Bert Edens's Blog

“Dismember The Coop” Going Live February 15, 2024!

Well, it’s taken a while for various reasons, but “Dismember The Coop,” the charity horror anthology benefitting Alice and Sheryl Cooper’s Solid Rock Teen Centers has a publication date! It’s been set for February 15, 2024.

This is a collection of 15 amazing stories, all inspired by the music of Alice Cooper. This includes not just his solo work, but his work with the original Alice Cooper group and even Hollywood Vampires, his band with Joe Perry of Aerosmith and Johnny Depp.

As mentioned, this anthology benefits the Solid Rock Teen Centers in the Phoenix, Arizona, area. This is an outstanding organization who does so much for the youth of their communities. I love how much the Coopers, and those like-minded folks in the Teen Centers, give back to and make a difference in their area.

The anthology is available in print in both regular paperback and large print, and on Amazon, it will be available on Kindle and will be part of the Kindle Unlimited program. But if Amazon isn’t your jam, no worries, the print copies are available through Barnes & Noble and other online resellers. Plus, you can have your local bookstore order a copy if you want.

Here are some links should you want to pre-order the book before February 15, or just purchase it outright after the release date:

Amazon (US)
Amazon (Canada)
Amazon (UK)
Amazon (Australia)
Barnes & Noble

Check it out!

Call for Submissions for a Horror Anthology!

“Dismember the Coop” is a charity horror anthology of stories inspired by the music of Alice Cooper, both the group and solo. The proceeds from sales go to support the Solid Rock Teen Centers, an organization setup by Alice and Sheryl Cooper that benefits the disadvantaged youth in the Phoenix area. To learn more about it, go here:https://www.alicecoopersolidrock.com/

Note that although this is a charity anthology, authors and artists will be paid. I don’t like giving my work away for free, and I suspect most other professionals don’t either. Submission guidelines: Stories should be between 3,000 and 5,000 words with payment being at $25 USD, plus an e-book or paperback copy, your choice. Payment will be upon acceptance, with distribution of books following publication. I don’t really care about the format, font, etc., since I’m a geek and a lot of that will be sorted out in the editing process, but just be consistent, eh?

No explicit sexual content just for the sake of having it. No racism, hatred toward marginalized groups, animal cruelty, or violence just for violence’s sake. No reprints. Multiple submissions are fine, but only one story per author will be chosen. Simultaneous submissions are also fine, but if your story is chosen elsewhere, please let us know so we can remove it from consideration.

Some notes about the stories:

You can base your stories on song titles.

You can base it on characters referenced during a song.

*** You CANNOT quote lyrics in your story. *** Doing so creates so many copyright headaches it’s not even funny, and this will cause your story to be rejected outright, regardless of quality.

Alice has a huge catalog of songs to choose from, going back over 40 years. Try to be creative and go deep catalog. If you submit a story based on “School’s Out” or “Welcome To My Nightmare,” you might be among a bunch of others who did the same, and I want variety. So that might make your story less likely to make the cut.

Also, while Alice has been in many non-musical projects from movies to “The Muppet Show” to “Hollywood Squares” to commercials and so many other things, this anthology is focusing on his music, from the Alice Cooper Group to his solo work to Hollywood Vampires. That’s a broad enough base to select from, we don’t need to extend it to his other works.

Stories should be submitted to dismemberthecoop@authorbertedens.com. Please include at the top of your story your name, email address, approximate word count, and the song that was your inspiration.

Submissions will be open from July 1 through August 31, 2022. Publication TBD.

Let’s see what y’all got!

New Short Story Published!

I’ve long been a fan of B-horror movies. Sometimes, the worse it is, the better it is. “Blood Orgy of the She-Devils,” anyone? So when I had the opportunity to submit a story for an anthology dedicated to the genre, I jumped at it, and I am honored my story was accepted.

As I was writing this story, I was thinking of some movies where something typically viewed as innocuous ends up being quite deadly. Now, I’m not talking about children, which has been pretty overdone but is still effective if done well. I was thinking more like “Killer Klowns From Outer Space,” which was released between when Stephen King introduced us to Pennywise but before the TV series lured our culture down a dark gutter. Or even “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes.” You get the idea.

So I picked something I have been fascinated with for a long time and actually got to hold while on a cruise to Honduras in 2018: sloths. They’re so cute and so adorable and so slooooooooooooow. What I did with them, well, you’ll just have to read the story.

This anthology contains many amazing stories that all harken back to the glory days of B-horror movies, as each author takes a different tack when approaching the theme. And, as always, there are some stories I read and mutter to myself, “I wish I’D thought of that.”

So check out “Savage B’s: A Tribute to B-Horror” (affiliate link) now. It’s a great, fun read that will have you strolling down the memory lane of classic B-horror.

“Sting of Hope” Gains Dual Citizenship

Back in 2019 when I first self-published “Sting of Hope,” it was primarily to help me navigate the world of self-publishing via Kindle Direct. While I’m happy to work with an established publisher, I also am willing to do it all myself if necessary, and that short story served as a good way to dip my toes into the surf to see what all self-publishing entailed.

At the time, I made “Sting of Hope” exclusive to Amazon, meaning it was available for the Kindle Unlimited program. While I have gotten some page reads via that program, far and away the majority of my income has come from sales of the book. With that in mind, I have stewed for some time about making “Sting of Hope” available somewhere in addition to Amazon.

Then along came Drew Stepek and Godless. This is a website dedicated to horror and nothing but horror. So not only are there some amazing finds there, as an author, I don’t have to worry about “Sting of Hope,” which is essentially a body horror story, being buried under all the books marketed as horror simply because they have someone shagging a vampire or werewolf. Or both. Easier to find the proverbial needle in the haystack, so to speak.

So, after talking to Drew for a while, he was gracious enough to let me list “Sting of Hope” at Godless, where it’s available for download in various eBook formats. I still have the story available on Amazon (affiliate link), but it’s no longer exclusive to that platform.

Check it out at either location and let me know what you think of the story!

New Short Story Published!

Interestingly enough, I actually had written up this post back when this book was released, but for whatever reason, I never pushed “Publish” to send it out into the world. Oh well, as My Gorgeous Bride, Carrie, will tell you, I am nothing if not absent-minded.

There’s a wonderful new book out, “Fill The Void,” which is a single story told via a collaboration by sixteen authors. It’s a magnificent, Armageddon story, and I’m honored to be part of it.

I admit, when I was accepted to submit a chapter of this book, I was curious how cohesive the story would be since it’s told with such a variety of styles. But, while each telling is laid out in a different way, it does indeed make sense as you read through the book.

I must admit, much of the fun of this collaboration was getting to know the other authors and the banter back and forth as we anxiously waited for a chapter to be completed and submitted so the next could be worked on. It took a bit to pull it all together, but I really love the way it came out.

So check it out! You can get it on Kindle, paperback, or hardback through Amazon (affiliate link) or via various eBook formats at Godless.

Review: “Pieces & Parts” by Dawn Hosmer (2021)

I read “Bits & Pieces” by Dawn Hosmer when it first came out and found it to be very creative with a driving plot that kept you reading, stringing you along with just the right amount of tension. So when I saw she had a second book in the series available, I jumped at the chance to read it.

And let me tell you, I was not disappointed. Tessa returns as the main character, one whose gift allows her to see flashes of the future or past, each flash accompanied by colors that relate to a type of memory. However, unlike before, Tess is having flashes without having to touch someone.

The flashes begin, accompanied by a previously unseen color, green, when Tess discovers the remains of a young boy in the creek near the home where she and her husband live. This starts her down a path of trying to find the young boy’s killer, not just to find justice for all of the killer’s victims, but to keep them from striking again. Because the next one could very well be someone very close to her life and heart.

As Tess struggles with the visions, she draws many people into her whirlwind. And while most are willing to help her in any way they can, the pressure also drives a wedge between Tess and the most important person in her life: her husband.

Will Tess find the other victims and bring peace to their families? Can they find the killer before they strike again? Will her marriage survive the strain put on it as Tess tries to balance all the demands on her? And oh yeah, how will Tess manage all of this while nearing the end of her pregnancy?

I definitely enjoyed this book and recommend it for anyone who enjoys fast-paced thrillers with a good touch of love and humanity. You don’t have to read the first book in the series before “Pieces & Parts,” but it would definitely add some depth and color, pun intended, to this one.

Rating: Five Stars (Out Of Five Possible)

New Short Story Published!

A brand new anthology of dark fantasy/horror western short stories has been published, titled “Six Guns Straight From Hell 3,” and I am honored to have a story included in it! This story is one of my favorites, and I’m glad it found a home.

It’s a cautionary tale about making sure, when visiting a brothel, you treat the working girls there appropriately. Because, if you don’t—well, you’ll just need to read the story.

I really wasn’t terribly familiar with weird/horror western stories, although I definitely knew they were out there. So when I decided to work on a story for this anthology, I tried to take a different tack, believing that vampires, ghosts, werewolves, etc., had been overdone. I’m hoping my novel approach to the story is one of the reasons the editors chose to accept my story.

Oh and make no mistake about it, there are many other amazing stories in this collection too! You will probably like some of them even more than mine, which is just fine with me. There are some very talented writers on-board with this anthology, and it shows.

So check it out! You can get it in Kindle or paperback format through Amazon (affiliate link), and maybe through other sources too.

Review: “Population 436” (2006)

I was cruising along Amazon Prime Video, which is totally worth the price for the movies, not to mention the free shipping, looking for something to watch when I ran across this one. I thought the premise was decent, but it also had Fred Durst of Limp Bizkit in it. Not sure if this was going to be good or a train wreck, I decided to watch it. Because, you know, train wrecks can be fun.

Steve Kady is a U.S. Census Bureau employee sent to the tiny town of Rockwell Falls to determine why the population of the town has remained unchanged, at 436 of course, since 1860. Just inside the city limits, he hits a huge pothole, giving him two flat tires. He’s assisted by Deputy Caine, played by Durst, who reluctantly takes Kady to town to get settled in while a tow truck is sent for his vehicle.

The longer Kady is in town doing his job and research, the more questions he has about the town, which its residents consider the most perfect place on earth. Even more so, the residents begin acting odder and odder, especially as Kady begins learning more about why the population of the town has been unchanged.

Of course, there’s the obligatory romance storyline, which is actually germane to the plot, but it feels natural and unforced. As you would also expect, that romantic subplot creates some tension within the town, since Kady is an outsider, and a town of such a limited population has only so many people you can put a ring on.

The plot builds, with some shock value thrown in to amp up the tension, until it reaches the climax and wrap-up. So much of the ending was easy to see coming, including the clean-up from the big moments. And there were definitely unanswered questions. But that didn’t ruin the whole movie.

Overall, I thought this was a decent movie. It was categorized as horror, but it felt was more like a thriller than a horror movie, or maybe at the very least soft horror. It dances around some possible evil/supernatural foundations and never really answers that question. But that’s fine with me because, as anyone who’s read my writing knows, I’m not opposed to ambiguous endings at all.

As noted, it did feel predictable at times, but not so much that I felt compelled to shut it off. And hey, Durst did a decent job, although his character didn’t have a ton of depth. I don’t know if this is one I would watch in regular rotation because the suspense surrounding the unchanged population can only let that cat out of the bag once. But it was definitely worth checking out.

Rating: Three Stars (Out of Five Possible)

Review: “Love Life” by Matt Shaw (2011)

Matt Shaw is well known in the publishing world for his extreme horror, which doesn’t bother me in the least, so when I was able to find this available on Kindle Unlimited, I went ahead and grabbed it. I wanted to get a sense for what people have been talking about since, for whatever reason, I haven’t read anything of his before.

This is a story about Kirk, who has a prostitute, Kim, come into his orbit twice in one day. The first time, he contacted her, and the second, she contacted him. As they spend the evening together, we begin to learn more about each of them.

Both share a common link to the past, which they didn’t know when the day began. As they begin exploring that link, more and more is revealed about Kim’s past, both distant and immediate.

But why is she trying to make as much money as possible in a single night? And what, or who, is she running from?

As this story progressed, it was definitely a slow burn. But that’s not a bad thing, because it’s counterbalanced by good character development. From a reader’s perspective, I found both Kim and Kirk to be sympathetic characters, well-rounded, and realistic.

The ramp-up to the climax is sudden and brutal but also completely in line with the plot to that point. Maybe I’m just a depraved individual, but a significant piece of the climax I had seen coming. However, that doesn’t make the story any less good. Shaw absolutely knows how to write brutal and extreme horror, even if it’s only for a few necessary pages.

Overall, I enjoyed this novella/novelette, and it was a quick and easy read. I’ll definitely be picking up other works from Shaw. If you would like to pick this one up yourself, it can be purchased through Amazon and perhaps other places.

Rating: Four Stars (Out Of Five Possible)

Review: “The Hellbound Heart” by Clive Barker (1986)

Most people know the Hellraiser movie series was based on a novella by Clive Barker, and of course, this is that novella. It was originally released in 1986, and the Hellraiser franchise started in 1987. I first read “The Hellbound Heart” back in the late eighties, as the movies led me to Barker’s work, and I definitely went on a binge with his “Books of Blood” series and have loved most of his work since.

With that in mind, I wanted to see if, thirty years later, Barker’s work still held up well considering the emergence of extreme and splatterpunk horror. Without a doubt, it does. It’s not as “in your face” as some authors such as Edward Lee, but Barker has always teetered on that fence between nuance and explicit prose. As a side note, this isn’t a denigration of Lee’s work, as I love it too.

The gist of the story is actually very close to that of the movie, rather the movie is very close to the book, with just some minor details differing. It was interesting how vague Barker is with the appearance of the Cenobites, and I have to wonder how I would have pictured them had I not seen the first movie before reading “The Hellbound Heart”.

As a side note, it was the movie series that gave “Pinhead” his name, as in the books he’s simply known as a priest. A year or so ago, I read “The Scarlet Gospels” in paperback, which is the swan song for Pinhead, and I had to laugh at how Barker included a nod to the movies, in that the character despised that nickname.

Bottom line is, if you like Barker but haven’t read this, why not? And if you like more raw, brutal horror, whether a fan of the Hellraiser movies or not, you should definitely check this book out. It’s thoroughly enjoyable and, as I noted before, really stands up over time.

If you want to pick up the book, it’s available all over, such as on Amazon and countless other sites.

Rating: Five Starts (Out Of Five Possible)