Showing posts with label Ghosts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ghosts. Show all posts

Tuesday, October 31, 2017

Spooky Reads

Posted by Susan B James on 3:00:00 AM with No comments
Happy Halloween. In honor of the eerie holiday I offer you some spooky reads.
While I have been know to scare people,
Me as The Real Butcher in AHS Roanoke.

I myself am not much of a spooky reader.

I went afield to my LARA and Soul Mate Facebook groups and asked for suggestions. Christiana Miiller, Aurora Peridot and Allison Morse sent me suggestions. Here they are, I've linked the titles to Goodreads.

But first: S.C Mitchell's book There's No Such Thing As Werewolves is currently free on Amazon. I've read his book, Blame it on the Blarmlings and enjoyed it, So I picked up my free copy.

The list sent me gave me a few books that I as a non-scary reader wanted to read.

Maybe This Time by Jennifer Crusie The thought that Jen Crusie wrote a spooky book which I apparently forgot about sent me haring off to the library for a copy. I had a wonderful time reading it last week. Just my degree of scary. I highly recommend.

Summer of Fear by Lois Duncan (YA)

Ghosts by Noel Hynd

Bag of Bones by Stephen King (There is no way I'm ever reading, or watching Stephen King. The only thing we have in common is that we were both scared to death by Bambi as children.)


14 by Peter Clines This sounds interesting. If anyone has read it, please comment on how scary it is.

 Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie She's Dead by Christiana Miller
I've read this one. It's funny and spooky. Just the right amount of spookiness for me. I don't mind ghosts and magic. But I don't want to be up all night imagining terrifying things.

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson. Read that book in high school and loved it. The film versions are both good, but the one with Julie Harris is the best. (Allison Morse) 
Hailed as the perfect work of unnerving terror. Not going to read it ever. (Susan)



Interview With A Vampire by Anne Rice

For Paranormal Erotic Romance with Vampires, Laurel K. Hamilton


Haunted Ground by Erin Hart Ireland. Archaeology.Mystery. A perfectly preserved head of a young woman with long red hair. I marked it to read.

Night of the Living Deed by E.J. Copperman I marked this one to read on Goodreads.

We're Off To Find The Witch's House by Richard Krieb (children's book. I want to read this to my grandson.)

The Accidental Demon Slayer by Angie Fox 
(Christiana says, not specifically Halloween, but a fun paranormal)

Murder in the Neighborhood by Janis Lane (a Halloween mystery,)

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (children's book) I remember blogging in a first lines post about this book. It's pretty amazing.

Every Witch Way But Wicked (edited by Barbra Annino -Christiana  said, "it's a charity Halloween anthology that I'm in, that benefits Kids Need to Read)
I like short stories and I like the charity and it is 2.99. I bought it,

The New Vampire's Handbook: A Guide for the Recently Turned Creature of the
Night by Joe Garden

Bloodsucking Fiends by Christopher Moore

Hell House by Richard Matheson

Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris

The Witching Hour by Anne Rice

Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman
I read Practical Magic several ears ago. Not scary and very good.

 Phantoms by Dean Koontz.
Last, but it ought to be first. From the woman who won the Who Can Write the Scariest Novel contest that Lord Byron thought up in 1816 - Mary Wollstoncraft Shelley
Frankenstein 

If you want to add your favorite horror read in comments, please do. Happy Haunting.

Tuesday, June 7, 2016

Meet Carole Ann Moleti Cross-genre Romance Writer

Posted by Susan B James on 3:00:00 AM with No comments
Carole, please tell us a little about yourself.
Hi everyone! My name is Carole Ann Moleti and I live in New York City. I write urban fantasy and paranormal romance as well as non-fiction and memoir.

Growing up, my favorite books were classics like Black Beauty, Nancy Drew Mysteries, and the Bobbsey Twins. I also loved the Whitman Westerns and science fiction, including The Andromeda Strain and The Arm of the Starfish. Once I got older, my grandmother would give me hand me down romance novels. The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings Trilogy began my love affair with fantasy, and the Harry Potter series turned me into fanatic for urban fantasy and paranormal romance. So, I read everything and writing cross-genre stories is the result.
We've read a lot of the same books.

Breakwater Beach, Book 1 in the Unfinished Business Series came out April 13.
More about this a little further down.

I love firsts, so tell me about the moment when a publisher told you they wanted to publish your book.
I had been working on the Unfinished Business series for ten years. When Deborah Gilbert at Soulmate emailed that she loved it, it felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders.

If it isn’t too nosy. How about the first time you kissed your true love?
It was an awkward and sweet moment - while buying hot dogs at a NY Mets game. 

Other than your own, who are your favorite (heroes/heroines/writers) in your genre?

That’s pretty easy. I write paranormal and urban fantasy. My favorite hero and heroines are in the Harry Potter series. Hermione is smart, brave and loyal. The Weasley brothers have a fantastic sense of humor. Harry rises above all his tragedies. My absolute favorite character is Molly Weasley. I’d love to have her sense of humor and magical skills.
Oh. me too!!!
I guess that makes JK Rowling my favorite- for world building. I love Neil Gaiman for his bold, elegant, and innovative style.

What is the most exciting moment, so far, in your writing career?
Holding the print copies of my first novel edged out winning the Oasis Journal prize for Creative Nonfiction in 2009.
  Love!

What is your favorite pastime, other than writing?
Taking ballet class. I could dance all day if my feet and knees could hold up.
That's terrific. I took dance again for a while when I was in my forties. Patsy Swayze was teaching. I called her on her 84th birthday, She had macular degeneration and was limited in her driving, but she was still teaching dance and, she said. "I can still dance the hell out of my kids." Keep it up.

How do you motivate yourself when inspiration takes a vacation?
I write something else. Or I go outside and garden or take a ballet class.

Any advice for new writers just starting out?
Take classes, online or in person. Hone your craft. Every single class I’ve taken teaches me something new.

What genre or genres do you write?
Besides paranormal and urban fantasy, I write memoir and creative nonfiction.

Tell us about Breakwater Beach.
It's the prequel to The Widow's Walk, and part of the Unfinished Business series of Cape Cod paranormal romances. I grew up on the waterfront around boats and learned to fish, swim, and sail. My family spent time just about every summer on Cape Cod. In all of the Unfinished Business series novels, the seaside setting is one of the main characters.

In Breakwater Beach, Liz is trying to recover from the untimely death of her husband. She attributes the visits of a dream lover to grief, but when she moves into the dilapidated Victorian in the historic sea captains' town of Brewster, the dream becomes very real, jeopardizing her chances at a new life—and a new love. In The Widow's Walk, Liz and the new man in her life struggle to escape the ghosts from their past lives.
BLURB – Liz Levine is convinced her recently deceased husband is engineering the sequence of events that propels her into a new life. But it’s sea captain Edward Barrett, the husband that died over a century ago, who has returned to complete their unfinished business. Edward’s lingering presence complicates all her plans and jeopardizes a new relationship that reawakens her passion for life and love. What are Captain Barrett’s plans for his wife, and for the man who is the new object of her affections?

Excerpt:
Mike tipped his hand in salute and went out to his truck. “Morning,” he said to Mae who was getting out of her van.
“Good morning’ to ya, too,” she replied, looking at him askance. “Come along, lassies, still plenty to do.”
Mae looked at Liz standing in the doorway wearing Mike’s sweatshirt. Her eyes traveled from Liz’s hair, still damp and caked with mud and sand, all the way down to her bare feet.
“Ehh . . . a change in plans, girls. We’ll start downstairs today. First, polish the woodwork and then clean all the fixtures. Then upstairs, after the missus has time to get dressed.”
Mae herded them out of the foyer then followed Liz upstairs, smiling like she was about to solve the crime of the century. “From the looks of ya, that was one wild night on the beach. Now ya best be hoppin’ into the tub after passin’ me the nightie. I’ll soak it and get that mud out before it’s ruined. I’ll freshen the big guy’s sweatshirt, too.”
“It was nothing like that, Mae.” Liz couldn’t bear the thought of having to explain this to another person she knew from another life.

“Don’t get me wrong. I’m not passin’ any judgment. To be honest, I’m relieved. Ya took my advice. There’s nothin’ wrong with livin’, Liz.” 
Sounds great. Love the excerpt.

All subscribers to my newsletter will receive a free PDF of Haunted: Ten Tales of Ghosts, which has a preview (hint, it's a spoiler). http://eepurl.com/bfNver

The Widow’s Walk, Book 2 came out first in 2014.
Blurb
Mike and Liz Keeny are newlyweds, new parents, and the proprietors of the Barrett Inn, an 1875 Victorian on Cape Cod, which just happens to be haunted. By their own ghosts. The Inn had become an annex of Purgatory, putting Mike, Liz, and their infant son in danger. Selling the historic seaside bed and breakfast was the only answer, one that Liz and her own tortured specter refused to consider. Were they doomed to follow the same path that led to disaster in their previous lives? Was getting out, getting away, enough?

What’s your current WIP?
I am finishing up the third book in the Unfinished Business Series, Storm Watch.
I’m also researching the second book in the Boulevard of Bad Spells and Broken Dreams Series.
Bad spells. Sounds great!

And finally, where can we find you?
My website has dedicated pages for the Unfinished Business Series books. I also have a page for my urban fantasy shorts, which are mostly excerpts from Boulevard of Bad Spells and Broken Dreams.
http://www.caroleannmoleti.com/the-unfinished-business-series/
http://www.caroleannmoleti.com/boulevard-of-bad-spells-and-broken-dreams/

I haven’t gotten around to creating a page for my non-fiction, but one of my memoir pieces is in the Shifts Anthology, which has won some very prestigious awards.
All my fiction and non-fiction is listed on my Amazon Author Page. http://amzn.to/23KBru8

Thank you for being here, Carole. Carole is giving away an ebook copy of The Widow’s Walk. Enter via Rafflecopter below. Happy reading and Happy week to all of you.


a Rafflecopter giveaway