Cameron Pierce's Blog, page 3

Cthulhu News

Cthulhu Comes to the Vampire Kingdom is now available for the Kindle. You can purchase the trade paperback or e-book here.

Ross Lockhart, editor of the excellent anthology The Book of Cthulhu, recently included Cthulhu/Vampire on a list of his favorite books of the year at SF Signal. Here's what he said about it: "A bizarro fever-dream tale of vampire lovers attempting to summon a hamburger and LOLCat-obsessed Cthulhu to destroy their doomed undersea kingdom. Including a Necronomicon that is really a unicorn coloring book, Cthulhu Comes to the Vampire Kingdom is sure to annoy Lovecraftian purists, but made me laugh out loud at many turns." I recommend reading the complete list.

In other Cthulhu news, you still have time to vote on the Cthulhu/Twilight war. Cast your vote for a chance to win a Lovecraftian/vampire package that will include The Book of Cthulhu (edited by Ross Lockhart), The Orange Eats Creeps by Grace Krilanovich, The Selected Fiction of Henry James (signed by Re-Animator director Stuart Gordon), a bootlegged copy of every Twilight movie, and more.

 

Reading at University Bookstore in Seattle

Tomorrow evening I'll be reading at the University of Washington Bookstore alongside Kirsten Alene and Bruce Taylor. Nick Gucker, the extraordinary Lovecraftian artist, will be on hand composing an illustration for the crowd based on our readings. The reading starts at 7pm.

I'll be reading from the new novel that I'm working on.

For more information, go to the reading's  page on Facebook.

Booklife and Truly Immortal Poetry About My Cat in Knitted Sweaters

I'm sure many of you are familiar with Booklife by Jeff VanderMeer, a guidebook of strategies and advice for surviving as a writer in the hypermedia explosion that is life in the age of the internet. Booklife is not a 'how-to' guide or a book on writing craft, and this is a good thing. I think this book is essential reading for anyone attempting to nurture a writing career in the early twenty-first century. You'll learn from this book. You'll be inspired and motivated.

I've read Booklife multiple times. Each time I discover some piece of inspiration that I somehow missed (or failed to fully process) before. About a year ago, I was rereading the appendix of Booklife. Appendix F is a short essay called "Evil Monkey's Guide to Creative Writing." Toward the bottom of the second page, I was struck so hard by a single line in the essay that I dropped my snifter of brandy. The dog began lapping up the brandy, cutting his tongue on the broken glass, but I was paralyzed. Struck dumb.

I realized where I'd gone wrong in my booklife.

This is the line that affected me so: "No one has ever written truly immortal poetry about how good their dog looks in knitted garments."

Of course, Evil Monkey shot straight to the root of my problem. I had written books about flying sharks, pickles and pancakes falling in love, children imprisoned in concentration camps, and Cthulhu's quest for the perfect hamburger, but secretly, in private, I had filled numerous spiral-bound notebooks with poetry about how good my dog looks in knitted garments. These 'dog poems' comprised the majority of my output, but none of them had been published. Eraserhead Press did not want my dog poetry. Neither did Tin House, Melville House, Glimmer Train, Caketrain, or the countless other publications and presses where I had submitted my dog poems.

And so, guided by the sage advice of Evil Monkey, I reexamined my booklife.

I tossed my dog poems in the garbage can, put on my best cardigan sweater, and threw myself into a creative furor. For many months I burned, until one day I looked up from the typewriter, only to realize that my masterpiece was finished. I called it Truly Immortal Poetry About My Cat in Knitted Sweaters.

My thought process had gone something like this:

Cats are more literary than dogs.

Sometimes my dog cat simply does not look good in knitted garments. If poetry is about spilling/revealing/stabbing the eternal truths of the universe, then it was my duty as a poet to write about how ugly my dog cat looked sometimes.

Specificity is key. I chose sweaters to replace garments, but I could have just as easily chosen socks, scarves, or booties. Admittedly, my gut instinct said booties, but I feared the establishment might not take me seriously enough. Everyone likes sweaters.

Of course, writing my masterpiece wasn't all that easy. During those months, I endured many dark nights of the soul. I overcame the anxiety of influence. I battled inner demons and police offers, who insisted that a 'blurb request' violated the restraining order Harold Bloom had placed on me. Let's put all that aside for now. This is a happy time, for I can finally announce the impending release of my masterpiece!

Look at the glowing praise TRULY IMMORTAL POETRY ABOUT MY CAT IN KNITTED SWEATERS has received! The stunning cover, created by design virtuoso Matthew Revert, is sure to send copies flying off bookstore (and digital) shelves.

For this, my masterpiece and what is certain to be the poetry event of next year, I only have Jeff VanderMeer and Evil Monkey to thank. And maybe my dog cat.

Look for Truly Immortal Poetry About My Cat in Knitted Sweaters in stores early next year.

For now, be sure to pick up a copy of Booklife: Strategies and Survival Tips for the 21st-Century Writer by Jeff VanderMeer. Maybe you too can write truly immortal poetry like me.

Lost in Cat Brain Land wins the Wonderland Book Award

Lost in Cat Brain Land, my first short story collection, won the Wonderland Book Award for best collection of 2010. J. David Osborne's great-ass book By the Time We Leave Here, We'll Be Friends took home the Wonderland for best novel.

 

 

New story at Word Riot

I have a story in the latest issue of Word Riot. It's called Moop and the Woggle. You can read it here.

Be sure to check out the rest of the issue, which includes work by Gregory Sherl and Kevin Sampsell, among others.

Brief note on BizarroCon

I returned from BizarroCon on Monday only to retreat to the woods north of Seattle on Tuesday. I'll be up here for about a week, hopefully recovering from BizarroCon so I can return to the grind and finish out this productively insane year.

The highlight of BizarroCon is always getting an opportunity to connect with old friends, make new ones, and finally meet in real-life people I've only known through the internet and telephone conversations. We come together for a single weekend every year to celebrate this movement that we're all a part of, to get drunk, get crazy, and dream of the future we hope to see. Then we leave BizarroCon, sad to depart, but glowing inside, full of light and fire, ready to make that future happen. Bizarro is home to me. I couldn't be happier to be anywhere else. I couldn't be happier to report that after this convention (which is more like summer camp), the future looks brighter than ever, and not just for me. For all of us.

This year, I also performed a reprise of Meat Magick, as per Brian Keene's request. I'll post some photos from that later on.

Out Now: Cthulhu and the Flying Spaghetti Monster

I've been so busy hustling on various book projects that I haven't had a moment to announce my latest releases here. First up, there's my latest novel, Cthulhu Comes to the Vampire Kingdom. At some point while working on this book, I stepped back and realized, Oh fuck, I'm writing a teen vampire book. And yet I persisted.

Cthulhu Comes to the Vampire Kingdom tackles many subjects, including global warming, losing loved ones, the invention of the internet, the angst of teens who listen to black metal, and Cthulhu's quest for the perfect hamburger. It's probably my 'funniest' book, and also the first time I've utilized cut-up techniques in a few years. The ideal reader of this book is probably a dwarf who used to hate themselves but now feels pretty much okay being a dwarf most of the time. If you dislike vampires, you will probably like it.

The other book I have out is an anthology of Flying Spaghetti Monster stories I edited. I'm a longtime FSM fan, so this anthology was a lot of fun to compile. I feel very grateful to all of the contributors for writing such wonderful stories. This anthology was a true labor of love, and I hope it leaves no stone unturned in your spaghetti heart.

Cthulhu Comes to the Vampire Kingdom and Amazing Stories of the Flying Spaghetti Monster were both published by Eraserhead Press. You can order copies by clicking on the covers.

Coming Soon: Cthulhu Comes to the Vampire Kingdom

"What you'd get if H. P. Lovecraft wrote a Tim Burton animated film." – Carlton Mellick III

Franz and Lola are vampires in love. They live in a cottage near the sea with their little vampire baby.

Burn Girl is a lonely girl who walks along the bottom of the sea, constantly on fire. The water doesn't put her fire out or soothe her burns. It only makes her feel like she's wearing an itchy wool sweater.

Bruno is the buffest vampire. He is building Muscle Island, a floating fortress comprised of mussels.

The Vampire Science Council has been working for centuries to prevent the depletion of their arctic planet's blood supply, but the blood has finally run out.

Cyrus Lugosi's friends want to slaughter him as part of a ritual sacrifice that will raise Cthulhu from his tomb at the bottom of the sea. There are just two problems: The closest thing to the Necronomicon they've got is a unicorn coloring book, and Cthulhu is more interested in his quest for the perfect hamburger.

Their fates will converge when Cthulhu Comes to the Vampire Kingdom.

Warmed and Bound

Warmed and Bound, edited by Pela Via, came out this week and debuted at #7 on Barnes and Noble's bestseller's list. It features an introduction by Steve Erickson and stories by a bunch of writers I admire, including Stephen Graham Jones, Brian Evenson, Craig Clevenger, Craig Davidson, Paul Tremblay, Jeremy Robert Johnson, Blake Butler, Bradley Sands, and J. David Osborne. I'm really happy to have a story in here and can't wait to receive my contributor's copy. You can pick one up for yourself at Amazon.

The Magazine of Bizarro Fiction #5

The latest issue of The Magazine of Bizarro Fiction is now available! This is the issue I guest-edited.

Feature Novella: The Obsese by Shirley Jackson Award-winner Nick Antosca. Imagine The Birds with obese people instead of birds and you'll have a slight idea of what this brilliant social satire is all about.

Also featuring:

Fiction by Stephen Graham Jones, Bradley Sands, Andersen Prunty, R.J. Sevin, Matty Byloos, J. David Osborne, Kirsten Alene, a collaborative story by Alan M. Clark and Jeremy Robert Johnson, and an exclusive excerpt from Sam Pink's forthcoming novel, The No Hellos Diet.

Non-Fiction by Douglas Lain, Molly Tanzer, Patrick Wensink, J. David Osborne, and Caris O'Malley.

The author spotlight this issue is on multi-talented bizarro favorite Andrew Goldfarb.

Click here to order MoBF #5.