Tis the Season to be Scary!

Well, kids, we've reached that magical time of year. It's a good time to curl up and read a good scare or two. At a good price ($2.99 & $1 Kindle// $5 each on paperback) you can get these scary reads for your Halloween needs!

Sharp Items & Bad Intentions
https://www.amazon.com/Sharp-Intentions-Christopher-Michael-Carter-ebook/dp/B075TJ6YY7/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1509124750&sr=8-1&keywords=sharp+items+and+bad+intentions

Beyond the Wall
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B076W3Q54Y/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1509117088&sr=1-1

Beyond the Wall - Out Now!

My second surprise release of 2017 is out now! Beyond the Wall is my second self-publication and the ebook is available through Amazon.

With Last Rites of the Capacitance around the corner (5 days!) this year has been a productive one of older material. Much like how my poetry work is from many moons ago, and like its brethren Sharp Items & Bad Intentions, Beyond the Wall had been chillin' in some files for a bit. Other than some small connections, the two horror anthologies share a history in their form. I stated a few posts back that the stories in Sharp Items began as individual screenplays and that's how the majority of Beyond the Wall came about. I transferred the style from the screenplay to this and sat on it for a while as I tended to other things. I sent it to my aunt Wanda Hoffman, who edited Sharp Items, and she cleaned it up for me to get it presentable.

The stories have a framing story. The tales within come from different places. The first, Destination Unclear, came from a messed up dream I had. The dream itself is featured as a scene in the story. The second, Bad Day, was actually a little short script I had originally written just after high school. When it comes to ideas and stories, I'm a packrat, so it stuck around until I converted it for this anthology. This story was actually a last minute inclusion as the entirety of Beyond the Wall was all done and finished as a complete anthology screenplay ala Creepshow. It was included after the script was converted. The third, Switchblade Nuns, was another old idea of mine just floating around in my head. I didn't really know what I wanted to do with it so it eventually came in handy when writing the screenplay. The same can be said for the fourth tale, Mounted. Originally title The Mounting, this story was conceived around the same time as Switchblade Nuns and, like that story, it sat around among various file folders full of stories and ideas. While it retains the same brutality of Sharp Items & Bad Intentions, Beyond the Wall is a bit more multicolored. A gruesome set of stories told to us by a rather calm, albeit eccentric gentleman. If you enjoy a quick read, it's only $1 on Amazon. Check it out now!

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B076W3Q54Y/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1509117088&sr=1-1

Boarding the Capacitance

“We came to find a cure, and what we found was death.”

      In less than a month my first novel will be out. It's kind of a trip. I've touched on this before, a while back anyway, but I'll catch you up to speed since it'll be coming soon. No spoilers, don't worry. In 2015 I'd signed the deal to be published. The book came out in February of 2016. I was thrilled. I felt like a "real writer." While I was happy and proud, there was this feeling I had got from most people upon hearing that it was poetry almost as if "That's cool...but when are you gonna, y'know, really write something." I had just recently returned to a short story writing and had just signed a contract for Gun Control for Polar Bears. No real plans of writing novels or anything like that. I just kept trying to grow.

      While we waited for the artwork and printing of the poetry book, I had been perusing my new employer's website when I saw a thematic submission: Sci-Fi As Hard As Ice. I thought, 'I've just started being able to finish short stories and I'm still writing scripts. Novels are for real writer-writers, not writers like myself who just does these weird little things. But I guess it couldn't hurt to try. I've always loved science fiction. I can see if I can do it and if not, then I was right and should just stick to these other things.' Being a LGBT lit company, the rules to this particular submission was along the lines of "Story has to be hard sci-fi, the lead has to be gay, and the word count has to be over 40k (I believe)."

      I love hard sci-fi. My favorite sci-fi has always been cold and calculated. It just perks my interest more so than other kinds. 'Hard' science fiction is more based around science and not so much fantastical elements. In example: 2001: A Space Odyssey would be considered more hard sci-fi while something like Star Wars is a bit more fantasy-like. A lot of people think hard sci-fi isn't as fun as the science fiction adventure stories but I argue that it's just as fun, it's just a more mental and cerebral fun - something that gets your brain working.

      The lead being gay didn't faze me at all. I'm a straight man but I realize the laws of attraction and affection are the same as in 'the straight world' it's just the gender is different. Someone close to me had once asked me if I was okay writing gay-lit and having that on my list of accomplishments. I found the question a little short-sighted and closed-minded, as if I'm an actor who can't get a gig so I go into gay porn. I had told them that I want to write great stories and if the characters or straight or gay, it doesn't matter. I also put it in perspective for them using a movie as an example. I brought up the wonderful horror film High Tension, which we're both fans of. I pointed out to them that it's actually, at the root of it, a lesbian love story. My friend said 'What!? No!' I explained the movie, despite them knowing it well, beat for beat, proving my point. They were stumped. I said 'Yeah, you don't look at it as a lesbian love story, you look at it as a bad ass horror movie.'

      So the content and the character's personal lives didn't really bother me - what scared the hell out of me was that word count! I thought 'That's gonna do me in. I can barely finish short stories, how in the hell am I supposed to write a n-n-n-novel? A grown up book.' So I pressed forward anyway. I had a feeling I'd fail, let it go, and go back to what I was trying to do. Now for the story - what do I know that I could use in such a technical science fiction story? Well, I have multiple sclerosis and I've spent (and spend) plenty of time at hospitals. Learning about a disease like MS anyway is like reading intricate sci-fi. Less than a couple of months before reading this submission post I had been trying to work with my brother on some things. Though I had tried many times, he was never interested. One of the things I'd proposed to him was a space story where the entire text was be from the Captain's Log as the survivor's journal. When I was kicking around ideas for what Supposed Crimes had put out there I decided to use that. I had asked my brother first if he was cool with that, and of course he was as he didn't really want to work on something anyway. So it was set - medical science, space, story told in journal form, gay lead, got it.

      Now, when I started on this, to say I was green was an understatement. I didn't pay attention to the rules of literary prose, I just wrote something I'd want to read. I thought of my story and the format. I wrote an outline and sent it to my publisher. This is late 2015, my first book hadn't been published yet. For the longest time, I'd wondered how artists were able to secure projects before something was released. Now I know. Had it not been for them taking in that little poetry book, I wouldn't have ever written Last Rites of the Capacitance or anything else I've come up with for them. She read the outline and liked it and pressed for me to continue. I did so but there were some weird curveballs. I tried to keep it realistic as possible which kept pulling it away from an actual science fiction feel. So the 'harder' I'd try to go in the subgenre, the further I got away from the genre in general. It was a weird fine line.

      Every time I came up with an idea, I brushed it off thinking 'Nah, they wouldn't like that. It's probably too weird and out there or just not a fit for the subgenre of hard sci-fi.' I'd send more of the rough draft to her and I'd get notes. No lie, almost every single note was exactly what I'd taken out of it. Only one note was one I didn't think of prior and it wasn't used simply because it didn't fit the story. So my publisher and editor, Christy Case, had told me "That's great! Go with your gut! Don't second guess yourself!" So there were considerable changes made from the original outline - for the better. Then there was one other - the format. In the midst of writing the original draft I had the thought of 'You know, some of this is really hard to get a good effect using just journal entries. I guess I could do found footage, explaining all the security camera footage of the ship. Buuuuut that's a whole lotta work and I don't wanna do that.' The next email of note came to the inbox. In this email, she suggested "Have you thought of maybe doing it like found footage? Aren't there security cameras?" So of course I thought 'Son. Of. A. Bitch.' I got to work pretty quickly on reshaping the book. Now it's a mix of found footage, journal entries, and more. It still defies the average literary prose format but it's not so one-note.

      I don't know about how many 'drafts' it went through but I know there were about four extensive edits between myself, Christy, and another editor (I didn't catch her name actually). As I said, I was green and any long-writing I had in me was in a fetal stage so the book was a mess and together we shaped it into something. The release date had changed a couple of times because of that shaping. While it felt like it took forever, in hindsight it wasn't that long at all. I wrote the original rough draft around October two years ago. The edits became more extensive and lengthy. In that time I wrote a lot more and grew more as a writer - of course, the world has yet to see it beyond Sharp Items & Bad Intentions. Not long ago the work came to a close and I saw the finished product.

      My personal copies came in the mail a day or so after my father went into the hospital so it was bittersweet. Even after my father had gotten well enough to leave the hospital, it still hasn't hit me. I see it on the coffee table alongside poetry books. I'm proud of it but it still hasn't dawned on me that I've done something I never thought I'd do. Not only did I not fail and move on but I actually like what's been created - which, if you know me, then you know is weird for me because I'm not exactly my biggest fan. Most of the time, I hate reading back on my stuff. I dreaded having to read this but there was enough time that had passed during it's editing and I was pleasantly surprised when I read it. I told Christy "Strange, I don't hate this. I love it. This is something I would read."

      I wasn't sure if my wife would read it. She doesn't share the same affinity for the sci-fi subgenre as I do. When my friends and I went to the movies the other night, she read it cover-to-cover. The only thing she knew about it prior was the fact that it was a sci-fi book. When I got back I was surprised that she actually liked it and thought it was good. Some people would say "Yeah, but that's your wife, she's gonna say that." Nope. My wife is no 'Yes Woman', if she doesn't like something of mine, I hear about it. "C'mon, you're a writer, you can do better than THAT." or "Eh, that needs a hard edit...or just delete it and do something else." Plenty of "That's no good." So there's no bias in this house haha. She got it and she got into the characters and the story and situations. One thing I was extra proud of in her review was her skepticism that I was the one who wrote it. Of course, it could come off bad to some, like "It's really smart - I didn't think you wrote it." However, for me, it was a compliment. That's what I wanted - not only for people to love the book but for the people who know me to do a double take.

      Throughout the writing of it I was so worried that it was terrible and that I would get raked over the coals for writing such a piece of crap. My wife told me "If it was terrible, they never would've published it." Point taken. Now, in the time between the writing and release I'm more worried that either no one will like it or no one will read it. Other than my publisher and editor, the only person to read it has been my wife (honestly, I thought she'd hate it so her response was a surprise) so I won't fully know until you all get to see it.

      If you've read my poetry, my horror anthology, or any of my stuff on this blog, hell, even if you just know me personally, then you know that my brain is like a kaleidoscope of ideas - so it's a bit hard to put all that it entails into its simple synopsis or logline. Once I stopped trying to censor myself, I just started writing and brainstorming onto the page and, looking back at it, it's quite loaded for its size. I'd list all the things explored in it but I don't want to give it away. You'll have to go in blind like the Mrs. did. Incidentally, much like the birth of this book, I came up with a different science fiction novel for Supposed Crimes and, while working on an edit of this book, I pitched it. My publisher loves the idea. Though I've been busy with so much lately, I've started on it. And since I've grown at least a different shade of green, I'm confident that the next one will take less nurturing.

      When it came time for the cover of Gun Control for Polar Bears to be done, I was asked if I had any ideas. I made a mock-up of an image. It was sent to an artist to reinterpret it and come up with what some of you now have on your shelves. This book was no different. I was trying to think of what the cover would be. I thought about how I didn't want people or creatures on it and so I went through the parts in my mind like a scene rolodex and I went to a very specific scene and sent that idea in. It was only slightly reinterpreted. We're proud of the cover just as we are with the work within.

      I hope you all board the Capacitance when it comes out on November 1st and I thank you for the time you took to read this. I appreciate it.

Deeper on Bad Intentions

Like a lot of things of mine, Sharp Items & Bad Intentions isn't exactly new. I've been working on so much throughout the years that nobody has seen that are just now getting a polish on and released (as seen with both Gun Control for Polar Bears and Reflections at Various Speeds).

I briefly covered this horror anthology before but I'll dig a little deeper.

The Slit started off as a horror film I was going to shoot myself. I was hoping to cast my brother as the pale, razor blade wielding killer. It never came to fruition of course and not many people at all knew about it. Originally titled 'Slit', I had struggled with changing it when years later I found a horror movie or two come out with the title. The Slitting, Slitting, etc. Eventually, I just settled on The Slit. I grew up on 80s slashers and this was basically me doing that. I had written it as a screenplay some time ago and quickly realized it wasn't exactly working in that format - mainly due to my inability to write for film correctly. Like most of my stuff, it just sat there for the longest time. I always loved writing in a script format - comics, plays, screenplays - but I always had trouble writing short stories. I would get a little bit into them before I'd become discouraged. But it all changed. I honestly don't remember what I was working on when it hit me, but I was working on yet another failed screenplay when I had noticed it was so detailed and more novel-like and it hit me, 'Maybe I could actually write this kind of style'. I simply adapted the screenplay which is why it reads as it does. If I had the time to go back and flesh it all out more (and this goes for the others) I'm not sure if I would because that was the writer I was when I wrote it. Like a snapshot in time. After adapting it to story form it, of course, remained on its lonesome, waiting.

All in a Day's Work I wrote originally as a really short story, about 8 pages, but more of a layout. I wrote it as a screenplay to the same feeling I had with the others. Much like The Slit was my take on the slasher subgenre, this was in part my take on the simple mild mannered man who snaps. In another part it was me taking my frustrations out after being unfairly fired from a previous job. I'm a writer. If I can't make a big (or absurd) change and if I can't take out an animal-like aggression in real life, I'll simply write it all out - create a world and an avatar of myself to do the things I'd never do in the real world. Another one that sat around for years before doing something with it. Much like wanting to do a slasher story, I've always liked the idea of the normal man who loses it so I decided to do it.

Big Prizes is probably my favorite of the three. It's the least slasher of the three as it's more of an abduction story. My wife and I were walking in the park and kicking around ideas for a movie that would eventually come to the idea of this. Like the others, it started off as a screenplay but changed. The idea of people being lured into a game leading to abduction became the basis. Though it's not as violent as the previous two, it's probably more tense, more suspenseful.

I wrestled for a while of what to do with these three before I decided to put them in a little anthology, an unapologetic, violent, slasher-heavy collection. Of everything of mine, I felt these three had that common violent theme so I put them together. All three of them have something personal in them, something from me or my life. When I was still kicking around what I was going to do with said anthology, I sent it to my aunt, Wanda Hoffman, to edit it. She frequently commented on how gross and violent it is but whipped it into shape. Originally titled Sharp Objects, I found that it was already a book. Though there's no rules against using similar or even the same titles, I'm not a fan of doing so. So I changed it to Sharp Items & Bad Intentions. I thought it summed it up well.

I kept the cover simple. It went through different variations before settling on this. There's a power in minimalist art. I could've gotten an artist to do it for me but I just wanted to do it regardless of my lack of art prowess. Maybe it's controlling nature but I just want to be involved in all of it.

This is my first foray into self-publishing. It's an ebook and I really doubt it ever gets to print. Who knows. I'm interested in doing more with some of these things I've had lying around while I push forward. Dennis Magnant and I are still hard at work on various comic book projects. I'm working on things for Supposed Crimes (beyond the upcoming Last Rites of the Capacitance). And I'm writing a lot more to send out to other publishers. If you read my poetry and want to see something different from me (before the release of Last Rites) then I hope you check out this straight forward horror collection.

You can get it here: https://www.amazon.com/Sharp-Intentions-Christopher-Michael-Carter-ebook/dp/B075TJ6YY7/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1507393973&sr=8-1&keywords=sharp+items+and+bad+intentions

More on Reflections

As I've stated before, most of Reflections at Various Speeds consists of old lyrics of mine with some extra pieces thrown in. I'd been sitting on the collection that became Gun Control for Polar Bears for some time but this collection - most of it - is even older.

Before the first one was published I was trying to find my way as a writer only to be ignored by most publishers. Not a rejection of "No" or "It's no good" but swept under the rug. I've talked to my friend Jeffery Potts about feeling like a toxic writer who nobody would touch. My wife suggested I release a poetry book. I told her I had one sitting on the computer. She said to do something with it. I sent out Gun Control for Polar Bears, and while publishers were quick to tell me how much they loved the title and how intrigued they were by it, they wouldn't publish me. I understand poetry's place in the modern world. It used to be popular and more important, now it's a very niche thing. Supposed Crimes picked it up and though it came out to crickets, it got me a chance to attempt to write a novel - the upcoming Last Rites of the Capacitance. While it was being formed and I was playing the waiting game, I did what I've always done and worked on countless things. I was growing antsy with a lack of patience. I remembered I had another collection of poetry. But I'll be honest, I was a little apprehensive about submitting it for different reasons. 1 - after the first one fell on deaf ears, I doubted my publisher would want to take the chance on another one. And 2 - I'd been looking at it for so long that I practically grew to hate it. I guess that happens with anything. The magic lost and all you see is something you wrote long ago, from a writer you no longer are.

I emailed Christy Case (Supposed Crimes owner and publisher) and asked if she'd be interested in another poetry book, expecting to hear "Eeeehhhh, maybe not." To my surprise, she said yes. I edited and sent it in. She did an edit and sent it back. I did a final. Then I did the art. I had an image for it many many moons ago but had it no longer. I tried to replicate it to no avail so I just came up with another minimalist piece. As we waited for Last Rites of the Capacitance to take shape through many edits, the physical copies of Reflections were printed and sent to the house. Still not excited about it as I was the only one other than Christy to see it and I was still on the fence about the material. As I said, I've been looking at it for too long.

NOTE: One thing a lot of people don't realize is by the time a book gets in the hands of a reader, the writer's seen it more times than they care to count.

My wife was reading it and approached me in the kitchen with an exhausted sigh. She told me how Reflections at Various Speeds was hard to read. I thought 'Oh shit, my hating it is justified. It's terrible!' I asked if it was bad. She said, "No, it's good. It just feels so intimate. Almost too intimate." We've had our copies for some time and I recently picked it up to thumb through it, and with enough time away from it, I got a fresh look at it. I don't feel like I did staring at it on the computer for years. I actually enjoy it and, yeah, some of it seems a bit heavy or intimate. There's still the experimental weirdness like some of the pieces in Gun Control but it's a different feel. It's definitely a more personal feel I suppose. You don't know until fresh eyes see it. Until someone else reads it, it's just something the old you wrote.

Interestingly enough, many years ago I attempted to make it as an art book. In my previous relationship, my ex was a sometimes artist. I presented to her the idea of an art piece with a poem on each page. She agreed. Then she read it and declined saying that she thought I was writing about other girls before her. So it continued to lay dormant. When my wife now reads it she doesn't say it's about other girls or whatever but she just says it feels too close, too intimate. I knew I wanted to do something with it despite my glaring at it for so long. I'm happy it's out and happy someone else can read it with fresh eyes, whatever their reaction may be.

Jeff, I still feel like the toxic writer.

I have written and started work on more things than anyone would ever guess. I'd been convinced for a while now that nobody will know who I am until about my tenth book. I'm still putting in the work trying to build a readership. I've read, heard, and seen a lot of writers talk about money and deals but a readership is the most important thing. I suppose it's hard to build one on such a small thing as poetry but I'm hoping you all get to see what else I can do. My horror anthology Sharp Items & Bad Intentions is available on Amazon and my scifi novel will be out in less than a month. With all that said, I hope you guys check out Reflections at Various Speeds and, furthermore, I hope you find something in it you enjoy.

Where to buy

Alright, gotta get back to work.

Here's where you can get your copy of Reflections at Various Speeds:

https://supposedcrimes.com/products/reflections-at-various-speeds

https://www.amazon.com/Reflections-Various-Speeds-Christopher-Michael/dp/194459146X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1507130039&sr=8-1&keywords=reflections+at+various+speeds

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/reflections-at-various-speeds-christopher-michael-carter/1126381720?ean=9781944591465

https://www.booktopia.com.au/reflections-at-various-speeds-christopher-michael-carter/prod9781944591465.html


As well as

https://www.adlibris.com/se/bok/reflections-at-various-speeds-9781944591465

https://singapore.kinokuniya.com/bw/9781944591465

http://www.foyles.co.uk/witem/fiction-poetry/reflections-at-various-speeds,christopher-michael-carter-9781944591465

I'm sure you can find it in more places.

Happy reading,
Chris

Hard times

I haven't posted anything about it on social media because more and more I don't like to post personal things as any more I mainly want to use it for work, but my father is in the ICU at the VA. I'm not going to go into all the details but I'll say he's got heart issues and things got scary (understatement of the year). He went in on the first and he coded during a CAT scan. They worked and worked and he's now off of his tubes and he's doing better. It was heartbreaking to see him in that situation. Luckily, my older sister was there throughout and keeping us all updated. My aunt was also there as well as my little sister. My wife and I went to see him on the first. It was nerve-wracking and still is. He's doing well but there's still much to discuss. A situation like this puts things into perspective. My second poetry book came out on the first. Of course, who cares, dad's in a bad way in the hospital and it was looking grim. For a week now I'd been waiting on my shipment of personal copies of my first novel. It came on Monday. I should've been excited, but I couldn't. These things are so insignificant in the grand scheme of things. We're praying for him that he makes a FULL recovery. I want him to be good and well, not just 'making it'. He's a man with a lot of problems and more than anything I just want him to find peace. I'm so thankful that our family has been there for him and keeping us posted and I hope the future is brighter than the present.