October Newsletter

New book release today and general writing news in the newsletter this month.

AMAZON AMAZON UK SAMPLESMASHWORDS

My latest book, THE GREEN AND THE BLACK launches today. Before I go on, I’d like to ask a favor. If you could spare a moment, head on over to my Twitter and retweet the pinned tweet at the top, please? The link will take you directly there –> HERE IT IS

The more eyes on my announcement of the book, the better it will be for me, and Twitter gets me the best bang for no bucks. And you’ll make a pal for life. I’m loyal, like a labrador puppy.

THE GREEN AND THE BLACK is a Newfoundland based novel in paperback and ebook from Crossroad Press.

A small group of industrial archaeologists head into the center of Newfoundland, investigating a rumor of a lost prospecting team of Irish miners in the late Nineteenth century.

In this one you’ll meet some Irishmen, some archaeologists, a fair bit of booze, some mannequins, a song, two mineshafts, hospitals, the wee folk, cigarettes, a lot of foliage and more booze.

You could call this folk horror, dark fiction, weird fiction, or dark fantasy. But at its heart it’s a horror story and it deals with some of my own fears, particularly that of dark, enclosed, spaces, and the perils of drinking too much.

Here’s some links with more background on where THE GREEN AND THE BLACK came from.

• The Things We Leave Behind (Ginger Nuts Of Horror)
• On Drinking (William Meikle Blog)
• Where I got the idea (Ink Heist)
• Newfoundland and Me (William Meikle website)
• Old Stories, New Words (William Meikle Blog)

As ever, if you buy it and read it, a wee review anywhere of your choosing is always appreciated, on this, or any of my books.

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In other news, I recently sold my 4th CARNACKI collection, THE KEYS TO THE DOOR and Other Stories, to Dark Regions Press for publication in paperback and ebook. This means that I have now written 50 of my CARNACKI tales, 48 collected in four volumes, and the two CHALLENGER / CARNACKI crossovers in the Challenger collection. 50 seems like a good point to stop for a breath. Ten years ago I hadn’t even written one of the old lad’s stories, and I think both of us need a rest for a few months at least.

I’m currently working on OPERATION: LOCH NESS, #5 in my S-Squad series. The first 4 are selling well for me, and there is an audiobook of INFESTATION coming soon. SEVERED PRESS seem happy for me to keep on keeping on with the Scottish squaddies adventures, and I’m happy to oblige for a while.

My anthology appearances page at my website currently as of writing shows I’ve had 99 short stories in anthologies. #100 should be along some time very soon. I might need to have a centennial party.

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On drinking

I like a drink.

I’ve liked a drink for about 45 years now. People keep telling me it’ll kill me, but at this stage, if it’s drink that gets me now, I’ll consider it a win.

It started back in late ’73 and my first foray at 15 going on 16 to one of the local discos. Beer was 8p a pint, spirits 10p a shot and a packet of ten Embassy Regal 12p. I took to the beer first, fags later, and spirits a wee bit later after that, but by the time I went to University in late 1975 the taste for beer in particular was well developed.

While in Glasgow I discovered hand-pumped real ale, and that became a love that’s stayed with me though University, then 10 years in London, then eventually back to Scotland and a growing small brewery / real ale pub culture that kept me happy for years before I came to Newfoundland, where the search for decent ale in a small fishing town is a bit more challenging.

There’s an old saying, I only drink to be social. Not quite true, but it’s hard to beat banter with old pals around a table in an old bar with decent beer and food on offer.

Alongside the beer during University days I also discovered single malt Scotch. I’m not an aficionado, but I know what I like, and I like it a lot. I took to it eagerly.

By the time I was around 30, back in the mid to late ’80s in London I was mostly working and mostly drunk, a heady combination of good beer, good whisky, Camel filters, curries and Chinese takeaways.

Sue rescued me from incipient alcoholism back then and nowadays I still like a drink, but it’s under control and even diminishing as I get older and try to avoid hangovers.

All of that has come out in several of my books and stories, Derek Adams, The Midnight Eye in particular being a bit of a Mary-Sue character for my love of booze, Chandler and Glasgow.

And it came out again in my newest work, THE GREEN AND THE BLACK, where you’ll meet a lad who doesn’t know that he likes a drink until he has one that transports him, and a man who knows he likes cigarettes a bit too much, but can’t quit the smoke without a push.

In THE GREEN AND THE BLACK you’ll also find Newfoundland and a lot of Irishmen, many of whom, like the Scots, enjoy a few pints, a wee dram, and a song. There’s also archaeologists, cabins in the woods, derelict mineshafts, singing, and drinking in dark places, where the green meets the black.

New Book Day – RAMSKULL

RAMSKULL is new today.

In this one you’ll find a remote Scottish island, some baffled cops, bloody mayhem, a bar, an ancient Ram’s skull, dank caves, some whisky, another bar, Oban, some mad monks, a lighthouse, and more whisky.

It’s a return home for me after a few years writing Newfoundland based stories, and it’s a back-to-my-roots thing that runs in my head like a Hammer Horror, with blood so red it almost glows, screams so high they tear the top of your head off, and stoic rural workers doing what needs to be done against a terrible peril rearing up out of the past.

Another one I think should be a movie. But then I would, wouldn’t I?

 

http://www.williammeikle.com/aboutramsskull.html

2017 – My Writing Year

It’s been quite a year.

It started with DarkFuse publishing my novel FUNGOID to great reviews, only for the publisher to fold just as sales were starting to take off, leaving the book, and all my other DarkFuse titles in limbo. I’ve since managed to place all the works at Crossroad Press who are doing a sterling job of getting old and new books into ebook, print and audiobook. They’ve already brought out the new novel SONGS OF DREAMING GODS and the reprint of THE HOLE, as well as the three Sigils and Totems novellas. Next up from them is RAMSKULL, a Scottish Hammer horror tribute with Satanism and bloody mayhem on a small Scottish island, so look out for that.

DarkFuse weren’t the only publisher to disappear. Dark Renaissance finally ended their on-again, off-again dance, leaving me with another couple of books to home. My Sherlock Holmes novel, THE DREAMING MAN, found a home and was published in the spring by the ever reliable Gryphonwood Press, and my third Carnacki collection, THE EDINBURGH TOWNHOUSE was published in the Fall by The Lovecraft Ezine imprint to some very satisfying reviews.

On the personal front, my wife fell very ill, and a lot of the late Spring and early Summer for me was spent in worry that has thankfully abated a bit with her recovery. It left me with some catching up to do on the writing front that I’ve just about managed to handle.

I’ve been involved in the ROWAN CASEY / VEIL KNIGHTS series cooperative venture with some great fantasy writers, and that’s been fun, playing out of my usual comfort zones.

And towards the end of the year I’ve seen the publication of my big-bug creature feature INFESTATION at Severed Press, and, most recently, and the current focus of much of my activity, my Victorian supernatural short story collection, THE GHOST CLUB from Crystal Lake Publishing. It’s picking up great reviews. Which is nice.

2017 also saw me making some inroads into the German language market, with THE AMULET and SHERLOCK HOLMES: REVENANT being published by Blitz Verlag in ebook and very nice mass-market format paperbacks. I have THE INVASION coming from them soon, and have also sold a handful of novels to Voodoo Press for publication in German, so watch this space.

With all of that, my short stories in anthologies and magazines have taken a bit of a back seat this year, but I’ve had some great appearances, including one alongside the likes of Joyce Carol Oates and Joe Lansdale among others, and I’ve repeated my success with sales to Night Land Quarterly in Japan, had my sixth sale to NATURE FUTURES, and some nice appearances in Dark Regions Press anthologies. I also took great delight in providing a James Bond novella to April Moon Books’ BOND UNKNOWN. (Contrary to S. T. Joshi’s well publicised belief, I am not actually trying to make a career out of Carnacki pastiches.)

I hope to get more time next year to hit some short story markets, but it’s already looking to be a busy one.

Coming up I have…

• The Boathouse (novel) / Crossroad Press
• Ramskull (novel) / Crossroad Press
• The Green and The Black (novel) / Crossroad Press
• Operation: Antarctica (novel) / Severed Press
• Fungoid (novel) / New Edition coming soon from Crossroad Press
• The Dunfield Terror (novel) / New Edition coming soon from Crossroad Press
• The Exiled (novel) / New Edition coming soon from Crossroad Press
• Night of the Wendigo (novel) / New Edition coming soon from Crossroad Press
• Tormentor (novella) / New Edition coming soon from Crossroad Press
• Clockwork Dolls (novella) / New Edition coming soon from Crossroad Press

There’s also the novella, BLACKTOP coming in Dark Regions Press’ huge I AM THE ABYSS anthology that I’m really looking forward to, and work in another handful of anthologies waiting to be published, including a story in Jeffrey Thomas’ PUNKTOWN setting that I think is close to the best thing I’ve ever written.

As for the writing schedule, I’ve got another novel, OPERATION: SIBERIA to write for Severed Press, I’ve got book 3 of a fantasy trilogy I’m working on with Steve Savile to complete, and I’ve had a tickle of interest from a publisher interested in a set of Victorian ghost stories.

I’ve got my 60th birthday in January. I always thought I’d be dead or at least stopped writing by now, but it seems I still have stories to tell.

Busy, busy, busy.

Onward.

The Ghost Club Launch Tour – Stop 7

GHOST CLUB LAUNCH TOUR STOP 7

The Weird Tales Radio show is now available to download as a @PodBean #podcast top stories include an interview with me about THE GHOST CLUB stories

https://paranormalukradio.podbean.com/e/urban-fantasist-120717/

The Ghost Club Launches

My new book, THE GHOST CLUB is now live on Amazon and available in both ebook and paperback, and I’m hoping at least some of you will be interested enough to give it a try. It would help me out enormously if you could tell your friends today, and spread the news. Hell, tell your enemies.

GET IT HERE

I’m right in the middle of a twenty-stop blog, podcast and interview tour in support of the launch so come on over and say hi if you want to know what makes me tick. If you’ve missed the earlier stops along the way, I’ve got them all linked on the front page of my website at Williammeikle.com

‘The Ghost Club is a massively ambitious anthology of stories ‘by’ classic authors as imagined by the extremely talented William Meikle. Massively entertaining, too.’ – Simon Clark, author of the award winning The Night of the Triffids

‘In the past, we’ve had the Diogenes Club, the ‘Club of the Damned’, and even Peter Straub’s ‘Chowder Society.’ Now we have THE GHOST CLUB by William Meikle. And it is, quite simply, a delight. Not only has the author displayed his knowledge of and love for the writers of yesteryear, but in creating ‘The Ghost Club’ our host has produced his own collection of unknown and previously unpublished short stories ‘by’ Robert Louis Stevenson, Rudyard Kipling, Leo Tolstoy, Bram Stoker, Mark Twain, H. G.Wells, Margaret Oliphant, Oscar Wilde, H. Rider Haggard, Helena P Blavatsky, Henry James, Anton Chekhov, Jules Verne and Arthur Conan Doyle. I say ‘unknown’, when I mean – of course – that all the stories are written by Mr Meikle in the style of the aforementioned authors; and the entire experience of reading this collection is like sitting with him in an old fashioned study, with a roaring fire, guttering shadows and a snifter or two of brandy as he unfolds his ‘Ghost Club’ tales. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience.’ – Stephen Laws, author of GHOST TRAIN

‘William Meikle is an audacious writer! In The Ghost Club he takes on the personalities of literary icons Bram Stoker, Arthur Conan Doyle, Jules Verne and the like and creates stories they might have told, mimicking their voices and writing styles. And he makes that work! I have too many favorites to name but as I read from start to finish, the stories just got better and better and I found myself as absorbed as if I were reading spooky tales told by these master storytellers. Kudos to Meikle! Lovers of traditional and quirky ghost stories need The Ghost Club in their library!’ – Nancy Kilpatrick. author of REVENGE OF THE VAMPYR KING

‘Masters of literature spin classic spooky tales in this chilling collection.’ – Scott Nicholson, author of THE RED CHURCH

In Victorian London, a select group of writers, led by Arthur Conan Doyle, Bram Stoker and Henry James held an informal dining club, the price of entry to which was the telling of a story by each invited guest.

These are their stories, containing tales of revenant loved ones, lost cities, weird science, spectral appearances and mysteries in the fog of the old city, all told by some of the foremost writers of the day. In here you’ll find Verne and Wells, Tolstoy and Checkov, Stevenson and Oliphant, Kipling, Twain, Haggard, Wilde and Blavatsky alongside their hosts.

Come, join us for dinner and a story.

Squeaky Bottom Time

It’s getting to be twitchy time. Launch day tomorrow, and the payoff for all the jumping up and down and waving and talking bollocks I’ve been doing.

I need a favor from any of you still paying attention; if you could see your way to sharing THE GHOST CLUB link around over the next 36 hours, I’d be most grateful.

http://getbook.at/GhostClub

There are still some great blog posts, podcasts and interviews to come on the tour, but right now, it’s crunch time for raising the book’s profile and giving it a good start in life.

The Ghost Club Launch Tour – Stop 4

The Ghost Club Launch Tour – Stop 4

My latest stop is an interview about the Ghost Club and its writers over at John Linwood Grant’s Greydogtales site. John and I share many of the same enthusiasms, being of similar ages and academic backgrounds. He’s a whimsical Yorkshireman — you dont get many of them to the pound — and I enjoyed investigating the act of lying convincingly in this long interview.

http://greydogtales.com/blog/ghost-club-reveals-secrets/

New Book day: INFESTATION from Severed Press

 

 

AMAZON SAMPLE

New today, a new big bug novel from me at Severed Press. It’s pulp, pure and simple. Sweary Scottish squaddies and big bug mayhem in the waters off Baffin Island. It’s not subtle. But it’s not meant to be

It was supposed to be a simple mission. A suspected Russian spy boat is in trouble in Canadian waters.

Investigate and report are the orders.

But when Captain John Banks and his squad arrive, it is to find an empty vessel, and a scene of bloody mayhem.

Soon they are in a fight for their lives, for there are things in the icy seas off Baffin Island, scuttling, hungry things with a taste for human flesh.

They are swarming.

And they are growing.

INFESTATION is a tribute to several things – 50s B movies, Alistair MacLean books and movies, Aliens, and Dog Soldiers are all rattling around in there.

But mostly it’s for the love of big beasties. Mostly.