A thrilling new-to-me writer

I know quite a bit of time has slipped by since I last posted, when I promised to give my take on the book THINGS HAVE ONLY GOTTEN WORSE SINCE WE LAST SPOKE, AND OTHER MISFORTUNES, by Eric LaRocca.

Part of that has been just plain old procrastination, a particular skill I have spent years developing. The other part is that I've been a little unsure how to describe this work.

First, it's not a novel, but a collection – a novella, a longish short story, then a small short story. I enjoyed this particular aspect of the book, or collection, simply because it's so rare today. In the modern book world, at least among the big boys of the traditional publishing world (and the wanna-be big boys), it's uncommon to see a book published that doesn't hit the prescribed word length for a novel. That length is different in the different genres – horror is generally around 80,000 words, I believe – but long gone are the days when a novella, or a novella with a couple of short stories, were regular finds at a book store.

So I was immediately drawn to this one as a simple nod to my younger days, when I would pick up these types of books at stores or library sales.

Now for the content.

Wow.

The first tale, the novella “Things Have Only Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke,” is one of the most exciting macabre stories I've ready in years! (And I never, ever do exclamation points – at the paper where I'm editor, I've always told my writers they are allowed one exclamation point a year, and even then they better be ready to justify it when I ask).

There is a Six Sense-level ending to this one.

The story is engaging, set back in the early days of the internet when folks could communicate with one another through rudimentary chat services. That's what's going on here, when two women meet by chance in the virtual world. One of them, a needy and lonely individual named Agnes, has resorted to selling a family heirloom, an apple peeler, to raise some much-needed money to pay her bills.

She comes across Zoe, a woman of means who is interested in the peeler. She appears to be a kind-hearted soul, going so far as to tell Agnes to keep the peeler – which has great sentimental value to Agnes -- while at the same time extending financial support to Agnes. From there grows a tangled, increasingly perverse relationship that eventually ends with...well, I won't spoil the work, because this is absolutely stunning at the end. Like the aforementioned Six Sense movie, the final line just stopped me in my tracks. It's the kind of ending I didn't see coming yet when it happened in the instant I finished reading, I could see every clue, every marker pointing to how this was going to play out – things that I should have picked up earlier.

I didn't, and that's because LaRocca does an exceptional job of story telling, building characters and weaving their lives together in a way that draws the reader in, yet doesn't give away too much. This one story made the entire book worth it.

The second tale, “The Enchantment,” is centered on a couple grieving the loss of their son, at some point in the not-too-distant future when science has supposedly proven, beyond any doubt, there is no after-life: Whatever we get here on earth is the whole ball of wax.

As part of their grieving process, the couple takes a position on a resort island as caretakers during the off season. Not long after everyone else packs up and leaves, a stranger – a young man not much older than their late son – shows up, and their life is thrown into turmoil. Soon enough, they begin to learn that science may not be right, and the afterlife may not be all they had hoped.

For me, this story was a study in story-telling. It was an extremely well written tale, an engaging story with building conflict that kept me turning the pages. For my money, the ending left me a little flat, but that was just me – most reviews I've read rave about this one as much as first story.

The third tale, “You'll Find It's Like That All Over,” was a fun little examination of the dangers of being too polite just for the sake of being polite (or maybe just for the sake of appearances), and the dangers of getting caught up in an escalating series of bets by the protagonist, known simply as Mr. Fowler. He finds what appears to be the fragment of a bone in his yard, which leads him to his neighbor's house, Mr. Perlzig. The neighbor turns out to be a master manipulator, who leads Mr. Fowler down a path of increasingly lucrative, but dangerous, bets. I won't tell you how this ends, but I will say there is a guillotine put to use before the story concludes.

All in all, this was an enjoyable book. The second and third tales were good reads, but that first one was fantastic. As if you couldn't already figure this one out, I would recommend you grab a copy of this and get to reading!

Excerpt 7 -- This hearse is looking for a body...

An excerpt from The Hearse...

Rylan was fantasizing about sleep when he glanced in his rearview mirror. His gaze locked on what he saw there. Two headlights, roughly fifty yards away, he guessed. Behind the headlights was the outline of a hearse. From this distance, in the dead of the night, Rylan knew he shouldn’t be able to make out anything behind the headlights. But the hearse was clearly visible. It was black. All hearses are black. An odd bluish glow enveloped the vehicle, bringing out details that should not have been visible.

At the sight of the hearse Trish’s first words, what she told when he arrived at her house, came flooding back. She said she was convinced someone killed Randy, even though he was found lying in the kitchen floor, felled by a heart attack in the middle of the night. Trish said she thought someone had been stalking Randy – that for two days before he died Randy said he kept seeing a hearse following him around town.

She said Randy only glimpsed it at first – catching a reflection in the mirror, then it would be gone. Later that day every time he went out he saw it, following him, or parked in the same garage. He had told her the same thing happened the day he died.

Trish said Randy was convinced he was going to die, that the hearse was some sort of harbinger. She thought it was something more easily explained, though just as sinister – a stalker. She didn’t know why, or have any idea by whom, but to her that explanation made more sense than her thirty-seven-year-old husband dropping dead in the kitchen floor.

She had shared this with the police, but they treated her like a hysterical wife, too distraught over her husband’s death to think clearly. Rylan didn’t respond to her suspicions. Truth was, he thought the same as the police. The medical examiner had pronounced the cause of death most likely a heart attack, with no reason to investigate further. Case closed. Now Rylan wished he had paid more attention to her, asked her more about the hearse, about what happened leading up to Randy’s death.

Rylan glared nervously at the mirror, the sleep that had been dancing at the edges of his mind now gone. Rylan glanced at the speedometer – sixty-five. He nudged the cruise control a bit until the speedometer read seventy, then looked back at the mirror.

The hearse matched his speed, staying the same distance behind.

He tapped the cruise control button twice more, pushing the speed to seventy-five. He kept his eyes on the road ahead, too scared to look in the mirror. Finally, after several minutes he did glance at the mirror. The hearse was still there, keeping pace.

Rylan mashed the accelerator. The speedometer shot up, past eighty, past ninety. Rylan knew there was a good chance he would trip some state trooper’s radar, end up with a ticket, feeling silly that he had let a simple hearse spook him. He didn’t care.
Feeling silly explaining all this to a cop would be a relief. The speedometer passed ninety-five, inched close to one hundred.

Rylan kept his eyes on the road ahead of him, as nervous about driving at this speed as he was about the hearse tailing him. He glanced at the dashboard clock – one forty-five. He kept driving, his focus on the road ahead, not wanting to look in the mirror until he’d left the hearse behind. He drove and glanced at the clock, repeating the process as the clock ticked off one minute, then two, three, four, five. Another minute later Rylan could stand it no longer. He looked in the mirror.

Still roughly fifty yards behind the hearse followed.

“Damn,” Rylan whispered.

He lifted his foot from the accelerator and gently pressed the brake. The speedometer dropped – eighty, seventy, sixty, fifty.

Rylan looked in the mirror. The hearse slowed, keeping the same distance between them.
*****
For just 99 cents you can read the rest of The Hearse, as well as all the stories in my collection THE ALCHEMIST & OTHER DARK TALES (sale ends, soon, though!). Download here for your Kindle, or here for your Nook.

Mother's Last Wish...

Day two of Ten Days of Excerpts from my collection, THE ALCHEMIST & OTHER DARK TALES.

Today's excerpt, from the story Mother's Last Wish, examines what is ultimately the worst horror for us all -- death -- and how the world might be different if we could avoid dying. If everyone could avoid death.

*****

A high-pitched hum, worse than any alarm clock, invaded his sleep. Sonny woke, the fading light of dusk adding a melancholy mood to the room, and remembered he was alone, in his mother’s bed.

The hum grew louder. Sonny sat, glancing around for its source.

Lying on the bed next to him the music box vibrated with the hum, a pulsing pink light surrounding it.

Eyes wide, heart hammering, Sonny scrambled across the bed, away from the light and sound.

The glow drifted up from the box, formed a small globe of light floating next to the bed. It changed from pink to yellow, then red, followed by purple, brightening with each change, the hum growing louder. The light expanded to the size of a basketball, turned white, so brilliant Sonny closed his eyes. He placed his hands over his ears, shielding them from the loud, piercing whine emanating from the light.

He screamed. The whine grew so loud he could not hear his own voice, the light so bright his eyes burned, even while closed.

“No,” he called.

It stopped.

Sonny took his hands from his ears and peeked through partially-open eyelids.

Standing in the bedroom was a woman, dressed in a sheer, billowing emerald green robe, a soft white glow surrounding her.
Sonny’s eyes snapped open, breath caught in his throat.

Gorgeous was the word that popped in his head.

The woman was tall, at least equal to Sonny’s five-foot-nine frame, and slender. Red hair fell in loose curls around a lightly freckled face. Her eyes glowed bright and green. She smiled, lips full and red, teeth brilliant white.

“Who are you?”

“My name is Anu,” she said, her voice musical in quality.

“What do you want?”

“I want nothing, dear boy.” Anu cupped Sonny’s face, her touch warm, intoxicating. “I come to fulfill your mother’s wish.”

“I don’t understand. My mother?” Speaking of his mother sent a wave of fresh, raw grief over Sonny. Tears welled in his eyes.

“Come,” she said, pulling Sonny toward her, resting his head on her chest, stroking slender fingers through his hair. Her touch brought memories of his mother, running her fingers through his hair while he was a boy. He sobbed. Anu put her arms around him, rocked gently until his cries faded.

“Your mother loved you very much. You did not know at the time, but you gave her a very special gift. The music box you presented to her is older than you can know. It holds my spirit, and the family which owns it three wishes I must grant.”

“Three wishes?”

“Yes. Over many centuries I have granted wishes – victory in battles, riches beyond measure, long life. But your mother simply asked for two things.”

Sonny pulled away, looked into Anu’s eyes.

“What?”

“Do you remember buying the music box with your father?”

“Yes?”

“Do you remember where you bought it?”

“At a thrift store, because we couldn’t afford to shop anywhere else.”

“Yes. You were very ill. Your parents put all their money into doctor visits, drugs, hoping desperately to find a cure. You were dying, and there was nothing any healer could do. When I revealed myself to your mother, she wished for your health, and it was given back to you.”

“The second wish?”

“She held onto that until you went away to study. She wished simply for your success.”

Sonny reflected on his life. He had been successful, more than he had dared dream when he left for college. Studies came easily, unnaturally so, and after college more job offers than he could have imagined. He took what he believed to be the best, advanced quickly, soon found himself in the upper management of the firm, enough money to buy anything, to go anywhere.

He lavished his mother with vacations, gifts, cars, but she had never wanted to move from the simple house where he had grown up, so they remained.

Some said he seemed to live a charmed life. Now he understood why.

“The third wish?”

“She saved that for you. She set me free to roam the world, the only condition I return upon her passing, grant you the final wish.”

Sonny rubbed his eyes, leaned and rested his elbows on his knees.

“Anything I want?”

“Yes, my boy, but please do not ask me to bring your mother back?”

He stood, voice tinged with anger.

“You said anything. Any wish.”

“If that is your wish, I can restore life to your mother’s corpse, but it will not be her. She has passed to another world, across a great chasm I cannot cross. Raise her body? That I can do, but her soul will be gone. She will be gone.”

Sonny turned, paced across the room, hands atop his head. He whirled back to face Anu.

“Why do you torment me? You offer me a wish, yet tell me the one thing I desire I cannot have.”

Anu said nothing. Sonny stared, again struck by her simple beauty.

“No more death,” he said.

“Is that truly your wish?”

“Yes. Never again should anyone face grief. No more death. Ever.”

“It is so.”

*****

For more of Mother's Last Wish and the entire collection THE ALCHEMIST & OTHER DARK TALES, click here to download to your Kindle, or here to download to your Nook.

A Mother's Love

Well, I'm a couple of days late with this (and I'm almost always more than a few dollars short), but today I'm starting ten straight days of excerpts, a different one from each of my stories in the collection THE ALCHEMIST & OTHER DARK TALES.

Today's dark treat comes from my story, A MOTHER'S LOVE, and takes a look at just how far a mother will go to save every child should be saved.

*****

Amy Jennings stands on her front lawn, staring into the empty street. Fog-shrouded street lamps cast a ghostly pallor over the neighborhood. Amy shivers. She is clad only in a nightgown and her husband’s trench coat, which gives scant warmth. Memories — pushing Adam on the swing, playing tag with her little boy and her husband, picnicking on the back deck — swirl through her mind like leaves stirred by the late night breeze. Recollections of a time now gone, taken under cover of night.

Behind her activity fills the lawn, the house. Men in uniforms search, those in suits and ties talk with her husband, with neighbors. She hears them, noises meant to show activity, attention, though the results will be nil.

Amy knows this. She’s been there, in her own detective clothes. We will do everything possible. We have every available person working this case. We have a nationwide alert out, his description sent to every law enforcement agency in the country. We’ve had good success. We are hopeful.

She has recited the statements a hundred times over — Amy’s worked half the childhood kidnappings in the Mid-west over the past decade -- and she's well practiced at the empty words that leave the promise of hope while making no commitments, no hints at the truth.

Your child is gone. Unless we’re lucky, you’ll never see him again. His fate is sealed. Tonight, maybe next week, perhaps in a month, he will die. And it won’t go easy.

That’s what Amy thinks every time she mouths the words of cautioned hope. Those are the thoughts behind the practiced, non-committal statements the men and women give tonight.

Amy walks across the wet grass. Fear flashes through her. Terror. Panic. He was here, on this spot. Amy falls to the ground, her hands tracing the path of horror, Adam’s emotions still alive, traceable, as clear to her as a trail of blood. She’s felt this before. Her “gift” everyone calls it. The ability has made her a kidnapping specialist, not because of her powers of observation or ability to out-think criminals, but simply because Amy can feel the emotions of those who have been taken, track their movements.

Tonight is different. Her stomach knots, the taste of bile seeps into her mouth. No professional detachment, just a battle to hold her emotions in check.

Amy climbs to her feet and marches by the men and women in uniform, the detectives in the living room, ignoring the “Mrs. Jennings,” and “Are you okay?” Fifteen minutes later Amy pulls from her garage, stopping only because one of the uniforms stands in her way. She recognizes him as the shift captain.

“Amy, where are you going?”

“Out.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Am I under suspicion?”

“Should you be?”

“Captain, step away from the car. I’m leaving.”

“The FBI response team will be here momentaril—”

“I’m a member of the goddamned response team, remember? I’m the one who leads them to the …” She cannot finish the sentence. “Get away from the car.” Amy mashes the accelerator. On the street, even with the car between her and the pavement, she still feels it, like an ache in bones. Terror. Dread.

*****

To read the rest of A MOTHER'S LOVE, and the full collection THE ALCHEMIST & OTHER DARK TALES, click here for your Kindle or here for your Nook.