Rebecca Besser's Blog, page 47
June 22, 2015
Teaser: Jessica Robinson #SummerofZombie
Read an excerpt from Jessica Robinson’s Undead Obsessed! #SummerofZombie
Originally posted on Dying Days:
CHAPTER 1:
THE OBSESSION BEGINS
Zombie films serve as a great lens to examine concerns society has about modern science. Let’s face it, when it comes to horror movies, science has a bad reputation. Blind ambition, experimental serums, and genetic experiments are often blamed for the giant monster terrorizing the city or the reason aliens are taking human prisoners or the cause of the dead rising from the grave to consume living flesh.
Using film, literature, and interviews with experts, this book examines how zombies portray real-world fears such as epidemics, mind control, what may or may not exist in space, the repercussions of playing God, and the science behind the fears.
Science has made it possible for us to live the way we do; it has given us numerous advances in all fields of life from medicine to agriculture to entertainment. Yet, with all of these advantages, there are…
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June 21, 2015
Teaser: J.E. Gurley #SummerofZombie
Read an excerpt of J E Gurley’s Jake’s Law! #SummerofZombie
Originally posted on Dying Days:
Teaser for Jake’s Law by J E Gurley
Jake Blakely was a Pima County Arizona deputy when the Staggers struck, the parasitic disease from the frozen tundra that first killed the infected, and then reanimated them as staggering, stumbling zombies. Unfortunately, the undead quickly became fast, deadly predators, killing everyone they encountered. As a die-hard survivalist and a loner by nature, Jake had prepared for an apocalyptic event, but a zombie plague had been low on his list of possibilities. In spite of the unlikely scenario, Jake was resourceful. He had food stockpiled. He had weapons and ammunition. His impregnable home in the mountains had water and solar power. He had a small patch for growing crops and pens for livestock. He hunted and scavenged. He established a personal set of rules to live by, Jake’s Laws. Law #1 – Aim high; shoot straight. Law #2 – In a lawless land…
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Teaser: Armand Rosamilia #SummerofZombie
Read an excerpt from Armand Rosamilia’s Dying Days 5! #SummerofZombie
Originally posted on Dying Days:
DYING DAYS 5
Armand Rosamilia
Chapter One
Sally was bleeding out and all Mitchell could think about was if the zombies could smell it. He’d been covering her mouth for an hour, pushing down hard every time she tried to scream.
“You’re hurting her,” the little Puerto Rican bitch said for the fifth time in the last twenty minutes. Her New Yaw-Rican accent was getting on Mitchell’s nerves. If she wasn’t so damn hot, he would cover her mouth, too, but also her nose, until she died.
He hated having such vile thoughts. He was one of the good guys. “If she cries out, we’re dead. I heard noises outside.”
“There’s always noises outside,” the wimpy dude with the cracked glasses said. “The world moves around us.”
“Man, whatever drugs you’re taking, please share with me,” said the Puerto Rican chick. “Or else shut the fuck up with your Matthew…
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Teaser: PM Barnes #SummerofZombie
Read an excerpt from PM Barnes’ Zombie Seed! #SummerofZombie
Originally posted on Dying Days:
Searching for food had gotten easier and easier, with fewer zombie spotted each time. It was one of the only reasons that the council had allowed her to accompany this particular search party.
Fucking council, what a joke Claire thought. What it really amounted to, was the last bastions of old world macho bullshit. The few survivors who had lasted through those first hard months had banded together and started to rebuild. Not rebuild so much as just survive. And of course, in the face of uncertainty antiquated ways had returned.
Part of the reason for the power dynamic, was that out of the hundred or so people in the enclave, only 15 were women. In a situation where humanity needed to be rebuilt entirely by their group, you had to protect the breeders. Or so Jack the council leader kept saying.
Even though they had yet to run into…
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Teaser: Shana Festa #SummerofZombie
Read an excerpt from Shana Festa’s Time of Death Book 2: Asylum! #SummerofZombie
Originally posted on Dying Days:
Excerpt of Time of Death Book 2: Asylum
Daphne stood on the seat next to me and let loose with a growl. The fur on her back was raised and she looked toward the dock. We were on our feet in an instant and turned to see what was going on.
“Shit!” swore Jake, running for the helm. “Get the poles!”
A muffled bump and scrape sounded as the boat butted up to the dock. My eyes widened with fear and disbelief when I leaned over to see three undead close enough to step onto the lower deck. Vinny, Meg, and I grabbed our poles and flew down the stairs to push them back while Jake got the boat fired up and out of the danger zone.
“What the fuck happened?” shouted Vinny as we reached the bottom.
There was no time to answer, because two of the zombies had…
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Teaser: Claire C. Riley #SummerofZombie
Read an excerpt from Claire C. Riley’s ODIUM III The Dead Saga! #SummerofZombie
Originally posted on Dying Days:
ODIUM III The Dead Saga Excerpt
I reached the first one, side-stepping as it stretched its one bony arm for me. The other arm was barely a nub of bone left jutting out of its socket, yet it still moved. I managed to get behind it and I raised my katana high, slamming it through the back of the deader’s neck before it could turn around. The force of my blow knocked it to its knees but didn’t cut it all the way through, and I grunted as I struggled to wrench the katana free from the thick flesh and bone of its neck. I pressed down, begging the sword not to snap.
Finally the blade cut right through and the head fell from its shoulders with a resounding splat. The body slumped forward with a thud, and thick black gore that smelled like rotten eggs and three-day-old…
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June 15, 2015
Guest Post: Rebecca Besser #SummerofZombie
#SummerofZombie
Originally posted on Dying Days:
Decay
By Rebecca Besser
If you’re anything like me, you’ve often wondered how zombies survive for such long periods of time without rotting away, being eaten by bugs, etc. I mean, logically, shouldn’t they only last an X amount of months after they’ve been turned into walking puss bags? I thought so, until I read an article about plant life decay being retarded around Chernobyl due to radiation killing “…bugs, microbes, fungi, and slime molds who nourish themselves by consuming the remains of dead organisms.”
There are elements required for decomposition in nature. And, when they are taken away, things work differently than they naturally would otherwise. The article addresses the changes made from radiation on the decomposition of fallen trees and leaves, noting that the trees and leaves that have fallen in the more radiation saturated areas are building up and not decaying like they should.
Radiation is acting…
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June 14, 2015
What is Horror? by Rebecca Besser
By Rebecca Besser
If you do some research on what horror is, you’ll discover horror is the revulsion one feels when something terrible happens. That it follows terror, which is the anxiety and anticipation of something bad about to happen.
“The difference between Terror and Horror is the difference between awful apprehension and sickening realization: between the smell of death and stumbling against a corpse.” – Devendra Varma in The Gothic Flame (1966).
There are many vehicles in which horror is found: film, literature, art, etc. All of which use a mixture of terror and horror elements.
When people hear the word horror, they generally think about creatures such as vampires, zombies, demons, and other monsters. They also think about blood, pain, misery, and torture – psychological horror. The common denominator in all horror is death.
Death is the most terrifying thing that anyone can face – either their own demise or of someone they care about. Often, even a stranger’s death, seen up close, can impact someone in ways they never dreamed possible; it forces them to face the fact that they will die someday and there is nothing they can do about it.
Death, and what leads to death, scares everyone in some way whether they realize it or not. That’s the base root of all horror. Terror is what we feel leading up to the death we know is coming and horror is what we face when we are toe to toe with death.
What form of death scares you the most? Chances are that’s the kind of horror you like to experience the most, because it gives you that thrill of terror and most satisfying horror moments as it all pans out.
©Rebecca Besser, 2015. All rights reserved.
June 10, 2015
Guest Post: Rebecca Besser #SummerofZombie
#SummerofZombie
Originally posted on Dying Days:
Anything but Zombies!
Edited by Gerald Dean Rice
For decades we’ve had vampires, werewolves, Jason, Freddy, and Michael. And now zombies have gone all Hollywood.
In this tongue-in-cheek take on the zombie sub-genre, author and publisher, and lifelong horror enthusiast Gerald Rice has assembled a fresh and downright disturbing collection of stories. Inside new breeds of monsters emerge like sentient sex dolls, anti-zombie terrorists, suicidal cultists, the woman who can smell sin, and there’s more.
ANYTHING BUT ZOMBIES features original short stories from some of the most clever and imaginative horror writers of the day including Armand Rosamilia, Jake Bible, Tonia Brown, Rebecca Besser, Jimmy Pudge, Gerald Rice, MontiLee Stormer, Lee Moan, Jeff Strand, Tim Curran, and Faye McCray. This diverse cast of writers lends their extraordinary talents to usher in the next wave of monster.
This impressive anthology is both frightening and fun. Now the horror world has finally…
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June 9, 2015
Guest Post: Armand Rosamilia #SummerofZombie
#SummerofZombie
Originally posted on Dying Days:
Why I do Summer of Zombie Blog Tour
This will be a short and sweet guest post, since I’m very busy not only putting together this massive tour but pacing to write 5,000 words a day on a project I’m on deadline with. So…
Someone asked me in the beginning of the Summer of Zombie blog tour why I do this. Why have to format interviews, guest posts and teasers for 30+ authors every June? Why?
Because I believe in Karma.
Capital K, too.
Sure, I could spend the month worrying about my writing. I could use the hundreds of hours it takes to get this tour organized writing and promoting myself. I could do my own thing and shout from the rooftops about my upcoming releases… and I always have something coming out.
Instead, I give back. I learned a long time ago it is better to give than…
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