Happy (almost) Halloween! 🎃 Half Price Books and Spooky Readings

Welcome to my October newsletter. As you read this newsletter, I find myself in Madrid, where my good lady has a congress and I’m taking the opportunity to explore this awesome city a little more.

But enough about that - we’re finally into the heights of spooky season. And as such, I’ve got such things to show you. Let’s start with half price books, shall we?

Way back in April 2020, my debut novella, The Balance, was released by the fine people at Lycan Valley Press. It’s a folk horror story with eco-horror vibes, set in Cold War Poland, and involving the mythic Slavic figure of Baba Yaga. It was well received, and you can watch a trailer for the book which really demonstrates the vibe of it, here. Anyway, it hasn’t been available for a sale price for a long time but, from October 22nd until the end of today, it’s half price in eBook and audiobook formats at the Lycan Valley Press store. That means $2 for the novella in eBook, $4.25 for the audiobook, and $5.25 for the combo deal with both formats. If you feel like heading down to the Polish woods for a creepy, atmospheric horror story, tinged with folklore, now’s your chance. Click here, or on the image above to grab yours.

This coming Tuesday, 29th October at 9pm UK time, 5pm Eastern Time in the US, I’ll be joining some fantastic authors who are also published through the wonderful Brigids Gate Press, to take part in an evening of readings. I’ll be reading from my novel, Shadow of the Hidden, while my friends and colleagues Alethea Lyons, Stephanie Ellis, Katie Marie, Rae Wilde and Catherine McCarthy will be reading from their books, too. It’s free to attend, and should be the ideal event to get you in the mood for Halloween, just two days later. If you’re interested, you can click this link and hit ‘Notify Me’ and your YouTube app or browser window will give you a nudge just before we start. This is a great way to be introduced to some new authors and to hear their fictions in their voices, which I always feel adds something. So, come along if you have time and are not busy on the day. Huge thanks to Alethea, who has put the whole thing together and whose book, The Hiding you absolutely want to check out if you like magical realism tinged with darkness. Oh, and if you miss the reading live, you can access it from the same link from about thirty minutes after the event finishes. Hope to see you there!

This month, I was honoured to be asked to write an introduction to Villimey Mist’s new short fiction collection, What Protects Our Heritage and Other Abberations. I obviously read the book first and it is an absolute treat from start to finish. Villimey’s first vampire novel, Nocturnal Blood, landed in 2018, a couple years before my novella, The Balance. But we’re very much in the same generation of horror writers. It’s been awesome to share pages with her in a couple of anthologies, so to be asked to write this intro was a real honour. I was doubly delighted to find tales rich in folklore, particulary from her native Iceland. Anyway, the book is available for pre-order now, so do consider adding it to your shopping list.

Last month, I mentioned the anthology, Violent Advents, which is to include my story, ‘What You Had.’ This month, to give you a bit more information about the reason behind the charities chosen to receive royalties from the book, I asked editor and writer, L. Stephenson, if he would explain for my readers. This is what he said:

Stephenson had already told me about this when he invited me to submit a story for the anthology, but I wanted to give it to my readers from the horse’s mouth, as it were. So there you have it. If you want to grab a copy, you’ll find it here.

As for writing progress, yesterday I signed off on edits of Chapter 9 of 20, of my novella, The Siren of Armorique. So far, it’s been a relatively smooth process. I love working with different editors, because they have different processes, different focuses, and it strikes me as a really good way to sharpen different elements of my craft. I’m incredibly lucky to have worked with Kenneth W. Cain, Elle Turpitt, Vicky Brewster and now Austrian Spencer, and they’ve all done their part in smoothing off one or other of my writing’s rough edges. I’m very grateful for their insights.

The other project I’m working on, the fire novel (definitely a novel now, all pretences of it being a novella have been … well … burnt), is coming along really well. The end is very much in sight, and then begins the second draft, which is probably the most substantive in my writing. My first drafts are usually quite clean, but there’s still a lot to be added and taken away in draft two, after which it will go to beta readers for feedback. I’m hoping this one will be with them in the early part of 2025, after which I’ll try to sell it to a publisher. Watch this space!

Once this book is second drafted, and Siren released, I will be starting the first book in a trilogy, with an occult detective as its protagonist. This character has been whispering in my ear for about three years now, and it’s time for me to finish the manuscript I started when he first showed up, during the pandemic. More info to come, but now, on with the recommendations:

Recommendations

Reading - The Fisherman by John Langan

In 2019, I sat in a restaurant in Cascais with fellow writer and friend Zachary Ashford, and he told me I had to read The Fisherman by John Langan. That I would love it. I knew he was right. But, a combination of it not having been given a UK/European release and me being a fool, meant that I have only just now got around to reading it. You hear the word ‘masterpiece’ bandied around a lot, but this one really is in that bracket. A fairy tale woven into a cosmic horror which is simultaneously dealing with the microscopic scale of personal grief. Don’t dally around like I did, just read this book.

Listening - A Fair Dream Gone Mad by In The Silence

If I was late to the party with this month’s recommended read, I am even later with In The Silence’s A Fair Dream Gone Mad. Great songwriting that brings to mind mid-period Katatonia, with performances to match, a track from this record popped up on my recommended tracks a couple weeks ago and blew me away. I downloaded the album to my collection shortly after and have been blasting it ever since. Check it out on your chosen streaming service, here.

Watching - The First Omen - Sky Showtime

Growing up as I did with parents with 1980s values, I was allowed to watch a lot of inappropriate stuff at a young age. One of the horror film series that stuck with me was The Omen. While the third didn’t match up to the level of the first two, it remains one of my favourite horror film series from that time. When The First Omen dropped, I didn’t seek it out in the cinema, in case it tarnished the originals somehow. Now I’ve seen it, though, while it isn’t perfect, I definitely felt it added something to the mythos of the story and handled the original respectfully. A solid cast and some great performances, recommended. Check out the trailer here.

Bargains and Freebies

Writer and editor Robin Knabel of Inky Bones Press has created this catalogue of 34 free horror books for you to enjoy. There’s bound to be something to have you keeping the lights on here. Check out the full list.  

Writer Gerhard Dennis has compiled this promo of horror and sci-fi horror mash-ups to thrill you this Halloween season. With more than 50 titles, many of which are discounted, you’re sure to find something creepy to read. You can view the full list here.

For all those Kindle Unlimited readers out there, this is the promo for you. Over a dozen spooky books, all for free if you’re a KU member. Check out the full list here.

Oh, one last thing, and this is for UK-based readers only, I’m afraid. For some reason, Amazon UK must’ve ordered in a load of copies of my collection, Paths Best Left Untrodden in paperback format, and they’re getting rid of them at £3.50! That’s down from the regular price of £7.29! 204 pages of horror goodness for less than a tall drink at Starbucks or wherever you get your caffeine fix. I don’t know how many they have at this price or how long they’ll last, but grab one here if you fancy it.

Well, October is almost up, so all that remains for me to do is to wish you a happy Halloween, to say I hope to see some of you at the reading event on Tuesday and, beyond that, I’ll see you next month. Keep reading the dark stuff!

Kev