first to argue that horror was not the object of the gothic novel (she wrote six of them and is considered the Mother of the Gothic form), that terror was the dutiful aim of such literature. When the gothic stories became gruesome and sensational (circa early 1800s), Radcliffe dropped out of the writing scene and her work “On the Supernatural in Poetry” was her last published critique of the romanticization of her beloved story form. To find any other literary criticism of horror, we’d have to look back as far as the Ancient Greeks, who argued that “horror vacui” was “a fear of empty spaces.” Thus artwork of the grotesque crowds every single space of the canvas with images, from the works of Dadd to Bosch to Crumb (and even Mad Magazine movie parodies where each caption is filled to capacity with absurd and sometimes horrific pictures and characters that backdrop the main characters of the movie being ridiculed).

Today, however, there is no longer any criticism of horror as art or literature. What I have been trying to do for the past few years under the pseudonym Anthony Servante (especially under the Servante of Darkness moniker) is to revive this critical spotlight on works of horror that meet the criterion established by critics of old and guide readers to new critiques of art, whether in horror, science fiction, fantasy, noir, or gothic forms.

While most writers veer toward fiction and fame, very few choose nonfiction in a field rich such genres as the supernatural, mystery, suspense, thrillers and, of course, gothics. As an academician, I specialize in works of the grotesque in art and literature, concentrating on German and English Romanticism. My interest extends to the Victorian Age because it spawned many a great monster (Dracula, Invisible Man, War of the Worlds, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Dorian Gray). As a reader, I peruse the monsters of today from new and old talents in film, art, and books. One day I decided to bring my academic writing to bear on my current readings. I decided to review today’s books the same way I critique the old literature. The only difference is that I don the Servante of Darkness garb for my reviews, but the result is still the same. I’ve had a hoot since I’ve been writing about the new wave in the grotesque.

I have followed the current trend in the Zombie Apocalypse and have interviewed authors on their views on the longevity of the genre. I have followed “cybernocturalism,” the self-publishing avalanche of horror eBooks. Some books are instant classics, while others are just plain bad, and the chasm between the two grows with no end in sight. The literature of Noir is being kept alive in the creative mind of Trent Zelazny. The Southern Gothic is alive and well with Ray Garton. Historic horror maestro Mark Rainey adds a dash of education to his works. Literature of the Absurd is modernized in the works of Gina Ranalli. The Weird Western, a new but important form of horror, has sustained new life with authors such as Ed Erdelac and Ian Rogers.

G.N. Braun has taken horror in a new direction with his work “Hammered” and my review of his book remains one of the top five read articles on my blog. The top three pieces in the Servante of Darkness are interviews with three rock legends: Roger Hodgson, the voice of Supertramp; Dave Lambert, guitarist and vocalist of Strawbs; and Tom Toomey, guitarist for The Zombies. That’s saying a lot about the staying power of Braun’s nonfictional biographic work.

Which brings us back to the lack of nonfiction writers in the field of horror and its neighboring genres. You don’t need to be a professor of literature to write a review or to point out a new trend. You simply need an opinion and a voice. There are plenty of avenues to get your opinion read: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Goodreads, and so on.

Radcliffe would be proud that her view of terror is still being written about and critiqued, and that the gothic form lives on today in literature and even music and cinema. Even the horror vacui continues in the work of Park Cooper and Barbara-Lien Cooper. It’s a brave new world for horror. And it’s a braver new world for those who write about its branches and growth. I am proud to be amongst them.

Check out this writer at Servante of Darkness blog found at http://servanteofdarkness.blogspot.com/

Tip O'Day #386 - Complex Plot Lines

Guest blogger Cynthia Richards on “Keeping all the Wiggling Worms Straight.”

I love complicated stories with twists and turns weaving intricate patterns of clues or deception. These are the stories that keep me up until midnight, turning page after page. Tracking each strand of intrigue or character sub-plot in the writer's mind, however, can be as difficult as sorting worms in a bucket. How can an author make certain their character A isn't racing in his speed boat to rescue the scientist while in character B's point of view, character A is giving a lecture on physics at the same time?

I turn to my experience as a software developer. Computer code, depending on the software application, can be extremely complex. To keep the functionality straight in their minds, developers turn to a process called "Flow Charting." They use graphic representations of each step their code goes through to get from point A to point B. Sound difficult? It's actually very simple.

A writer can follow this same process with pen and paper. Start with the protagonist's story line. Draw a box and write a brief summary of the scene or event with the perspective of how it impacts your protagonist. Do the same thing with each scene, tying them together with arrows beginning with the first box (scene or event) to the last box. Voila! You have created a flow chart for your plot. If you’re using more than one character point of view, then do the same thing with the next character's storyline. Try printing out the flow charts for all your character story lines and comparing them. I've discovered quite a few plot holes I would have missed otherwise.

Paper and pencil work just fine as you’re flow charting, but if you'd rather save your work in e-copy, there are software tools available. I recommend Open Office, because it's easy to use and it's free (big plus). Having an e-copy version comes in handy when you’re writing your synopsis. The major plot points have already been written. You’ll just need to copy/paste into Word and then freshen up the language.

A co-author of horror and urban fantasy novels, Cynthia’s first solo fiction project is scheduled for release in 2013. Learn more at her website.

Tip O'Day #342 - One Hell of a Ride

Guest blogger Michael McCarty on a writer’s journey.

My advice for beginning writers looking at getting their first novel published: hang tough, it’s one hell of a ride.

An author’s first book is like a first kiss – something you’ll never forgot as long as you live. After having nearly twenty books published, my first book still has a special place in my heart. It was Giants of the Genre published in 2003 by Wildside Press.

The story doesn’t really start here; it starts about a decade before that, in 1993. That’s the year I had my first national sale, an interview with Frederik Pohl in Starlog Magazine. Around the same time, I had started to send out query letters for a vampire novel called Liquid Diet: A Vampire Satire. Nobody seemed that interested in the novel. The suits at the publishing companies were saying, “Nobody is interested in vampires anymore.” And I would say, “Vampire fiction has been popular for over 100 years.” A decade later True Blood, Twilight and The Vampire Diaries would prove the editors wrong.

I would continue to do interviews with such genre writers as Ray Bradbury, P.D. Cacek, J.N. Williamson, and Charlee Jacob for various national and international magazines including Writer’s Block in Canada, The Zone in England and Dead of Night (where I was a contributing editor) in the United States. Strangely, I felt I was on a world conquest, but it was a humbling one to see my words spread to the different corners of the world and I hadn’t even left the United States my entire life. I interviewed Dean Koontz for a men’s magazine and received a four-figure check – I am still amazed at making that kind of money from a single article.

Near the end of the decade, Brian Keene approached me as being a contributing editor for a new internet magazine called Jobs in Hell. At the time, I was writing for another internet magazine, called Hellnotes. I kept writing Liquid Diet and finished the book in 1999. I still hadn’t found a publisher. I was so busy doing interviews I hadn’t spent much time querying the book.

The twentieth century soon became the twenty-first century and I had my first big break. There was this website called Science Fiction Weekly, which was the official website of the Sci Fi Channel. It was edited by Scott Edelman. After interviewing Neil Gaiman, I became a staff writer. For the next couple of years I interviewed more giants of the genre. Between interviewing people for Science Fiction Weekly, I continued sending my vampire novel to different publishers. I was starting to get frustrated and depressed. My goal had been to get my first book published by the time I turned 30, and I was nearing 40.

I was talking to Bentley Little one day and he gave me some excellent advice. He said it was time to put my vampire novel in the trunk and begin another one -- a lot of writers never get their first books published, including himself. I started working on another horror novel, called Monster Behind The Wheel, but figured that might take a lot of time to get published. In the meantime, I needed a new game plan. I was talking with my friend Mark McLaughlin about this and he suggested I do a “best of your genre interviews” type book.

I sent a query to a small publisher who specializes in collectible books. The editor wanted to publish the book, but in the end, I decided my book wasn’t right for this house, so onward I went. Next, I sent it to a publisher in Spain. The editor also wanted to publish the book, but ultimately, it didn’t work out there either. During the World Horror Convention in Chicago, I talked to William F. Nolan about the book project; he was enthusiastic, saying if two publishers liked it, a third was probably around the corner very soon. And he was kind of correct about that.

About ten minutes after meeting with Nolan, I talked with Neil Gaiman about the book. He suggested that publisher John Betancourt at Wildside Press might like it. So I sent a query and three chapters about my new book idea called Giants of the Genre to Mr. Betancourt. He read the three chapters and outline and politely rejected it.

A couple of weeks later, on the fourth of July weekend, 2002, I was thinking about Betancourt’s rejection. He said a lot of nice things in the rejection. So that Monday, I wrote back to the publisher saying something like, “Hey John, you’ve been in the publishing business for awhile, who would you recommend I send my book to.”

John wrote “You know, funny thing is -- I've been bugged by Giants since I turned it down. This usually means I'm convinced on some level that I've made a mistake. If you are still interested in having me publish it, I'll do it next year.” And that is how I got my first book published. Mark McLaughlin wrote the introduction. The book featured 21 interviews: Dean Koontz, Peter Straub, Neil Gaiman, Ray Bradbury & Barry Hoffman, The Amazing Kreskin, Dan Simmons, Douglas Clegg, P.D. Cacek, Graham Masterton, Alan Dean Foster, Forrest J. Ackerman, J.N. Williamson, Charlee Jacob, Dan Curtis, Poppy Z. Brite, Frederik Pohl, William F. Nolan, Charles de Lint, Connie Willis and Bentley Little.

My first novel, the collaborative horror novel Monster Behind The Wheel, with Mark McLaughlin, ended up on the Bram Stoker Final Ballot for First Novel and eventually became an ebook from Medallion Press in 2011. And, in 2009 my vampire novel, Liquid Diet: A Vampire Satire was published as a trade paperback from Black Death Book (went out of print in late 2010) and is now an ebook from Whiskey Creek Press.

Since that time, I have written more interview books, which are still available in trade paperback or ebook including Modern Mythmakers, Masters of Imagination, and Esoteria-Land.

Story Excerpt - Jack the Ripper vs Louis the Vampire

Guest blogger Carole Gill on Jack the Ripper and Writing. (WARNING - contains vivid description of a murder.)

Jack the Ripper’s identity has been discussed ever since those horrific crimes were committed. Below is an excerpt from a short story I wrote, "A Tale of Whitechapel," which concerns a meeting between Jack the Ripper and Louis Darton, a most erudite vampire. It appears in a novel length collection of short stories entitled Haunted Tales of Terror.

In this story, I name one of the official suspects as being Jack. Truthfully, I hesitated naming him, but I think writing takes courage. We are faced constantly with so many daily challenges, such as the challenge of commitment and of sticking to our projects.

In fact, it’s anyone’s guess who he really was. Those killings may have been committed by an unknown lunatic who lived in the area and didn’t stand out. I think he seemed to be invisible because he knew every single alley and hiding place in those grimy warrens and impoverished hell-holes. Having said that, we like to have a little fun sometimes; I know I do. Here is the excerpt:

Some would have said she was pretty. I, myself, didn’t share that opinion. I could see the bog in her, the stinking midden, which flowed too near to her birth place. I could see and smell that as well. Yet when I first saw her move with the unmistakable sauntering gait of the street walker, I was fascinated, the way a lion might be staring at his prey.

I smiled and said something. She took my interest as flattering, my conversation as exciting. I saw a smile and flash of her teeth, still intact because she was young.

“Alone, darling?”

Darling! What effrontery. Had she known who I was, she’d have died! How ironic, don’t you think?

“Ooh you are a gent, ain’t ya? Look, dear! I don’t live far. Just this way. Miller’s court, see?”

It was late—few people were about even on these disease ridden streets. So we walked along, just she and I, both full of happy expectation. Her lodgings were grim and disgusting. A broken window with a piece of fabric shoved inside it to keep the cold out.

“Step in whilst I light the fire.”

The room was so tiny the door could not open properly. Her bed seemed to fill up the place, a busy bed no doubt.

“I‘ll just put this on...”

I turned in order not to see her tawdry preparations.

“Alright then.”

She was wearing a gaudy, nearly threadbare chemise, long past its best, a gift perhaps made cheap from overuse. I think she thought I was shy. “That’s right, ducks you just relax. I’ll stretch out on me bed and wait, that’ll give you time.”

I smiled too as I reached for my friend: Mr. Sharp and Ready—a pleasant sort of chap if you don’t rile him. The women rile him—some women that is.

Some kind of instinct must have alerted her for she suddenly opened her eyes. That’s when I slit her throat. Two swipes—the second so powerful, I nearly took her head off. Blood erupted like a beautiful fountain. Then it stopped.

Her eyes were open and staring and that’s when I began to paint my canvas.

I wanted to leave my mark. It was work. People said I wasn’t good at anything, but I was, for I was a master craftsman, an artisan! People don’t realize how much talent it takes to do what I do. Nor do they know how much time it takes; however as it was getting late and I could not afford to dawdle, I pulled off my blood-stained clothes (I had clothes underneath).

I planned to walk up Commercial Road toward Anthony Street, eventually reaching London Hospital where I knew I could easily catch a cab to Jermyn Street.

Ah, the luxury of a Turkish bath to wash away the tiredness and anything else that might need washing away.

Finally I leave, closing the door gently behind me, but that’s when I saw a man standing not 100 yards away. There was something familiar about him.

Suddenly I knew where I’ve seen him. Club Crimson!

I will have to be clever; I cannot afford to leave a witness. “Good morning to you, Monsieur Darton!”

Learn more about Carole at her website or check out her book on Amazon.