Jeff Strand's Blog, page 90
October 9, 2012
September 18, 2012
A Bunch of VOODOO Blog Reviews!
So, this summer I had this book called A Bad Day For Voodoo published. I probably told you about it. To help promote it, Sourcebooks sent the book (along with various goofy guest blogs) to a bunch of Young Adult Fiction bloggers. Reviews have been posted all summer, and now, in the glorious spirit of procrastination, I am finally posting links to all of the blogs that reviewed it. And also some non-blog reviews, like Publishers Weekly and Horror World.
This is not a hand-picked selection of reviews, so though I’m thrilled that the vast majority of reviewers loved the book, if you click around you’ll also find the occasional “WTF was that?!?” review. Honestly, if you don’t check out every single link below, you really can’t make an informed decision about whether A Bad Day For Voodoo is right for you, and all of these blogs deserve your traffic, so click, click, click!
Book Bite Reviews
Book Loving Mom
BookGeeksRule
Bookish
Booklist Online
Books and Other Stuff
Books by Pamela Thompson
City Book Review
Collings Notes
Dear Author
Drey’s Library
Elizabeth A. White
Fresh Ink
Gabby Reads
Horror Fiction Review
Horror World
I Devour Books
Jelly Loves Books
Junior Library Guild Shelf Life
Kayla’s Reads and Reviews
Kirkus
Leisure Reads
Letters Inside Out
No More Grumpy Bookseller
Once Upon a Twilight
Out of the Blue
Panda Reads
Publishers Weekly
Slaying Books
The Alternative
The Book Babe
The Book Goddess
The Book Monsters
The Book Slayer
The Horror Review
The O.W.L.
The Reading Diaries
The Unread Reader
Verb Vixen
Winfield Library YA Corner
YA Book Reads
YA Books Beyond the Cover
Willa’s Ramblings
September 17, 2012
Welcome to Gleefully Macabre!
Welcome to my website! Whether you were brought here by interest in my work or a Google search gone terribly wrong, I encourage you to hang around and start clicking away!
My young adult comedy, A Bad Day For Voodoo, is now available at a bookstore near you, or online in e-book and paperback editions!
My suspense novella, Faint of Heart, is available in both e-book and paperback editions!
It’s been a seven-year wait, but I’ve finally written the fourth Andrew Mayhem novel, Lost Homicidal Maniac (Answers to “Shirley”). The print version will be out later this year, but you can get the digital edition for a scant $2.99 from Amazon or Smashwords.
And you can get slightly polished up digital versions of the first three Andrew Mayhem novels, too! Yes, you can get Amazon Kindle versions of Graverobbers Wanted (No Experience Necessary), Single White Psychopath Seeks Same, and Casket For Sale (Only Used Once!). Or you can get Graverobbers, Psychopath, and Casket in other e-book formats from Smashwords!
My werewolf novel Wolf Hunt is also available as a $2.99 e-book! It’s not a short story or a trunk novel; this baby is 75,000 words of bloody werewolf mayhem for three bucks. Get it from Amazon! Or order the trade paperback edition from Dark Regions Press!
And my zombie comedy novel The Sinister Mr. Corpse. Madness! Insanity! So while you’re buying the Andrew Mayhem series and Wolf Hunt, you can conveniently add a sixth book to your Amazon and/or Smashwords shopping cart.
And also my giant killer ants novel Mandibles. So while you’re adding the Andrew Mayhem series, Wolf Hunt and The Sinister Mr. Corpse, it’s simple to add another low-price e-book from Amazon and/or Smashwords! Seven novels for less than twenty-one bucks!
(P.S.: People who leave reviews on Amazon deserve great big hugs!)
Friend me on Facebook ! Follow me on Twitter !
September 16, 2012
Facebook Fan Page!
Y’know, it always seemed insanely egotistical to set up a fan page for myself on Facebook. But then Goodreads set up their author program, where you can link your Facebook fan page to all of your titles, so I figured…hey, I’ll be insanely egotistical!
C’mon over to http://www.facebook.com/JeffStrandAut... and click that “Like” button!
September 5, 2012
Elements of Crime
The German website Elements of Crime just posted an interview with me. Mostly Andrew Mayhem stuff, because so far my Andrew Mayhem novels are the only ones available in German-language versions. (However, if you read the interview, you’ll see which of my other novels will be available very soon Auf Deutsch!)
The interview is in German, but they’ve also included a handy “English Version” button. Read them both! It’s educational!
Check it out RIGHT HERE!
August 12, 2012
Stalking You Now
No, I’m not actually stalking you. But I did just finish a new horror novella, Stalking You Now. I don’t know exactly when it will be published, but start scheduling in some free time in 2013…
August 7, 2012
A Title At Last
I haven’t actually posted about this, unless you’ve been following the Coming Soon page, which you probably haven’t, but I’ve been working on a novella without a title. It is, in fact, the most I’ve ever written on a project without having a title.
I need titles. Calling it “Untitled Novella” bugs the crap out of me. Sometimes I’ll have the title before I even have the story, but usually I’ll sit down and come up with something before I get too far along.
For this one, nothing came to mind, and I suddenly thought “Is it possible that there hasn’t been a book called Stalker?” I knew there was that awesome anthology Stalkers from days of yore, but had the singular version been used as a novel title?
Yes. It’s been used many times. Recently.
But, with some tweaking, I came up with Stalking You Now, which even has completely appropriate multiple meanings depending on which word you emphasize.
If you want to see how far along I am on the novella, along with the other stuff I’m working on (right now: Camp Doom and Survival Horror) check out the Coming Soon page.
25% Off Dark Regions Press Summer Sale!
If you’ve wanted to purchase the paperback editions of Wolf Hunt, Gleefully Macabre Tales and/or The Mad & The Macabre but thought “Nah, they’re about 25% too expensive,” now is your chance to get them for 25% off! For an unspecified limited time only, which may or may not be “While Supplies Last,” you can click RIGHT HERE and order away like a crazy person!
They have awesome books by plenty of other authors, too, so add to cart! Add to cart! Add to cart!
But wait! There’s slightly more! You can get the limited edition hardcover of Dweller for 50% off! Holy crap! CLICK HERE and get yourself one!
July 27, 2012
Could It Be? A New Podcast Episode? Whoa!
Yes, Episode VI of Dread Media Presents: Gleefully Macabre is now available for your listening ecstasy. This one clocks in at a whopping 13 minutes and 18 seconds, and unlike previous episodes, where I pretty much just babble about random stuff, this time I read you a short story! Yes, it’s basically an audiobook of “The Loneliest Jackalope,” a demented little tale from Unnatural Tales of the Jackalope, edited by John Palisano.
Listen to it RIGHT HERE. Or search for “Dread Media” on iTunes and subscribe!
July 14, 2012
One Sentence…
The progress of one sentence from my work-in-progress. A kid is riding in the backseat as they drive down a dirt road.
“The car made a THUB THUB THUB sound as if the wheels were going to pop off at any second.”
I like THUB THUB THUB, as would anybody, but the wheels popping off isn’t funny.
“The car made a THUB THUB THUB sound that sounded like important mechanical parts were being left behind.”
Can’t have “sound” and “sounded” so close together. Duh. And “important mechanical parts” still doesn’t work for me.
“The car made a THUB THUB THUB sound, and Henry kept glancing out the rear window to make sure that essential automobile components weren’t being left behind.”
It’s better to have the thought come from Henry instead of the omniscient narrator, but this sentence is still not quite there. It’s often funny to use a bigger word than necessary, like “components,” but “essential” is not the right word. Should I go back to “important?” That’s better. Or…
“The car made a THUB THUB THUB sound, and Henry kept glancing out the rear window to make sure that useful pieces weren’t being left behind.”
“Useful” works! Hooray! (I actually had it as “useful pieces of the automobile” and then, as I wrote this blog post, I realized that “of the automobile” was unnecessary.)
One sentence done!
EDIT: “The progress of one sentence from my work-in-progress?” What kind of sentence is that? It should be “The evolution of one sentence from my work-in-progress.”
