Cover Reveal

Tara Bush Cover Art for Luna Press Harvester Series Debut Collection by Steven J Dines

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Upcoming from Luna Press Publishing

Cover Art by Tara Bush

In the most recent mailing from Luna Press Publishing I noticed this stunning cover art image by Tara Bush for an upcoming entry in their Harvester Series, a debut collection from Steven J Dines.

From Tara Bush writing about her cover art:

“I knew early on I wanted to use the colours and tones to portray emotion and feelings, and during the process, I allowed the colours to wash organically over the face. Colour was mainly applied digitally, enabling me to keep the detail of the underdrawing. I knew I wanted yellow tones in the image and the blue washes felt right as the artwork was nearing an end.

The result is a combination of traditional and digital, which I think can work in harmony with each other. Steven’s writing is so evocative and haunting, that it really helps translate those deep emotions to the page for an artist.”

You can read more about this cover on the Luna Press Blog, or on the artist’s site.

I’m also looking forward to this book. From the publisher:

“Look Where You Are Going Not Where You Have Been is a stunning debut collection of dark literary fiction exploring grief, regret, and hope. A family is torn apart by tragedy and misadventure, their future creaking under the weight of judgment. Old men play at being ghosts while a young boy sees real ones wherever he turns. A wandering immortal desperately seeks an end to his pain. Intimate, unflinching, and poignant, these eleven tales of the broken and the unmade include the two previously unpublished novellas, dragonland and This House is Not Haunted.”

You can read more about the collection here.

A Charity Anthology from Raw Dog Screaming Press, with Proceeds to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society

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From Raw Dog Screaming Press and Editor Heidi Ruby Miller

Like Sunshine After Rain:

A Charity Anthology to Benefit the
Leukemia and Lymphoma Society

I’ve just pre-ordered a copy of this anthology to support this charity, the publisher, and its contributors. Check out the information below from Raw Dog Screaming Press and consider supporting as well:

“Raw Dog Screaming Press and international award-winning editor Heidi Ruby Miller are taking pre-orders for the charity anthology LIKE SUNSHINE AFTER RAIN. Proceeds benefit the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. The beautiful cover is by Brad Sharp. Interior illustrations by Sharon A. Ruby.

This limited edition anthology is available in lettered hardcover and numbered paperback editions. It hosts short stories, poems, and essays from 82 authors.”

Including:

  • New York Times bestsellers Jonathan Maberry and Maria V. Snyder
  • USA Today bestseller Annette Dashofy
  • International bestseller Liz Coley
  • Amazon Charts bestsellers Cary Caffrey, Sasha Dawn, and Jennifer Foehner Wells
  • Drue Heinz Literature Prize winner Randall Silvis
  • Bram Stoker Award winners Lee Murray, Christina Sng, Lucy A. Snyder, Sara Tantlinger, and Tim Waggoner
  • International Horror Guild Award winners Michael A. Arnzen and Gary Braunbeck
  • Asimov’s Readers Award winner Timons Esaias
  • Arthur J. Rooney Award winner Jason Jack Miller
  • Pittsburgh City Paper Best Local Writer winner Brian Butko
  • American Library Association Notable Book Award winner Lynn Salsi
  • Eugene V. Debs Foundation Literature Prize winner Eric Leif Davin

FROM THE FOREWORD BY HEIDI RUBY MILLER:

“When someone I loved was diagnosed with stage 4 leukemia in the middle of the pandemic, I spiraled into an existential disquiet. Everything was going wrong everywhere, and I felt helpless. The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society was there for my family in so many ways, including guidance and emotional support. I wanted to help them and also give myself purpose. I did what I do best, I wrote…and I asked others for their writing with only two requests:

It must be upbeat.

It must be under 1500 words.

I heard the groans right through my email. That’s a pretty tight word limit. And, even those writers who weren’t part of the horror scene said they didn’t exactly go for upbeat in their projects. But they all agreed to try. And something unforeseen happened. My writing friends were experimenting with forms and genres, writing out of their comfort zones, sharing personal connections to cancer, to fear, to overcoming their sadness, and they thanked me for it.

Their willingness to search for the positive became an unexpected time capsule of perseverance and pushing onward when so many of us struggled to make it through one day at a time.”

To reserve your copy of LIKE SUNSHINE AFTER RAIN, visit  http://rawdogscreaming.com/books/like-sunshine-after-rain/.

LEUKEMIA AND LYMPHOMA SOCIETY MISSION:

“Cure leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin’s disease and myeloma, and improve the quality of life of patients and their families.”

https://donate.lls.org/lls/donate

Cover reveal: NIGHTLY OWL, FATAL RAVEN by Jessica McHugh

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Coming in June 2018, a dystopian fantasy novel from talented and prolific author Jessica McHugh and published by Raw Dog Screaming Press. Yesterday was the grand cover reveal for this novel, which I’m very excited about. McHugh and RDSP are a match made in the most twisted and best of dreams.

“Nightly Owl, Fatal Raven combines speculative world-building and a deep appreciation of the works of Shakespeare. This is a Fantasy novel with a fully-realized world of brutal struggles but it is also crafted with lyricism.

While the female protagonist who fights to change a heartless and cruel world will be familiar to readers of Dystopian fiction, the brutality and bitter battles echo the Grimdark movement in Fantasy and add an epic feel to this gritty adventure.

McHugh does not shrink from portraying the ugly realties of war but there is a kernal of hope amid all the darkness. Betrayal, revenge, memory and transformation through knowledge are themes explored in the novel. Readers who enjoyed Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games and Lois McMaster Bujold’s Paldin of Souls will be particularly interested in Nightly Owl, Fatal Raven.” — [Promotional Material]

The cover was designed by Jennifer Barnes, a co-founder of RDSP. Along with her husband, Jennifer does a huge amount of work to help make their publishing enterprise a success, and her contributions don’t always get the press or recognition they deserve. She’s done a great job on this cover, using a mixture of a dusk-like lightness with shadowy darkness to create just the right design/mood for capturing interest in the creepy and beautifully demented patterns of McHugh’s writing and vivid characters.

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Debuting 14th June 2018 • PRE-ORDER

Funerals are usually the end of the story, not the beginning.

Since the rise of The Council, an oligarchy of despots and deviants, the legendary Capesman undertakes daily soul collections from Cartesia’s wasteland cities and battlefields. He also frequents Malay Prison, where a vigilante named Shal plots her escape. Armed with a thirst for vengeance and a sharp Shakespearean tongue, Shal must navigate a maze of trauma to save Cartesia and protect her sister from the brutal machinations of Chancellor Doa.

It will require all of Shal’s strength and cunning to resurrect her former army, battle the betrayals of the past, and avenge her father’s death. Will she survive long enough to see the Council fall, or is the Capesman coming for her next?

 

About the Author: Jessica McHugh

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Jessica McHugh is a novelist and internationally produced playwright running amok in the fields of horror, sci-fi, young adult, and wherever else her peculiar mind leads. She’s had twenty-two books published in ten years, including her bizarro romp, The Green Kangaroos, her Post Mortem Press bestseller, Rabbits in the Garden, and her YA series, “The Darla Decker Diaries.”

Visit the Hook of a Book Facebook Event page for Nightly Owl, Fatal Raven to view videos by McHugh and enter a contest to win a copy of her new novel.

Debuting 14th June 2018 • PRE-ORDER

 

Eric Nyquist Cover Reveal: CHILDREN OF THE DIFFERENT by S.C. Flynn

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This week’s reviews are still being written amid the Molecular Genetics of Bacteria and Phage conference, but in the meantime I have some other items to quick post, including the reveal of this excellent cover for a title that I’m looking forward to reading. Look for my upcoming review of it coming toward the end of this month. For now, perhaps the premise interests you too:

Here is the cover created by Californian artist Eric Nyquist for S.C. Flynn’s Australian post-apocalyptic fantasy novel CHILDREN OF THE DIFFERENT. The novel releases on September 10 in ebook, paperback and audiobook and the ebook version is available now for pre-order on Kindle:(Amazon US), (Amazon UK) or (Amazon Australia).

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Nineteen years ago, a brain disease known as the Great Madness killed most of the world’s population. The survivors all had something different about their minds. Now, at the start of adolescence, their children enter a trance-like state known as the Changeland and emerge either with special mental powers or as cannibalistic Ferals.

In the great forest of South West Western Australia, thirteen-year-old Arika and her twin brother Narrah go through the Changeland. They encounter an enemy known as the Anteater who feeds on human life. He exists both in the Changeland and in the outside world, and he wants the twins dead.

After their Changings, the twins have powers that let them fight their enemy and face their destiny on a long journey to an abandoned American military base on the north-west coast of Australia…if they can reach it before time runs out.

Read more about Flynn’s take on the cover, and find an extract of the novel to read, on his Goodreads blog.

Cover reveal: STEEL MAGIC by J.L. Gribble

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I have been away for FAR too long, but I’m pleased to come back to making updates and posting new reviews starting with a cover reveal for a book from Raw Dog Screaming Press that I’m really excited to dig into:

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Debuting 6th July 2016 • PRE-ORDER

Funerals are usually the end of the story, not the beginning.

Newly graduated warrior-mages Toria Connor and Kane Nalamas find themselves the last remaining mages in the city when a mage school teacher mysteriously falls ill and dies. But taking over the school themselves isn’t in the cards. They’re set to become professional mercenaries-if they make it through the next 18 months as journeymen first.

The debate over whether to hunt mutated monsters in the Wasteland or take posh bodyguard jobs is put on hold when a city elder hires them to solve the mystery of the disappearing mages. Toria and Kane’s quest brings them to the British colonial city of New Angouleme, where their initial investigation reveals that the problem is even greater than they feared.

But when a friend is kidnapped, they’ll have to travel to the other side of the globe to save her, save themselves, and save magic itself.

I previously read the first book, STEEL VICTORY, in Gribble’s Steel Empire series. It is a very entertaining urban fantasy / alternate history, and I recommend checking it out if you haven’t yet. Gribble’s characters stood out particularly strongly for me. So I’m eager to see what new directions they go in development.

Debuting 6th July 2016 • PRE-ORDER

About the Cover Artist:  Bradley Sharp

Bradley Sharp was born in 1977 in Oxfordshire, UK. From a young age he filled many sketch books, so it only made sense to study Graphic Communication at Nene University, where he received a BA Honors degree in 1997.

But the real world called Sharp away from academics, so he traveled around the globe a couple of times, working as a graphic designer. Now he makes a living by designing magazine spreads, but freelances with vector illustrations, allowing him to create something far-removed from what he does in his nine-to-five job.

Sharp finds vector to be an easy tool and believes anyone can use it. “I’d say my artwork is nothing more than glorified doodling. I like the logical inconsistencies of surrealism and find inspiration from many places such as music or the science fiction genre. Dog Star’s novels lend themselves well to my style. I look forward to working with DSB in the future, and hope fans will like the imagery as much as they enjoy the words.” Find Sharp’s work online at his website.

About the Author: J.L. Gribble

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By day, J. L. Gribble is a professional medical editor. By night, she does freelance fiction editing in all genres, along with reading, playing video games, and occasionally even writing. She is currently working on the Steel Empires series for Dog Star Books, the science-fiction/adventure imprint of Raw Dog Screaming Press. Previously, she was an editor for the Far Worlds anthology.

Gribble studied English at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. She received her Master’s degree in Writing Popular Fiction from Seton Hill University in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, where her debut novel Steel Victory was her thesis for the program.

She lives in Ellicott City, Maryland, with her husband and three vocal Siamese cats. Find her online on her website, Facebook , on Twitter, and on Instagram.

 

Cover Reveal – THE UNDERSIDE OF THE RAINBOW: Poetry by B.E. Burkhead

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I’m pleased to take part in the cover reveal for this gorgeous upcoming Raw Dog Screaming Press poetry collection by B.E. Burkhead. Look for it in July.

Unveiling the Rainbow

Artist Steven Archer has created a raw, textured cover to match B.E. Burkhead’s gritty, and unapologetic realism. In this poetry collection Burkhead shows readers what happens when they take off their rose-colored glasses and look at the world around them.

Instead of fields of freshly grown flowers, he writes of alleys with broken bottles and hypodermic needles, no happily-ever-afters, just blunt and honest truths, sometimes with endings, sometimes without. Just as life doesn’t hand out answers, Burkhead doesn’t sugarcoat its truths.

UndersideCover

Coming in July

You can pre-order this collection now!

“Underside took me on an unexpected emotional journey I relished long after reading. To me that’s the mark of a damn fine collection–and one that will remain in my library forever.” —Jessica McHugh, author of The Green Kangaroos

“There is a blatant honesty, an abject truth in B. E. Burkhead’s words, which is not buoyantly hateful, but bleakly hopeful.”—G. Arthur Brown, author of Kitten

About the Artist

Steven Archer is an artist and musician living in Baltimore, MD. When not recording, DJing, or producing art, he and his wife, author Donna Lynch, tour with their dark electronic rock band Ego Likeness. He has a BFA from the Corcoran School of Art in Washington DC and has shown his work at galleries and other venues throughout the east coast.  His work has also been shown internationally in the form of album art and magazine illustrations. He is the author and illustrator of the children’s book Luna Maris. For more information about Ego Likeness, please visitwww.egolikeness.com. Steven’s solo electronic project can be found at www.hopefulmachines.net.

About the Author

Born dead to a barren woman, B. E. Burkhead is a poet, writer and artist. He lives on the vestigial tail of Maryland with his wife, son and an army of starving cats. The Underside of the Rainbow is his first book of collected poetry.

[Title, artist, and author information from RDSP]

Books of Note: THE SALT ROADS, by Nalo Hopkinson and STEEL VICTORY, by J.l. Gribble

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As I now get back into catching up on reviews of things I have read, I wanted to mention two books that I’m excited about, but haven’t gotten to read yet.

The first was first released back in 2004, but just had an e-reader release from Open Road Media at the very end of January: THE SALT ROADS, by Nalo Hopkinson. I’ve heard nothing but utter praise for Hopkinson, including from writer Juno Diaz, so I’ve been looking forward to reading her work and regretted having to turn down the chance to review it. But I still feel comfortable in recommending it as something worth looking into if you missed it.

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From Open Road Media:

“Nalo Hopkinson’s third novel invokes the goddess of love in the name of redemption

Hopkinson’s time-traveling, genre-spanning novel weaves a common thread of spiritualism and hope through three intertwined stories of women possessed by Ezili, the goddess of love, as she inspires, inhabits, and guides them through trying personal and historical moments. Jeanne Duval is a talented entertainer suffering from the ravages of a sexually transmitted disease; Mer is a slave and talented doctor who bears witness as Saint Domingue throws off the yoke of colonial rule in the early nineteenth century; and Meritet is a woman of the night who finds religion her own way. Though the three are separated by many miles and centuries, a powerful bond draws them together.

Epic, wrenching, and passionate, The Salt Roads is laced with graceful, lyrical prose. Hopkinson has crafted a one-of-a-kind novel that spans hundreds of years and multiple countries to tell a mystical, heartrending story of self-worth, respect, and salvation.”

The second title I’m really looking forward to is STEEL VICTORY, an upcoming title now available for preorder from Dog Star Books (Raw Dog Screaming Press), written by J.L. Gribble. Out in June, today was the cover reveal and exclusive spotlight on the novel at Dirge Magazine. It looks fantastic with another superb cover for this small press by Brad Sharp. I look forward to getting my paws on a copy.

Steel Victory

From Raw Dog Screaming Press:

“One hundred years ago, the vampire Victory retired from a centuries-long mercenary career. She settled in Limani, the independent city-state acting as a neutral zone between the British and Roman colonies on the New Continent.

Twenty years ago, Victory adopted a human baby girl, who soon showed signs of magical ability.

Today, Victory is a city councilwoman, balancing the human and supernatural populations within Limani. Her daughter Toria is a warrior-mage, balancing life as an apprentice mercenary with college chemistry courses.

Tomorrow, the Roman Empire invades.”

Cover reveal: MR. WICKER by Maria Alexander

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I’m happy to take part in the cover reveal for this upcoming release from Raw Dog Screaming Press. The gothic elements of the plot description and the combination of the sinister and books is right up my ally at least. The cover design by Ryan Rice has me intrigued with the melting wax-like text and the subtle freakishness of the shadows: a reversal, a change in the number of books stacked and the bird’s postures. I’m looking forward to checking this out, and if it sounds like your kind of thing, you should check it out too. You can also sign up for a chance to win a copy through Goodreads.

Cover created by artist Ryan Rice

Debuting 9/16 • PRE-ORDER for $2 off

Mr. Wicker Cover

Mr. Wicker by Maria Alexander

Alicia Baum is missing a deadly childhood memory. Located beyond life, The Library of Lost Childhood Memories holds the answer. The Librarian is Mr. Wicker — a seductive yet sinister creature with an unthinkable past and an agenda just as lethal. After committing suicide, Alicia finds herself before the Librarian, who informs her that her lost memory is not only the reason she took her life, but the cause of every bad thing that has happened to her.

Alicia spurns Mr. Wicker and attempts to enter the hereafter without the Book that would make her spirit whole. But instead of the oblivion she craves, she finds herself in a psychiatric hold at Bayford Hospital, where the staff is more pernicious than its patients.

Child psychiatrist Dr. James Farron is researching an unusual phenomenon: traumatized children whisper to a mysterious figure in their sleep. When they awaken, they forget both the traumatic event and the character that kept them company in their dreams — someone they call “Mr. Wicker.”

During an emergency room shift, Dr. Farron hears an unconscious Alicia talking to Mr. Wicker—the first time he’s heard of an adult speaking to the presence. Drawn to the mystery, and then to each other, they team up to find the memory before it annihilates Alicia for good. To do so they must struggle not only against Mr. Wicker’s passions, but also a powerful attraction that threatens to derail her search, ruin Dr. Farron’s career, and inflame the Librarian’s fury.

After all, Mr. Wicker wants Alicia to himself, and will destroy anyone to get what he wants. Even Alicia herself.

 

Praise for Mr. Wicker

“Elegant chills, genuine awe, and true tragedy are all ingredients in the spell cast by Maria Alexander’s Mr. Wicker. Anyone who has encountered Maria’s short stories surely expects her first novel to be extraordinary, and she doesn’t disappoint. Mr. Wicker is rich, lovely, and deeply unnerving.” —Lisa Morton, author of Malediction and Trick or Treat: A History of Halloween