Carol Lanham

Do you ever get tired of inventing new passwords and filling out your name, bra size, and address for new sites just so you can post a five word comment on a website or blog?  Me too!  In fact, it will not surprise me in the least if someday, when my time has come, Heaven informs me that they’ve kept a running tally of all my many forays into social media and a full three years of my waking hours on earth were spent retyping confusing CAPTCHA.  I know it’s unreasonable to expect that there could or should be some easier way around all this but maybe I ought to be giving blood or getting a degree instead?

Alas, keeping your finger on the pulse of the writing world and staying in touch with other authors is an important part of the profession.  It’s an important part of any profession, for that matter.  Gone are the days when a girl could hole up in her office in a faded t-shirt and flannel pants with a steaming mug and unbrushed hair and be all alone with her words.  Do I mourn the simplicity of the olden days?  Of course.  Back then, the only one to come a-knocking was my trusty old pal Email and maybe, sometimes, the mail carrier.  Blog was just some pesky upstart nobody that I could completely ignore and it wasn’t the end of the world if I forgot to uncheck the box that adds me to somebody’s mailing list because I still wasn’t even sure I wanted to give Amazon my credit card number so really, I didn’t have many accounts.  I was a one password girl in those day and I thought I’d never have cause to stray.

But things change.

If I’m honest, it’s always been a balancing act so that part isn’t new.  The distractions generated by my computer were fewer when I started but my kids were younger and more dependent in those days too, and research has always had the ability to rip me out of my chair and toss me back in time for hours that zip away like minutes, and not all of those minute-long hours have resulted in pertinent information for my writing.  Most have not.  The big difference now is that there’s been a big gassy explosion in my office and it’s raining Facebook and Twitter and Goodreads all over the place.  How is one to navigate through the acid rain and keep their writing time from burning up until it’s been snuffed out entirely?

I love Goodreads, by the way.  The other stuff too.

Participating and staying abreast of things is important and yet, while I so badly resent the time it takes to create new accounts, I guess it comes with the territory.  My challenge in 2012 is to find a way to work at my computer and not allow myself to be stopped every time I’m invited to Like something new on FB.  It’s proving very difficult.  I’ve made up a schedule and I try to take care of social media stuff during certain hours of my work day but it’s like a crying baby and sometimes it’s all wet and in need of attention and every bit as hard to regulate as a one year old’s bladder.  Truth is, I could use some tips for this that really work but I get Writer magazine and hey, we’ve already established that I’m keeping abreast of the writing world, so there’s been plenty of advice to be had and I feel like I’ve had them all.  In the end, self-control is needed and, darn it, no one but me can give that to me.  I know what needs to happen.

Even so, here are a few other things that would greatly help me out:

• cheappuggireland.eu, please quit commenting on my Storyteller’s Unplugged posts and pretending like you’re responding when we all know you’re plugging boots or life insurance or marketing help or whatever the heck cheapuggirelands are.  Here’s the thing, cheapug (may I call you cheapug?  I feel I know you so well), I’m not going to post your comments so you’re wasting my time as well as your own.  How about we both give ourselves back an extra minute in our day and use it for something productive?  No?  You won’t stop?  Well, at least I tried.

• What about you Goodreads?  Why don’t you give a poor reader a break already and quit being so damned interesting!  I love your reviews and the sight of all those books all over the place makes me quiver every time I stop in.  Would you mind keeping the book chatter to a minimum?  It’s hard for me to get anything done around here.  Any help you could give me with this would be greatly appreciated.  Thank you.

• As for you Shiny Black Cat Girl Vintage, please oh please, I beg of you – start accepting Paypal!  I love that ice blue wiggle dress you’ve got for sale right now but I’m weary of giving out my private information and I can’t devote another second to non-work related business this month.  Why can’t we all just be (Paypal) friends?

Unfortunately, until Spam dies a hard fast deserving death and everyone settles on one universal form of payment, I guess I’ll be forced to focus on the things I have a little more control over.  Like time management.  Oh dear, I’m not qualified to offer any words of wisdom on this subject as yet, only sympathy to those who, like me, suffer to uphold it’s shimmering covenants.  But it would seem to be the only way out.

Good news is, it’s only February and the year is still young.  There’s still time for me to make a difference in my life.  I’m going to give self-control a good old-fashioned try and see what happens, by golly.  I’ll get back to you next month  J

 

Carole Lanham is the author of the Whisper Jar

http://www.amazon.com/The-Whisper-Jar-ebook/dp/B0062ID33K

Visit her at carolelanham.com & horrorhomemaker.com

What makes a book stand up and say READ ME! I’ve spent a lot of time in recent months researching different marketing strategies and to do this, I set aside my own writing and took a closer look at the books piled up on my Kindle shelves and spilling across the nightstand next to my bed. Today being the second day of a brand new year, I thought I’d share why I chose to read the books I chose to read in 2011. The rules of attraction might be different for you, but I’m still hoping I can find useful ways to use this knowledge when it comes to my own book sales. I’d love to hear what draws you to read a particular book so please share! Meanwhile, here’s what grabbed me in 2011 and why:

YOU HAD ME AT BACON
Word of mouth is number one for me. Outside of an obvious preference for titles that match up with my own personal taste, nothing makes me hungrier for a book than a scrumptious endorsement. Some opinions are more apt to sway me than others. A suggestion made by a friend who likes what I like will obviously carry more weight. Trusted online review sites are also good. I’m really loving Goodreads right now, which is nothing but a gigantic mouth passing along the word. Creating good buzz through reviews, blogs, reading groups, and advertising is key, of course. How you create that is something I’m still studying, but boy do I love my homework.

YUM, A FREE TASTE!
I’m one of those people who will buy a ten pound tub of Foie Gras if I taste an appetizer off a tray at the grocery store and it tickles my taste buds and I need a teaspoon of the stuff to make the appetizer at home. One of my favorite things about Kindle ownership is the free samples. If a sample tastes delicious, I’m all yours Baby – heart, body, and soul! If not, there are other fish in the sea and I’m moving on. That free sample from Amazon is all-important if you’re me. I’ve passed on many a book because of it – books I might have otherwise bought had I simply read the book jacket while rushing through Borders in the olden days. I try my best to grab a sample at the bookstore or library too but you’ve probably only got one or two paragraphs to snag me there. Outside of word of mouth, a savory sample is the second best way to earn my business.

BEAUTY IS ONLY SKIN DEEP
This is true, but I happen to be shallow as hell. An alluring book cover stops me in my tracks every time. I like a pretty spine and I’m not afraid to admit it. I might not end up going anywhere with you, you dazzling little thing you, but you’ve definitely caught my eye. If you talk as pretty as you look, I might jump on you right now. One word of caution though; if you’re a writer whose decided to put your own book on Amazon, please choose a book cover that will look good as a thumbnail. A cover I have to squint to see has the opposite effect. Unless you come highly recommended, a tiny, too dark, too elusive piece of cover art on Amazon is a real big turn off for me.

HAH! MADE YOU LOOK!
A clever and/or compelling book title really is tied for third place with good cover art when it comes to why I choose a book. Some titles are just more fetching than others. No, I won’t buy a book based on this alone but then again, in the vast sea of books I have to choose from, you’ve at least made me look.

A CHEAP DATE
I don’t care so much about the cost of a book, actually. I like lobster and I’m willing to pay for it. That said, when the above features line up, a nice price is appreciated. All things being equal, I will go for the better deal. If I have a Barnes & Noble gift card to spend, I want to make the most of it. In this economy, who doesn’t love a good bargain?

WHY IS SHE ALWAYS TALKING ABOUT FOOD?
Some of these things authors have control over. Some they don’t. Speaking only as a reader, this is the stuff I care about. I’m drawn to books that my trusted sources are raving about, I’m a sucker for a juicy sample, my eye is drawn by interesting book covers and/or fabulous book titles, and I’d rather buy two books for my money than one.

As a follow-up, about a year ago I wrote a post on the importance of having good cover art. Several authors with more experience than myself pointed out that it is rare for an author to have much say about the look of their own book covers. With the increased popularity of publishing one’s own book on Kindle, more people are choosing their covers now than in the past, but there is still something to be said for having professional input. When my book was published this year, I held my breath and said a fervent prayer before taking a look at the cover art the publisher sent over. I got very lucky. I loved it. If you’re in my same boat, I wish you similar good fortune! With all the work that goes into writing a novel, it’s a real blessing when the publisher finds you a cover you love.

I’d like to close this month’s post with some of the books that swept me up, either for a moment or for their entirety, in 2011. Please share your own as there are many more that deserve recognition than the ones I’ve run across lately. And yes, the last book I included on my list of Best Covers is the book cover of a dear friend. And yes, Crossroad Press happens to be the publisher. But it’s lovely cover art and it definitely made me look.

The following books appear in no particular order -

Best Titles of Books 2011

Bedtime Stories for Children You Hate by Antoinette Bergin

There But For The by Ali Smith

The Dirty Parts of the Bible: A Novel by Sam Torode

Women and Other Monsters by Bernard Schaffer

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

Speed Dating With the Dead by Scott Nicholson

Blueprints for Building Better Girls by Elissa Schappell

Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes by Jonathan Auxier

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith

The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities by Ann & Jeff Vandermeer

Go the F**K to Sleep by Adam Mansbach & Ricardo Cortes

Best Book Covers 2011

The Replacement by Brenna Yovanoff

Imaginary Girls by Nova Ren Suma

Bossypants by Tina Fey

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

How the Dead Live by Derek Raymond

Unloveable by Sherry Gammon

The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson

Juliet Immortal by Stacey Jay

A Jane Austen Education by William Deresiewicz

Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendare Blake

The Martyring by Thomas Sullivan (Kindle Edition)

 

Carole Lanham is the author of The Whisper Jar from Morrigan Books.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Whisper-Jar-ebook/dp/B0062ID33K

Merry Christmas Everyone!

The following article was originally printed at author Cate Gardner’s blog. I’m going with a rerun due to the frantic nature of this month. I’ll be back with something new in January though, God willing.

I wish you & yours a blessed season ~

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Through the garden gate was the hump of an old cat grave and Penny told us to tap our foot on it three times for luck so that’s exactly what we did, tap tap tap, until all the luck was gathered up – luck, in this case, revolving entirely around the hope that we might find the dead body of our elderly neighbor still lying on the floor, or maybe catch a glimpse of a real living ghost. “Don’t open that thing yet,” Penny said, as we tromped over the paint-peeled hatch of a cyclone cellar on our way to the creepy house. “Let’s save it for last.”
Penny was the girl who lived down the street and while I can’t recall whose idea it was to go inside the scary house, I was all for seeing it – every bump, every shadow, every creak.
Whenever someone asks what a nice girl like me is doing writing horror stories, I laugh like butter wouldn’t melt in my mouth, wipe my hands on my apron, and offer them a homemade cookie. I have a strong tendency to deny all association with the dark figures who turn up in my work. I want to pretend I don’t know them in the least. Then I remember about the haunted house in the neighborhood where I lived when I was a little girl. Truth is, I went through that garden gate once and tapped my foot on the old cat grave, hoping with all my heart to find something scary and grim. I was four years old and I brought my two year old sister along with me too. I had yet to begin kindergarten but already I understood that someone must always be along for the ride.
I no longer remember the names of all the kids who were with me that day but bits and pieces of our adventure still cling to my brain in surprisingly sharp detail, following me down the road of life in the form of clothes-less hangers jangling in empty closets and bare nails poking from scuffed walls. There were ghosts in that house to be sure, though they were not see-through spirits of the usual moaning variety. Rather, they were dents from coffee table legs engraved in the carpet, and cabinet doors that opened on shelf-paper stained with the rings of vanished Comet cans. A dead body would have been one thing, but I had probably never seen a room without furniture before and all that abandoned space was somehow more frightening than the thought of my body keeling over dead. What happened to the old guy’s shoes, I longed to know? Where was the refrigerator where he kept his milk? And where was his milk? He’d been scrubbed and swept and dusted away so thoroughly that there was nothing left to see.
I have no idea what the other kids were feeling but I’m guessing it must have spooked them too. We ran from room to room expectantly only to stop and turn in slow circles, looking. I can’t recall finding so much as a shirt button. Did they bury his toothbrush with him, we wondered? We went into the bathroom to check on this, and that’s when we saw the most terrifying thing of all. It was in the toilet.
“Poop!” someone yelled, and we tore out of the house, yelping with fear and bumping into each other in our effort to escape. After all the emptiness, that one unexpected sign of life had everyone in a panic.
I’m betting we laughed about it afterwards but it scared me. Even so, I was a glutton for punishment and I wanted to see more. We made our way to the cellar door and this time I tried to prepare myself for the disappointing possibility that we would find little more than black nothingness when we got the thing open. Whoever had stolen the rest of the dead man’s life had probably stolen whatever was in the cellar too. In any case, we’d lived through the poop, so how bad could it be? Eventually, with the combined might of our stringy pre-school muscles, we threw the heavy door back on its hinges and everyone peered down into the hole.
Dozens of glassy eyes looked up at us. I squinted. They squinted. Finally we recognized each other and there was a terribly terrible screech. On both ends. “Cats!” someone yelled. I tore across the yard, leapt over the lucky grave, and banged through the gate, giggling my head off even as my heart exploded inside my chest. Boy, did we frighten ourselves! My sister snitched the second we got home, but it was quite a wonderful day.
Thanks to Google Maps, I was recently able to hunt down the very same house I broke into with the neighbor kids all those years ago. Fortunately, glimpsing it through the wonders of Street View has not altered the images I carry around inside my head. We moved away from the neighborhood before I started school, but I can still see that haunted house as it once was and this is partly due to the fact that it stood directly behind my own house. As a result, it looms over the Easter egg hunts of my youth in home movies. It’s the backdrop behind kids in birthday party hats and aunts with funny hairdos smoking cigarettes. It’s featured in every photo that involves our swing set. But I also remember that old house because that’s how my weird brain works. I have a photographic memory for things that most people consider to be worthless information, and no. I can’t tell you where I put my car keys last night. I have my priorities, don’t you know?
What gets kept in my head is dictated by the smallest of feelings behind the smallest of things, the impressions of which tend to become stamped in my memory for all of time like leg dents in a carpet. When it comes to writing scary stories, I love quiet fear. A nagging sense that something is wrong is more worrying to me than a face full of blood and guts. And I’ll take a soft, shuffling sound behind a locked door over an ax murderer every time. I don’t guess the emptiness of that old house would have scared or surprised my mother very much, but then I was a four year old with an over-active imagination. A balled-up sock under my bed was maybe just a sock or maybe a shrunken head that someone had hidden there. Children make for wonderful characters because they’re chock full of all manner of small feelings.
I find secrets to be particularly loaded with fun. Hidden rooms, hidden truths, hidden love – the minute you try to steal something from view, it has the potential to grow into quite the proper monster, doesn’t it? As for the sneaking, chicken-hearted, two-timing, wobble-kneed, band of no-good regretters who populate my work, I suppose I ought to go on and embrace them for all I’m worth. When it’s all said and done, I don’t think they can help themselves. Like me, they were born to love a good forbidden romp in the dark.

if interested, please give my book The Whisper Jar at:

Amazon.com

http://www.amazon.com/The-Whisper-Jar-ebook/dp/B0062ID33K

Smashwords

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/87449

morriganbooks.com & carolelanham.com

Cheers!

It was Halloween night when we went in the bathroom to have a look around. Two little square windows of moonlight and a Coleman lantern lit up the stone room where many years before, a brown tuft of wiry hair poking from the top of a cabinet door tipped off police to the fact that Charles Manson was hiding there next to the toilet. “It’s gone,” someone said. The lantern moved on to the next room. I did not move on. I stood in the doorway squinting through a zigzag of dusty moonbeams. The outline of Manson’s missing cabinet clung to the wall like an Atomic Shadow.

Some places are more haunted by the past than others. The compound of broken buildings on Wingate Road has been suffering to hold onto its dark secrets since 1969. Wind, fire, and the passage of time have done their level best to help out. The desert (God love her!) is the most clever mystery writer there is, alternately blowing the dust off clues while burying the bulk of what she knows under layers of rotted bedsprings, animal bones, and busted Budweiser bottles. Windgate Road is a real page-turner.

Whenever I’m asked to explain where the inspiration for my writing comes from, its journeys like this one that pop into my head. Many authors, both living and dead, have influenced my work, and it’s true that I adore reading as much as I adore breathing. Still, I’d have to say that nothing feeds my imagination like an excursion into the unknown. Books are merely one way I like to travel. A blue Ford Bronco is another.

Barker Ranch was damaged by fire two years ago, but on the night we visited, it looked like many of the other places I’ve tromped through in the desert, which is to say, it endured in a state of Mad-Maxian squalor, a sloping, sand-pitted relic of the gold-mining apocalypse. Tin roof, lopsided walls of stone and concrete, and a door lousy with splinters of sunbaked green paint… Same old same old. Except Manson and his hippies once lived there.

We weren’t morbid enough to choose Barker as our destination for that particular weekend but if you want to hang out in Death Valley, you have to be flexible. Washed out roads, the sudden appearance of a No Trespassing sign, or unexpected damage to your vehicle can cause a change of course at any time. That our change of course should take place on Halloween near the ranch where the Manson Family was arrested seems like a suspect twist of fate. But we don’t call our little band of off-roaders the Dangerseekers for nothing.

Wingate Road leads to a sun-bleached bus that was once lifted into midair and transported by God Himself over the impossibly bouncy bumpy trail that winds its way through Goler Wash, or so the story goes. If you’ve ever driven this way before, you can embrace at least that much of Manson’s trippy psychobabble. The sight of that old bus is the first sign that you’ve stepped inside someone else’s dusty jar of secrets.

Exploring Death Valley really is like taking a trip to Armageddon. It’s no surprise to find a yellowed calendar still thumbtacked on August 1923. There is sometimes a jar of freeze-dried Folgers waiting for you behind a flowered curtain under a sink, along with a warped roll of toilet paper, a dead flashlight, and some fresh mouse turds. Striped mattresses trapped beneath fallen ceilings and ancient refrigerators with their doors rusted open give the impression of a hasty retreat, but there’s also the quiet presence of the curious campers who have come before you, their own history, if you’re lucky, meticulously and/or drunkenly recorded in a journal left behind on an old plywood table. And should you ever happen to stumble across the word DANGERSEEKERS burned with a magnifying glass into a stray board and resting against the wall of an exceptionally awesome fire pit built of perfectly shaped stones, you’ll know that you and I have traveled the same holy ground. I like the idea that, together with my husband, children, and friends, we’ve left behind a piece of our journey with all the other pieces.

To unearth some of the more interesting secrets though, you’ll want to rummage through one or two of the trash piles left behind in these miniature makeshift towns. Pick through the chipped, broken-up clues, and you’re likely to discover which brand of whiskey was the most popular with the hearty souls who mined the land back in the day. If interested, it’s not hard to figure out what sort of ammo these old-timers liked to shoot too. Or the freaky medicines (Tutts Pills for Tired Liver) they swallowed for poor health. These trash piles are the bone yards of secrets come and gone.

When I lived in California, I had a wooden shelf in my backyard and my husband and I lined it with jars filled with the mysterious stuff we found in the desert dirt; purple glass, one jagged piece of a teacup with tulips painted around the rim, an assortment of shoe buckles, a finger bone. Lucky for me, the desert has a long memory and I think that’s why we’re such pals. I’m an absolute nut for secrets.

I’m a nut yet I’m also a sensitive girl. Just ask anyone. But yeah, I admit it. When we pitched our tents at Barker Ranch, we made uncomfortable jokes about the fact that some of Manson’s victims had never been found. Heck, the Off Road guide makes jokes about that. But if you have any speck of heart at all, you’re sure to be touched by the mystery that surrounds the loss of those missing people. Think about it too hard, in fact, and uneasy thoughts are apt to reach up from the rocky earth like Carrie’s arm and grab you by the ankle. There wasn’t a one of my off-road buddies who didn’t draw a booted toe over the dust and wonder what might be buried under our lawn chairs and coolers.

That night at Barker Ranch, the moon rose as it always does. The wind whistled through the old walls. But for the appearance of a staring, black-eyed rat that crept in circles around our poker game, it was a quiet Halloween. The bus, the missing cabinet, the dust beneath our feet, all remained silent, keeping their secrets to themselves. This is not to say that we did not feel their presence. They set up house on our skin like a tender bruise, forgotten until, from time to time, we brushed against the spot.

In 2008, I heard that Sharon Tate’s sister, a team of forensic experts, and a cadaver dog named Buster formed up together and went out to Barker Ranch to demand some answers. Sensitive high-tech devices had picked up chemical compounds of the sort emitted by decaying bones and tissue. Responding to the command FIND FRED, Buster sniffed out five possible graves. The team of experts dug for bodies beneath the place where we’d spread our sleeping bags. They sifted through our footprints for fingernails and teeth.

It’s this sort of thing that makes my skin prickle more than almost anything else – ugly black secrets patiently nestled under a polka-dot pillowcase. Of course, mass murderers aren’t the only ones to keep secrets, and the desert is not the only place that counts them dear. While the forensic team failed to turn up conclusive evidence of any clandestine graves at Barker Ranch, it’s never far from my mind that the most stunning and awful secrets are often just a FIND FRED away.

Because of this, I feel hopeless to comb through the ruins of the past, both with my writing and with my own two feet. I just can’t seem to get my fill of these harsh and beautiful landscapes, where the sound of rusted cans clinking together in the wind sounds decidedly like the tambourine of a disappeared flowerchild.

If you’re putty in the hands of a good old-fashioned secret too, please check out THE WHISPER JAR at:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Whisper-Jar-ebook/dp/B0062ID33K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1320236568&sr=8-1

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/87449

http://morriganbooks.1freecart.com/i/237528/the-whisper-jar.htm

This post is part of my Blog Tour and was originally written for Erica Naone at Words Words Words http://ericanaone.com/

There are a few pieces of advice that get bandied about regularly when it comes to honing your craft and Write What You Know habitually tops the list. It shows up as a point of discussion in writing magazines, on forums, and in blogs. Some authors even like to line up on the opposite side of it and insist that you are better off Writing What You Don’t Know.
Personally, I don’t get a lot of joy out of writing about things that are currently going on in my life. When my kids were babies and they were finally down for a nap, sorry Baby, but I didn’t want to spend my writing time on baby stuff. I wanted to fly away. Still, I don’t disagree that writing what you know is a smart way to go. It’s my belief, however, that you don’t want to take this advice too literally.
Write What You Know, in my opinion, means look to your gut and your heart for the deeper, more spirit-felt stuff you’ve picked up on the road of life. When my kids were babies, I quickly discovered an unconditional love that made my soul positively float. I also learned the horror of being overwhelmed and the panic of not knowing how to stop someone else’s tears. A whole new language came to be invented that included sweet names for poo and pacifiers and throw-up and diapers. While I did not choose to write about the triumphs and tribulations of motherhood, these little lessons kept wiggling their way into my work. On the surface, dark fiction and a cooing little thirteen month old might not appear to have a lot in common but if you’ve ever gotten the theme to Barney stuck in your head for an hour or more, you know a thing or two about madness.
The same holds true with the places I’ve seen. I’ve spent a lot of time following a dusty flashlight beam and the crunching footsteps of my husband through the black tunnels of old mines, traveling until the opening behind my shoulder is nothing more than a white pin prick of light and the ceiling and floor come together in a tumbled pile of rock. I’ve pitched a tent in the ravaged remains of ranches built by hearty prospectors afflicted with gold fever, and I’ve feverishly panned for gold myself. Yet you won’t find these things in any of my writing to date. What you will find is the worried thrill of stepping into the abandoned ruins of a dark, mysterious place, and this is because I know this thrill intimately. I’ve lived it.
Sometimes writing what you know means exactly that – sharing an experience down to the last detail. More often, it is simply a reminder to take what you know and use it to make your fiction real. The foul beast in your horror story might rise from the cold sweat of a half-remembered nightmare or the rank scent of an old diapie you once knew. If you can master the art of writing from the heart, you will always be tapping into the best of what you know.

My new book The Whisper Jar is being released on October 31, 2011 by Morrigan Books. Please visit my website and give the book trailer a look and check out my suitcase full of secrets.
carolelanham.com

I know this has happened to you before too. A page on Facebook catches your eye and you decide to give it a Like. The next day, the Likeable So-and-So behind this page kindly reminds you to check out their new book. That’s fair. You Like them so maybe you will check out their new book. Yeah. It sounds pretty good, actually! Why not? But the next day (let’s call it Wednesday), another message arrives to make sure you remember about that reminder to check out the new book. And Thursday there is yet another reminder about the reminder about the reminder. By Friday, you’ve decided there is no way in hell you will check out that new book even if it’s the greatest story ever written. In fact, you might even discourage others from purchasing it when you complain about it on Saturday afternoon over at your writing forum.

In the majority of cases, the above scenario is an exaggeration of how it is apt to go when someone you Like abuses your affection. I have a current situation going on however that makes that same kind of headache seem like a timid marketing strategy. I wish I only heard from this So-and-So once a day. It’s more like two or three. Due to the complex nature of networking, Unliking this person has only happened in my heart thus far. But one of these days, I’m going to click that button.

In this modern age, writers are faced with two big responsibilities out there in the cyber world: We must lend support to our fellow writers, and we must take care with the trust that our support network gives us. This isn’t news to anyone, I realize. Even so, knowing the perimeters can be sticky business for some.

Over the last ten years, there have been many generous souls who have supported me by offering advice, reading my typos, and mentioning my work in their blogs. I can’t repay a lot of this stuff, it’s been just that wonderful. I owe it to these people to help them if ever they do offer me some small chance to do so. I admire these people and I admire their work. I want to support the things they write because, by golly, it’s good.

Another way to honor the help that’s been given to me is to keep my eyes open for opportunities where I might read someone else’s typos or lend a caring ear. We can’t live in complete fear of reaching out, right? Where would I be if other writers had not reached out to me?

The truth is, most of us want to support the people who are doing things we find interesting and exciting. We want to Like them and help them spread the word. But have a heart, dear friend! If we sign up for your newsletters, please be a doll and like us back. It matters not one whit to me if you Like me in return, but do go on and like me enough NOT to fill up my inbox with stuff I already know. Beating a dead dog is never a good idea. My city actually pays someone to come and take road kill away. Sorry there old dead dog, but I don’t want to look at that. And by the same token, I must resist the urge to fill your inbox needlessly as well.

No doubt about it, this is all very delicate business. If I’m too pushy, people will hate me. If I’m too chicken to say anything, there won’t be very many fans out there to wonder about my work. By my experience, some people just seem to have a better feel for finding that middle ground. In John Locke’s new book HOW I SOLD 1 MILLION BOOKS IN 5 MONTHS! he makes an excellent case for treading lightly with your newsletters and blogs. This guy has sold one million books so he certainly knows how to market his work. He advises writers not to blog every day. Not only that, but when you do blog, keep it short. Keep it important. If you’re talking about the coffee you spilled at breakfast and sharing details about your dry-cleaning, you’re practically training people to tune you out. Don’t do that to me and don’t do it to yourself. It’s anti-marketing. You’re spending hours and hours of your precious time to warn people away from your writing.

The way you treat your contacts takes some serious thought, is all I’m saying. Judging by some of the things people send me, not all of us are on the same page here. And I’m not talking about personal emails either. That’s a whole different thing, so please don’t take offence. Unfortunately, your most fascinating moments of the day still have to butt heads with the time crunch I face in mine. While it’s true that not everyone disdains daily updates, some people most definitely do. Don’t make your fans regret Liking you because you suffer a burning urge to keep in close touch. You’re probably really nice, and anyway it’s hard for me to Unlike you.

Please visit Carole at carolelanham.com and check out her Apron Hall of Fame at horrorhomemaker.com.

Coming in October 2011:
THE WHISPER JAR A Collection of Curious Secrets
morriganbooks.com.

There was this one scene that involved a severed finger hidden in some roses on a piano. Man, did I like that scene. The petals dropped one by one with the pounding of the keys, threatening to reveal the hastily stashed digit as the music thundered toward its flower-decimating, vase-quaking, secret-wrecking conclusion. This was my favorite moment in the Southern gothic horror story The Other by Thomas Tryon. The imagery has stuck with me over the years, though I can’t seem to unearth the actual book itself. I don’t really need it though. If I’ve misremembered any of the particulars, I’ll never forget the way my heart thumped as each little petal was played off its stem. The Other darkly unveils a set of mischievous twins, a pickled baby, and a forbidden apple cellar, all of which make for a squirming good time. I like the little scene with the finger and the showering petals best. I wished I’d thought of it.

As a rule, I’m not a fan of gory horror unless it’s sly or witty so my tastes are generally shaped by that. Shaun imagining different ways to kill his zombie step-dad with a baseball bat in Shaun of the Dead is priceless. When he pauses to consider which albums to Frisbee into the undead’s face, I find myself falling out of my seat. It’s both suspenseful and hilarious – two great tastes that taste great together. And when it comes to good old-fashioned nail-biting fear (sans the chuckles), I’m a sucker for moments like the one in Signs where Mel Gibson jabs a knife blade around under the crack of the pantry door in a frantic attempt to reflect what’s locked up with the kitchen broom and the pork-n-beans.

The reactions of the characters in a story are what I’m most interested in. A guilty conscience is better than blood, and atmosphere, done right, can be terribly terrifying. It should be terrifying if you’re writing a scary story, even if it contrasts with the horror of what’s taking place. When suspense draws on these things, I’m completely along for the ride. The Saws of this world don’t do it for me. I like my killing to embody a bit more subtly.

You heard me right.

Since when do albums hurled into flesh like death stars constitute a subtle end, you say? What makes that particular scene work for me is the dialog that takes place between Shaun and his friend Ed as they debate which albums to use for protection: Purple Rain? No. Sign o’ the Times? No. The Batman soundtrack? Throw it.

Not only does this make me laugh but the manic sorting process that takes place while the zombies are advancing works much the same as the falling petals. I say; if you absolutely must hack into a person’s forehead, at least have the common courtesy to use Dire Straits.

In eighth grade, I spent entire afternoons on the edge of my seat, glued to the film-like, scene-jumping non-fiction novel In Cold Blood. I knew the family in the story was going to be murdered before I picked up the book, yet my stomach knotted with anxiety as Nancy Clutter innocently went about her bedtime beauty routine and wrote of ordinary things in her diary while Capote, quick as you please, switched to the killers pulling up outside, following them as they doused the headlights and slowly crept forward. Capote used these rapid scene jolts to great effect throughout the book, making even the creaming of a sixteen year old girl’s face feel eerie and foreboding.

Another one of my favorite books is Dracula. The beginning part in the castle is especially atmospheric and I love the way Stoker plays with poor, out of his depths Harker, feeding him temptations of all varieties amid waves of distaste and fear. He uses Harker’s Victorian sensibilities as a weapon against him and buries him in bleak, confusing architecture that is at once sordid, weird, and inescapable. When Harker sees the count traveling along the castle wall like a lizard, he hardly knows which way is up and this disorienting quality transcends to the reader. The intensity of Harker’s emotions combined with the crumbling hallways and exotic customs that Stoker bricks up around this character make for chilling stuff. It takes real skill to weave all of these elements together in a way that remains scary a full century later. I admire the staying power of this story.

Last week I read Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children and I absolutely loved it. It might well be the next Harry Potter. Ransom Riggs’ story is highly imaginative and his use of old Victorian photos instantly caused me to wish, once again, that I’d thought of this idea myself. There’s a creepiness about these pictures that sets a peculiar tone, and the story is very much up to the challenge. One photo in particular has remained wedged uncomfortably in my head all week; a picture featuring twin boys dressed as clowns. In the photograph, one of the boys is feeding the string of a balloon into the mouth of the other boy. You’ll have to read the book to find out how Riggs’ uses this bizarre shot, but the image fuels just the right sense of dread and mystery that I happen to wildly appreciate. The Welsh fishing village where he’s set his story has spooky atmosphere to beat the band too. And you gotta love that title!

Suspense is king, of course, but you can’t force suspense to happen by drumming up an old fishing village that sounds creepy. You have to write your story and let the mist and the sheep and the shadowy shipwrecks flow out around your characters in a way that is organic to their foibles and fears. I’ve sometimes started writing with a specific setting in mind ahead of time, but it’s just a vague idea at that point. Atmosphere develops like a good, complex character. I visited a castle that inspired a short story called The Blue Word (part of my short story collection The Whisper Jar morriganbooks.com), but the strengths and weaknesses of my protagonist shaped the twists and turns of its stone passages. Before that, it was just a pile of rocks.

Reading good writers helps me learn what I like. I read because I love to read but I’m also careful to pay close attention when I read. It’s my favorite kind of homework. A perfect reading moment for me often involves stumbling across a line or a chapter that makes me wish that I might one day write something that is half as clever or scary or fun. I’ve shared some of the stories that inspire me and I hope you’ll take a minute to share your thoughts about what you think is scary and why.

In the meantime, happy reading!

thewife@horrorhomemaker.com
carolelanham.com
horrorhomemaker.com
morriganbooks.com

My youngest is fourteen but when summer hits, the full time writing schedule I enjoy during the school year suddenly shrivels to a couple of hours before everyone rolls out of bed.  My teenagers are certainly old enough to understand that I have work to do but I really like to spend time with them while they’re around so I try to clear my schedule as much as possible.  On those days when I do close the office door and tell them to go away, I usually get a lot of interruptions.  I’m not good at stopping and starting while I’m on a roll.  Someone is going to get cranky.  Figuring out the best way to wear both hats and not lose my cool is an on-going challenge and one that changes from year to year as my children change. 

The crazy thing is, I have it significantly easier than most.  Many a day, I scratch my head and wonder how the rest of you are managing to do it all.  It continues to surprise me that I have any competition in the writing world since it takes so much work and time to do things right in this business.  Those of you out there who are juggling jobs, family, health issues, and a household have my sympathy and admiration.  In fact, if you have any tips for how you cope, please pass them on to me.  In the meantime, I’ll share how I’ve been trying to make it all work in 2011. 

Being adaptable seems to be the only way to go.  A recent family emergency has left me with the care of my mother-in-law for an extended period of time, and the care of my little nieces for a couple of days.  As such, I’m writing this while hopping between my computer and dying Easter eggs – the real Easter was spent at the hospital.  Over the course of jotting down these first few paragraphs, I’ve wiped one butt, rescued a guinea pig from some seriously over-zealous loving, and thrown a load of bras in the dryer.  Before finishing that last line, I had to stop to spell Saudi Arabia for someone.  If this article doesn’t make one bit of sense, I’ll have properly made my point all the same.  Planning a well-thought out schedule is great, but sometimes poop happens.

One of the few things that’s remained consistent when it comes to my modus operandi is my big push at this time of year to get to a place where I can focus more on business stuff rather than creative stuff over summer break.  I am better at having the submission process chopped into little pieces than I am at bouncing up and down while working on a short story or novel manuscript.   Editing for a publisher, updating my websites, or putting some effort into social networking are all good summer jobs for me.  Everyone is different but these sorts of tasks are less likely to send me over the edge when I have to jump up because six girls in the pool are screaming for me to kill a horsefly.  I dig into marketing or submitting reprints and leave the creative juices to ferment until August. 

The other strategy I’ve had success with involves hauling myself out of bed at the crack of dawn.  I like to get in my workout at this time and then head for my desk.  This means I’m falling asleep by nine o’clock at night if I sit down to watch TV but dawn is the only quiet time I’ve been able to stake out over the years.  I always joke that I am neither a morning person nor a night person.  I set the alarm for five even so because getting up early offers me the undisturbed space of time I need to be productive.

Every summer I run up against the same lack of respect for my stay-at-home job.  Unless I have some pressing deadline to wave around at my kids, they have sometimes forgotten that I have things that need to be done.  Yes, I can usually put my work off while we’re on vacation or arrange things so we can meet their cousins at the zoo for the afternoon, but it’s been a little bit of a battle trying to establish the fact that the door is closed on my office because I’m working.  I’m hopeless to offer any good suggestions for how to handle the problem outside of the fact that I wish I’d drawn the lines early on between work and play.  I will never regret having fun with my kids while they’re still young.  I’ve seen how fast my time with them is passing.  Still, a better balance might have been struck if I had set some firm rules when they were little and stuck to them.  As it stands, I’m really the one to blame for the revolving door that has always existed between my writing career and everyone’s constant need for a snack or a ride or a game of Candy Land.  Now hang on for one moment, please.  Someone has a Happy Meal toy caught in their hair…

Where was I?  Ah yes.  I’m so grateful to be home with my children and working at writing as my day job.  When these two things are in harmony, my whole family is more likely to be happy.  I put a lot of thought into preparing for the summer months.  If I forget that the best-laid plans can go up in smoke at any moment, the world reminds me.  Meantime, I make good use of my quiet hours, stick to the kinds of work I’m best at when things turn hectic, and jump in the pool with my kids as much as I can while I can.  And yes, there will be more scratching of the head every time I contemplate how the rest of the writers out there are managing to do it all and still get published.  You guys make me look bad, but more power to you!  Now if you’ll excuse me, there’s purple Easter egg dye dripping down someone’s leg so I better call it a day. 

Read about my new short story collection at Morrigan Books:

morriganbooks.com

Or visit me at: 

carolelanham.com

horrorhomemaker.com

Everything Must Go!

When the first Borders store opened near my home, I imagined long afternoons spent roaming the isles lazily running my finger from spine to spine and drinking up the titles along with a cup of flavored coffee.  I could just see myself sitting at a little table with a big stack of books, enjoying a dozen different first pages and happily devouring a scone.  It would be a spa for my mind.  Time would magically stand still and I’d become like Burgess Meridith after he stepped from the vault, only my glasses wouldn’t be broken.  I assumed this was how Borders worked.

Over the years, I felt frustrated by the reality of running half a mile across the mall parking lot in the rain to grab a gift card for my daughter’s teacher.  I’d smell the coffee on my way through and promise myself that next time I’d not dash in and out.  After awhile, I didn’t even smell the coffee.  Borders became nothing more than a nagging email to be deleted daily and I discovered I could pick up their gift cards at Walgreens.  Some slightly sticky risidiual must have remained of the daydream though, because I still pictured those people who got my gift cards eating scones and lingering over books.

It’s not Borders fault that my fantasy never came true.  They provided all the necessary ingredients to make it happen except they didn’t blow up the world and create endless time for books.  That was their first mistake.  Now my store is closing.  All three stores near my home are closing, actually, and I never once had that scone.  Do they even have scones?

In the past few weeks, I’ve been lured in several times as the prices have dropped on “all re4mianing items”.  I’ve been offered the opportunity to buy everything from their almond coffee syrup to the wheelie cart they used for cds.  A stand that holds up to a hundred magazines can be had for fifty dollars.  I passed that by but I did get a damn fine deal on a Lindt Orange Essence candy bar.  If I wanted to, I could purchase all of Borders unsold coffee beans and take a stab at making my dreams come true at home, but I’m not going to do that.  It wouldn’t be right to drink it while vaccuming.

Currently, all books are 30% – 60% off so I finally let my fingers walk over a few spines.  It wasn’t how I dreamed it would be.  It’s hard to pay twelve bucks for a hardback, no matter how good the bargain, when I can download the same book on Kindle for $8.99.  I know.  I know.  There are some books you want to have and to hold.  I feel that way too, believe me.  But pickings are thin now and while there are still many books left that I would have snapped up in an instant a few years ago, I’m going with the marked down candy bar and my Kindle these days.

Thus, the demise of my hometown Borders store.

I won’t generalize and say that everyone is in a rush these days but I think that’s mostly true.  I’m not sure any of the teachers I bought Borders cards for ever had any more time than I did to properly enjoy the bookstore experience that Borders was offering.  I’m sad about that.  I don’t personally think that it’s all gloom and doom for the brick and mortars but there’s no denying that things are rapidly changing.

When I was a kid, it would have been easier to believe that I would own a light saber some day than picture a time when people would chose to read a book on their Blackberry rather than make the trip to the library.  For one thing, I wouldn’t have been able to understand how a book could fit on a little piece of fruit.  But still.  Who knew that human beings would choose to invest their brainpower in creating a fancier phone rather than the Orgasmatron.  The future is a difficult thing to figure.  Me, I wanted what Borders wanted; a place of respite and cinnamon buns.

My kids keep asking me what will happen to the Borders building once they close their doors for good.  I wonder about that too.  Will the people of the future conduct tours through its empty hallowed halls?  Here’s where the gift cards used to be.  And here’s where they used to keep an archiac form of something that the ancients called Books.  Maybe they’ll make it a CiCi’s pizza?  In any case, please do me this favor: If your Borders store is still brewing fresh cups of Seattle’s Best and offering books at slightly higher prices than you really need to pay, go spend the afternoon there before it becomes a dark, forgotten ruin.  It’s what the Athenians probably wished they’d done before the Venetians struck the Parthenon with artillery fire.  It’s what I’m wishing too.

Best wishes to all the Border’s employees who are losing their jobs!

carolelanham.com

horrorhomemaker.com

Years ago, when my kids were babies, I took up scrapbooking with my sisters and we enjoyed many a pleasant hour at the dining room table, surrounded by photos and stickers and baby bottles and bags of chips and dip.  We were accomplishing at least three things at the same time, four if you count the dip.  First of all, we were organizing the massive amounts of pictures we were taking of our kids.  Second, we were creating a lovely pastel record of their childhood for their future enjoyment.  And third, we were getting in some much-needed adult conversation.

My sisters had gotten a head start on me with this hobby so when the day came that I looked back at that first page I had so lovingly created in my son’s book, they knew before I even said a word that I was going to want to rip it out and start again.  “This is horrible!” I said, wondering why I ever thought that drawing little trains running around a newborn’s head was a good idea.  TOOT!  TOOT!  JAKE’S ARRIVED! “I’m going to have to do this over.”

My sisters smiled as they cut and glued.  “Oh, you’re not allowed to do it over,” they told me in that all-knowing, well-seasoned scrapbooker’s way.  “Everyone hates their first page.  Just live with it, Carole.”

I understood in my heart of hearts that my first page was worse than everyone else’s so I tapped on those little trains and said, “But I’m so much better at this now.”

My sisters knew what I was only just beginning to learn; that you should never destroy the road to experience.  If you start tearing things up, you’ll have one page in a photo album that’s been redone over and over again and the rest of the book will have to remain blank because you’ve used up all your time.

It’s the same with writing or anything else.  I have often thrown up a little in my mouth when rereading my earlier work.  I can’t love it anymore because I’ve moved on.  I’ve learned more and I’ve lived more.  I have an old novel manuscript that I’ve sworn to see in print someday but every time I go back to take another look, I can’t get past the first page.  I’m lucky to get past the first paragraph.  Even if I never do anything but torment myself with that manuscript, it serves an important purpose.  It has value because it’s helped me get to the point where I am today.  And that stands true also with the point where I am today.  A year from now, my current work might look to me like little hand-drawn trains running around a baby’s baldhead.  But that’s progress even so.  Right?

In many ways, I’m mostly writing to myself today.  I still need to warn myself not to sit too close to the shredder when reviewing old work.  I used to pitch stuff willy-nilly.  I used to hit DELETE.  My writing magazines instruct me to file away every note I’ve ever written to myself on a dirty wrinkled bank envelope.  You never know, I might become outrageously famous one day and my grandkids can auction my envelopes at Christy’s.  Regardless, it really is all about the journey, isn’t it?  When you get right down to it, it’s all Journey and there is no end to learning and evolving until we’re in our graves.

But you know what that means, don’t you?  Jake’s girlfriends are going to have themselves a big laugh when they get a load of all those Toots.

Please visit me online at -

Horrorhomemaker.com

Carolelanham.com

Angry Baby photo available at Decibel Magazine