Interview: Flashes in the Dark

I was interviewed by Lori Titus for Flashes in the Dark. The main topic of the interview was Zombie Punter, but we also covered some random topics. I hope you’ll check out the interview and leave a comment.

I want to thank Lori for interviewing me. This is my first ever interview, and I had a lot of fun with Lori’s questions. I’d say more, but cold medications have eaten my brain. (O_0)

More thoughts on feedback…

Last night on Twitter, I had a long ramble about my efforts to get feedback for my writing and rarely finding anyone willing to offer anything useful. Along comes a follower, @harmony0stars, who was
willing to go to the site and poke around. She was there less than two minutes when she said, “Hey, I don’t like this formatting with the indents and no line breaks.”

Aha! Feedback! And you know what? I’ve heard this complaint before. I believe I heard it the last time on Twitter…back when I’d last told people “talk, damn you!”

This reader proceeded to deliver the finest live review of Zombie Punter ever, and she had me smiling all night long because she really, REALLY understood the subtler points I was trying to make in the story. Other people liked it, but still weren’t as observant about the direction I was taking the story. Let me tell you, when a reader truly grasps the work that well, it’s truly better than sex.

Pssst, want some bonus blog fiction?

It’s this simple. Go to http://topwebfiction.com/ and vote for Haunting Sins. If I can crack the top five, I will post a bonus blog story, Job Interview With a Vampire. Y’all seem to really like Vicky the vampire and Amber the “overfed chipmunk,” so here’s your chance to get a new vampire story early.

UPDATE: Yerp! I’ve been tied for the top spot with 8 votes, so you get a bonus blog story. Thank you very much for the votes!

Book review: Zombie Bastard

Revenge is a dish best served cold, and in Zombie Bastard, it’s a dish served as leftovers long overdue. A novella by Jerrod Balzer, Zombie Bastard tells the story of Trevor, a city slicker who stumbles into a small town to poop on a bad night. No, really. A scuffle in the bathroom with a zombie lands Trevor in jail with Josh, who seems to know exactly what’s going on.

What follows if a fast paced race through town to avoid the zombies who are returning due to the effects of a curse. I liked the story over all, but there were many times when I felt like prime opportunities to milk scenes for tension were ignored, and the most expedient method was found to resolve the characters’ dilemmas. So while the story was solidly written, I don’t feel it was quite as scary as it could have been.

Still, it is an enjoyable novella, and I raced through the whole story in one evening. I give Zombie Bastard 3.5 stars, and I recommend it to fans of zombie horror.

Feedback and the fate of reverse tweets

Being entertaining online isn’t as easy as you might think. Sure anyone sticking a shingle online can post stories and claim to be entertaining. But it’s all meaningless until other people start to say “Hey, that’s good stuff!”

Still entertainment is about catering to the most vocal patrons. Take me for an example: I use Twitter to present sections of fiction by posting lines from the bottom of a scene to the top. I’ve worried that this wasn’t as interesting or unique as I think it is, and so every few episodes, I would ask what people thought.

One or two people came along each time and said, “I like it,” or words to this effect. I listened to them and started making plans to do regular nightly episodes. Some would be shorter fiction, but I was also doing an episodic series. Last night after I tweeted an episode, I asked again what the opinion was. A few people said they liked it, but a lot more said they skip the post or filter the reverse tweets out.

Review: Haunting Sins

So quillsandzebras reviewed Haunting Sins and gave it 3.5 stars (out of 5) Her take:

Haunting Sins is the type of horror tale that sneaks up on you. It starts off mild, like a pinprick of fear. I can handle this, you think. Then it gets a little worse. Still doing fine, still reading. Then a little worse, and then worse, and all of a sudden you realize that – actually – the story is pretty damn creepy, and you’re too far in to turn back.

You can read the read of the review here. I offer my thanks to quillsandzebras for reading my story, and for taking the time to write up a great review. ^_^

Guest post: Glitter-Covered Bullets: The Fear of Loss

Kody Boye is the author of Sunrise and the recently released short story collection An Amorous Thing.

Buried within ourselves is the inherent fear of loss. Whether it be the destruction of an object, the passing of a friend or the departure of a lover, we have all experienced the painful feeling of something fallen out of our grasp.

Regardless of its intention, regardless of its merit, the loss of something we love is something that we fear, day in and day out. Narcissistically, obsessively, without control and without abandon, we love the things that make us happy, which makes losing them all the more painful.

I could tell you a million stories about the things I’ve lost over the years. Books, movies, partial data files of work I’d spent hours slaving over—all are things that have come into my possession whether by my or by someone else’s hands, but the thing I fear  the most—and continue to fear the most—is the loss of people.

The New Bedlam Project, Issue 4

Huzzah! It’s another fantastic issue of the dark fantasy/horror e-zine, The New Bedlam Project! And what’s this? Issue 4 also seems to include another story from yours truly? Yes, Clocking in at the Baker’s is a sequel to my first TNBP story in issue 2, The Night Shift in New Bedlam.

Not a bad way to kick off a new year, with a short story coming out. It also helps that the other stories in the issue are just as solidly written. Natalie L. Sin has a very creepy tale of Eastern medicine gone terribly wrong with Medicine Soup, and Louise Bohmer made a sequel to her fetch story, Daughter of Iron. If you liked the first part, you’ll love this second half. There’s so much more to check out as well, so if you haven’t tried The New Bedlam Project yet, you’re missing out on an amazing anthology e-zine.