Posts Tagged With: Short Stories

New Short Story Collection by A. Renfro

Fellow self-pubbed author Anthony Renfro has published a new horror short story collection, and I’m helping to spread the word! If this looks like something you’d enjoy, check it out! If not, thanks for tuning in, and have an awesome weekend 🙂

 

6 tales of terror filled with gore and suspense.

bumps

Need to Feed

Another year. Another massacre looming. When the sun rises on the Old West town of Saltwater Junction this town will face head on two fierce predators. Vampires who stalk you in the sunlight, and werewolves that transform with the sunrise. This short story rewrites the legends and all you’ve ever known about these creatures of the night. Where do you go when there’s no place left to hide?

Fear of the Scarecrow

This short story is about a desperate man hungry for revenge. Sometimes revenge comes with a price.

The Man from the Road

A man suddenly appears on a road. He’s lost, confused, no clue as to how he got there. He starts to walk and stops suddenly. There’s a bonfire in a field nearby. He sees people dancing around this fire. They are performing some kind of ritual. He turns to flee, but he’s captured. No chance of escape. He hopes he is only dreaming, because all of this seems a bit too real.

Gluten Free

Suicide by Gluten? In this short story one man opts out in a most unusual way.

The Dead of Winter

A short story about an apocalyptic nightmare in a crisp frozen landscape filled with winter and living corpses.Two men try to find safety in this dead world. Hoping to ride out the night. Hoping to find warmth and shelter. Hoping not to become food for the zombies.

The Lot

This short story is about a Christmas Tree lot that has evil intentions.

EXP from Fear of the Scarecrow

Tommy pulled himself out of his nightmare thoughts and looked up at the scarecrow again. He took another bitter shot of cheap liquor, grimaced, and then put the bottle away. He pulled out the scrap of paper with the old witches incantations scribbled on it, and then he took out his wife’s wedding ring. He placed the gold band on the ring finger of the scarecrow, slipping it over the burlap flesh that seemed too life like for something so inanimate. It fit perfectly. He looked down at the paper, and then up to the moon. He read these words out loud.

“BY THE LIGHT OF THE FULL MOON!”

“AVENGE ME!”

Tommy looked from the moon to the scarecrow who was now alive. Its eyes burned an eerie green color, and its cut out mouth was now filled with razor sharp teeth and plump red lips. The scarecrow broke the bonds that held its wrists and ankles in place, and floated out towards Tommy, who, of course, took a few steps back, stopping when his butt reached the green corn stalks.

US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KBPYYLE

UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01KBPYYLE

AU: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B01KBPYYLE

CA: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B01KBPYYLE

Categories: Random | Tags: , , , | 5 Comments

Cover Reveal — Nightlight Tales by Anthony Renfro

13 tales of terror.

13 tales that will have you reaching for the nightlight before you go to bed tonight.

Nightlight Tales - High Resolution

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Excerpt from Need to Feed:

The house appeared to be silent, but he thought he heard something, something low and almost inaudible coming from one of the bedrooms.

It was a sucking sound, like something feasting.

He made his way towards that sound, boots clicking on the uneven hard wood floor, spurs jingling, hoping he wasn’t right, but pretty sure he was.

He stopped at the door that led into the Master Bedroom, and listened again. Sure enough, the sound he was hearing was coming from this room. He held the holy water vial up, and popped the lid off with his thumb. He aimed his gun forward, and slipped into the room.

The first person he saw was Bob, lying on his back on the floor, and on top of him was a Vampire, fangs sunk into the man’s neck, sucking him dry. The Vampire was so engrossed in his feast that he didn’t hear the sheriff move in behind him.

While this Vampire fed on Bob, the sheriff looked across the room, and sure enough Linda was lying on her back with another Vampire on top of her, fangs sunk into her neck.

The sheriff was surprised to see these two out so late, because night weakened them considerably; it didn’t hurt them or stop them, but it was sunlight that truly gave them strength.

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Get it here:

US: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B015D715VW?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B015D715VW?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

AU: http://www.amazon.com.au/gp/product/B015D715VW?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

CA: http://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B015D715VW?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

Paperback:

http://www.amazon.com/Nightlight-Tales-Collection-Horror-Stories/dp/1517355818/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

Categories: Random | Tags: , , , , | 3 Comments

New Book Marketing Idea — Short Story Booklets!

This Saturday I’ll be at the Gathering on the Green 2014 arts festival with my little tent and table, ready to sell some copies of Imminent Danger And How to Fly Straight into It!

In terms of marketing, my new strategy this year is to give away printed copies of my short story, The Coin Collector. I figure I can give these out to people who express interest in the book but aren’t sure they want to commit to buying, or even as a grand prize to people who spin the golden stars on my Wheel of Imminent Danger. I’ll also ask them to pass the story on to friends or family once they’re finished reading, in the hopes that some of these booklets might end up circling around the city and reaching multiple people. I doubt it will actually happen, but I remain hopeful!

Here are some pictures of the booklets:

Pretty booklets all in a row

Pretty booklets all in a row

Inside!

Inside!

Inscription on the back

Inscription on the back

I’ll let you guys know how this whole booklet thing goes, and if they actually entice anyone to buy the book. If you feel like reading The Coin Collector yourself, just click the cover on the right-hand column of this blog and it’ll take you to Smashwords, where you can download a free copy.

Wish me luck at the festival tomorrow!

 

Unrelated media of the day:

Categories: Self Publishing | Tags: , , , , , , , | 29 Comments

I need your advice RE: self-publishing a short story

Greetings fellow blogotrons! In today’s post, I desperately need your advice. Intrigued yet? Read on!

As I mentioned in a recent post, my short story The Coin Collector (formerly The Numismatist) has failed to win a place in the Sword & Laser Anthology competition. Tragedy strikes again! Anyhoo, at the suggestion of the lovely Keri Peardon, I have decided to self-publish my short story on Smashwords. Huzzah!

First of all, I’m going to offer the short story for free — as a kind of sampler of my work, in the hopes that people will download the story on a whim, enjoy my writing style, and then seek out other works by me. This process will of course be aided by whatever I stick into the ebook at the end of the story — so, something along the lines of:

Enjoyed the story? Want to read more by Michelle? Check out her debut sci-fi/romance novel, Imminent Danger And How to Fly Straight into It! 

Visit https://michelleproulx.com/ for details.

Or something to that effect. That’s what I was going to go with, anyway. Then the lovely Keri Peardon struck again, suggesting that I include an excerpt of Imminent Danger at the end of the short story. Her theory is that as long as I indicate the length of the short story in the ebook description, no one will be upset by a free preview at the end. I’m a bit worried, though, that people won’t read the description, and will just see “4000 words length” and get upset when the story ends about 2000 words before they thought it was going to. Then again, it’ll be a free download, so they really can’t complain, right?

Hmmm … what do you guys think about this? Let me know in the comments, or clicky clicky the poll:

 

I’ve also got a possible cover design I’ve been messing around with, which I will now share:

 

the coin collector cover 1

What do you guys think? I’m pretty pleased with it. The treasure chest image is from here: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/178312. It’s royalty free (woo!), but I will of course be crediting the photographer (“chancey”) in the front matter of the ebook.

 

SO! Please let me know your thoughts on:

A) Whether or not I should include an excerpt from Imminent Danger at the end of the short story

B) What you think of the cover design

Thanks oodles! Have a fab Tuesday!

 

Unrelated media of the day:

Categories: My Works, Self Publishing, Writing | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 49 Comments

Sword and Laser Short Story Anthology — REJECTED!

In a tragic turn of events, the short story I submitted to the Sword and Laser Short Story Anthology competition didn’t make the cut. Obviously I wish my story had made it, but I’m not too torn up about it — can’t expect to win the very first short story competition you enter, after all! That would just be silly. And awesome. But mostly silly.

For all wondering, the short story was a whimsical fantasy rambling of mine entitled The Numismatist. I was thinking of posting the entire thing here, but I think I might try entering it into a few more competitions, so you’ll have to make do with a teaser excerpt instead:

Pounding his fist against the dented metal door, Mr. Quimbly shouted, “Anyone in?”

“Just a moment, if you please,” a voice rumbled from inside.

The door squealed open of its own accord, and a huge, gleaming claw attached to a scaly green appendage nearly the size of Mr. Quimbly’s entire body reached out. Mr. Quimbly yelped, stumbling back and nearly dropping his file.

“Forgive my rudeness,” said the same deep voice, and the claw retracted into the darkness. “I didn’t mean to startle you, little manling. Do come inside. I’ve already put the kettle on.”

“I—I’d rather not, if it’s all the same to you,” said Mr. Quimbly, preparing to run.

“It isn’t, actually.”

The claw shot back out, hooked around Mr. Quimbly’s waist, and yanked him inside. Lying in the middle of the dimly-lit warehouse was a massive green dragon. Its iridescent viridian scales contrasted magnificently with the small mountain of gleaming gold coins on which it was nestled.

“Good heavens,” said Mr. Quimbly. “You’re a dragon.”

“Well spotted,” said the dragon.

The Numismatist — Michelle Proulx 2013

There you have it! As you can imagine, the situation rapidly deteriorates into silliness now that Mr. Quimbly is stuck in a warehouse with a dragon. I’ll probably give it another read through, maybe make some minor edits, and then send it off to another competition. I figure I have to win something one of these days if I keep entering things, right?

Never give up! Never surrender!

Unrelated link of the day:

This is so cool. Seriously. Go to this site and mess around for a bit. It’s really awesome.

http://weavesilk.com/

Categories: My Works, Writing | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 36 Comments

Attention Writers! Short Story Contest Ending Tomorrow!

For those of you who write fantasy/sci-fi short stories and are unaware, Sword & Laser is holding a short story anthology competition — and submission ends tomorrow! The word count is 1500 – 7500, there’s no entry fee, and the prize is $200 (plus all the exposure you get from publishing a short story). So if you’ve got a fantasy/sci-fi short sitting around on a hard drive somewhere, dust it off, tidy it up, and send it in!

My entry is whimsically entitled The Numismatist. Numismatist, of course, means “coin collector”. (I say “of course” because of course I had no idea what it meant until I Googled it.) I won’t say much more than that about the story, except to hint that the coin collector after which the story is named is definitely not your average Joe … in fact, he may be of a different species entirely! Dum dum dummmmmmmmmmmmm.

Anyway, here’s the link to the contest again. Enter … if you dare!

 

Unrelated media of the day:

For all you Game of Thrones fans out there … the POV chapter that needs to be included in the next book:

Categories: Writing | Tags: , , , , , , | 7 Comments

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