A lot of times, my novels will be catch-alls for everything I find interesting about a particular topic. Burn Me Deadly, for example, deals with dragons, and Blood Groove with both vampires and 1970s culture. Usually by the time I finish, I’ve burned out my intense interest in a sort of positive exorcism that gets the obsession out of me … Read More
The Importance of the Right Feel
There’s an element of storytelling that’s seldom discussed, even more seldom taught or mentioned in reviews, because for the most part it’s objectively unquantifiable. It’s a story’s feel. And it’s become for me the barometer of pop culture properties that pass through many hands before reaching the public. I first became aware of it thanks to Batman. In 1989, we … Read More
The toughest girl in the Valley of the Dinosaurs
Since my daughter, age 7, is obsessed with dinosaurs, we’ve gone through every permutation of them we can, from the spectacle of Jurassic Park to the kaiju pummeling of Godzilla to the head-scratching WTF of Land of the Lost. And from my own long-ago childhood, I dredged up the Hanna-Barbara one-season wonder Valley of the Dinosaurs. In my memory, I’d … Read More
The Unexpected Return of Dakota North, part 2
In an earlier post, I talked about the Marvel comic Dakota North, which ran for five issues in the mid-80s and is now the subject of a brand new collection, Dakota North: Design for Dying. Now Dakota’s creator and writer, Martha Thomases, has been kind enough to talk to me a bit about Dakota’s origins. You wrote about the fashion … Read More
The Original Story about Mount Horeb’s Psychic Boy
When I wrote about this in an earlier post, I offered to post my transcription of the original newspaper articles, if anyone was interested. Thanks to all who said they were. Here you go. Wisconsin State Journal, Madison, Wis, Thursday afternoon, April 1, 1909 Headline: MT. HOREB MYSTERY STILL BAFFLING ALL EFFORTS TO SOLVE IT Sub-headline: Residents Divided on Question … Read More
Review: Vampire Classics (Graphic Classics #26)
It’s no secret that I love me some vampires. I’ve even written two vampire novels of my own, Blood Groove and The Girls with Games of Blood. Their combination of danger coupled with intelligence, of being able to pass as one of us until the fangs finally come out, makes them the perfect monster. They can be used to represent … Read More
Ten years after The Sword-Edged Blonde
Ten years ago this week, a lifelong dream finally came true. My first novel, The Sword-Edged Blonde, came out in hardcover. It introduced both me, and my character Eddie LaCrosse, who has gone on to feature in four more novels and a smattering of short stories. Although the manuscript that became Wisp of a Thing was the one that induced … Read More
A Special Offer for Independent Bookstore Day
In honor of Independent Bookstore Day, here’s some incentive to get out and visit your local indie store today: if you buy one of my books from an indie and send me a photo of the receipt, I’ll send you a signed copy of another of my books. Indies are the people who are in it for the love, and they … Read More
Announcing the Tufa Coloring Book
Hey, all you Tufa fans! Artist Shoshanah Marohn has put together a official coloring book featuring scenes from all four Tufa novels, at least one short story, and even a sneak image from the fifth book. If you order it now, you can get $2 off the official price of $9.98. That’s right, from now until Chapel of Ease hits shelves on September … Read More
Ode to Billie Joe: the value of the hidden
Yesterday was June 3rd, or as Bobby Gentry describes it: It was the third of June, another sleepy dusty delta day…. That is, of course, from her magnificent ballad “Ode to Billie Joe,” a song as much about what’s unsaid (or unsung) as it is about what’s said. Billy Joe McAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge; the singer, a young … Read More