Zombie 2.0

Cordite's Zombie 2.0 is now online! I am delighted to have three poems included in this issue and to be in the company of such other fine poets!

The American Nightmare

In this fascinating documentary, horror film masterminds such as John Carpenter, Wes Craven, Tobe Hooper and George Romero provide commentary on how the creation of their films in the 1960s and 1970s helped meld our vision of today's horror films. They also shed light on what served as the inspiration for their horror flicks.

I enjoyed the psychological and political insights into the masterminds of some of the classic horror films. Informative and witty. The American Nightmare would be useful to writers, screenwriters, directors and horror buffs.

No More Nestle or Kit Kat for Me!

Interview with Joe Hill

I'm currently reading Joe Hill's second novel, Horns, and admire how Hill hooks the reader from the first page. It's complex, dark yet funny, and simply a damn good story.

From Booklist:

   One hangover-headache morning, Ig Perrish gropes his forehead and discovers “a pair of knobby, pointed protuberances.” As he proceeds to stumble through the day, person after person he encounters, including the nurse and doctor he consults about the horns, tell him things about their desires and intentions that they should keep to themselves, and whenever he touches someone, he instantly knows their darkest secrets. Most disconcerting, he finds out that virtually everyone thinks that, lack of evidence notwithstanding, he really did sexually assault and murder his lover since high school, Merrin Williams, almost exactly a year ago. Only his brother, Terry, a TV talk-show star, doesn’t, but that, Ig learns through his special powers, is because Terry knows Merrin was killed by someone near and dear to her and Ig both. Ig determines on making the culprit die as painfully as Merrin died. Hill’s a terrific descriptive writer, and realistic dialogue comes easily to him, but those skills don’t help this diffuse revenge caper move as crisply as it ought to, and they don’t compensate for the cookie-cutter sameness of its characters. Except for Ig and the Merrin, everyone in Ig’s little world is a covert creep seething with mean spirits; although he’s becoming steadily more demonic, Ig himself is the nicest guy around. Worst, the big-showdown climax comes off as splatter-movie farcical after the longueurs of the preceding 300-plus pages. --Ray Olson      

Read a short interview with Hill at BookPage. This little excerpt made me laugh:

"What three things would you want with you on a desert island?"

Hill replies:

"I love when someone answers this question by saying their three favorite novels. Have fun trying to eat 'Huck Finn,' dude. How about a seaplane and two pilots?"

A Few Acceptances

The Red Room: Writings from Press 1 is scheduled for release any day now! I am thrilled to be included in this anthology,  edited by Arlene Ang, Valerie Fox and Jordan Schilling. Cordite Poetry Review has accepted three poems for their upcoming issue: "Way of the Zombie," "Missing Girl, 1986"and "Zombie Sex." ChiZine has accepted my poem, "Blue Velvet," inspired by the David Lynch film of the same title.
"A Kind of Suffocation" will appear in Thursday's issue of Dark Sky Magazine. I am thrilled to have my work appear in these exceptional journals and magazines!

Grace...

The story of Madeline Matheson, an ordinary woman faced with the most tragic of loses.