Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Springtime in the Woods

It's official:

I am happy to report that Monica S. Kuebler, Editor-in-Chief of Burning Effigy Press, has confirmed that my novelette "Primeval Wood" will be among B.E.'s Spring 2009 line of horror chapbooks. You might recall that the manuscript was accepted back in the fall, but at that time their 2009 publishing schedule was still being ironed out. Now Burning Effigy is rolling forward full-steam and my novelette will be among their first releases of the year. The B.E. website will also have this announcement posted in the coming days.

Keep your eyes on Fear's Altar for updates in the coming weeks. Monica and I will be giving the manuscript a couple more passes before locking in the final draft. Cover art is in the works as well and will be posted here in due course. I can also promise plenty of public showboating as I flog "Primeval Wood" through official launch parties, readings, and other good things.

I'm very much looking forward to unleashing this tale upon the world. In many ways it is a marked departure from my previous work. I would describe this one as earthy. It's modern and strange and, I think/hope will chill you to the marrow.

And while we're on the subject of Burning Effigy's excellent line of horror chapbooks, I'd like to give a shout out to my friend Ian Rogers, whose novelette "Temporary Monsters" has been confirmed as one of B.E.'s Autumn 2009 chapbooks. Nicely done, Ian! I'm looking forward to prowling the Toronto-area literary events with you.

Lastly, for those who did not receive one of the postcards at any of the HWA dinners or recent booksignings I've done, what follows is a bit of teaser as to what you can expect from "Primeval Wood":

‘When Neil Kessler noticed the pale set of eyes staring out at him from the shaded tangles of hawthorn, he experienced what he believed to be a wholly new form of elation, one that crackled and thrummed well beyond the accepted human spectrum.

He soon realized that what blinked at him were not eyes at all, but tiny white blossoms; flowers that nonetheless seemed to glare out from some ecstatic mask.

Neil exhaled a blend of laughter and a sigh. Nature would never allow a thicket to sprout the perfectly-formed fetish of some leering daemonic child.

Yet that was what Neil was seeing, truly seeing…’