Graham Charleston, New Report, and Vlad Dracule!

In a recent issue of the Deerhaven Journal of Psychotherapeutic Effectiveness, Dr. C. Gramlich, a prominent local psychologist, identified three cases of a new cognitive disorder that he refers to as Bored-reader’s Syndrome, or BrS. BrS is a potentially non-fatal disorder that attacks the central nervous system, producing difficulties in concentration, loss of mental focus, and loose stools. Fortunately, Dr. Gramlich also published a simple cure for BrS in the same article.  At 99 cents, it also happens to be the cheapest cure ever for a psychological dysfunction. Simply purchase and read “Harvest of War” by Charles Allen Gramlich (no relation).   – Graham Charleston reporting, for the Deerhaven Extreme.

Barnes & Noble

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I don’t always read vampire stories.

But when I do, they’re from “Midnight in Rosary,”
By Charles Allen Gramlich!

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Writing and Sensuality

Sensuous writing, to me, has little to do with sexuality. It has to do, in large part, with engaging the senses, of enmeshing the reader in a world of lush experience. Ray Bradbury is a sensuous writer. Robert E. Howard was, despite the fact that he is often considered a hyper-masculine author. When you read Bradbury or Howard you feel the chill wind, taste bitter drink, hear the crack of ice, and pant from the heat. But the details are put together in such a way as to create a sense of exotic beauty. And there is more. Sensuous writing not only excites the senses, it creates a mood, most often a melancholy one.

Poul Anderson was a master of sensuous writing. His book The Broken Sword, or his long story “The Queen of Air and Darkness” illustrate Anderson’s love of language and command over mood. They sing with poetry. Even the darkest imagery is combined with a sense of sad beauty.

For me, and feel free to say if you disagree, I find the most sensuous writing in the fantasy genre, followed by science fiction. Mainstream literature seems to be suspicious of sensuous writing, and hard bitten genres like noir and crime fiction try to immerse the reader in gritty detail. These stories also create a mood, but not one that is infused with beauty. There are times when I want just that kind of mood, but more often than not I seek out the beautiful, even if that beauty is tinged with darkness.

I strive for sensuality when I write, and I think I’ve gotten closest to it in my fantasy work, such as in the Talera Trilogy, and in some of the stories that appeared in Midnight in Rosary. While many of the stories in “Midnight” feature vampires, most of these are not ‘horror’ vampires but ‘fantasy’ vampires. And there is a clear difference. Sensuality is important to fantasy vampires, while gritty savagery is the drape that clothes horror vampires. Some time back, I put up a link to a free story from Midnight in Rosary. I’ll post it again here since it indicates the kind of sensuality I’m talking about (and in this case has some sexuality as well.) The story is called “The Poetry of Blood” and the link is here.

I’ll end with a couple of quick passages from the Talera series, these two from Wings Over Talera. Here, for the first time, Ruenn MacLang meets Vohanna. With Vohanna, I hoped to create a villain who would combine both beauty and evil, attraction and threat. These are important elements of sensuality in the language of fantasy literature. At least, I think so.

1). There were no adornments anywhere upon Vohanna—-no web of black pearls in her silken flag of hair, no bright jewels at her finely sculpted ears, no copper brassards clasping her upper arms. She wore no kohl to darken her sable lashes, no paint upon lips that were already riper than the rising sun.

In her form, she looked guileless and fragile. In her face, she looked...innocent. But her gaze was ancient and black upon mine, with firefly runes twining and beating in the depths of her glance. I felt that glance like a bruise.

2). Vohanna took another step toward me. And a third. Down the skull steps from her throne she came, and it seemed her sandals spurned the dusky wine that cascaded beneath her feet. Her eyes teemed with scarlet embers and with...other things.

“Kneel to me, Ruenn,” she said.
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Free Story from Midnight in Rosary

I haven’t talked much about my vampire/werewolf/ghost collection lately. That’s Midnight in Rosary, the title of which the blogosphere helped me decide on. I thought I might post a sample story from the collection, one called “The Poetry of Blood.” It’s not quite vampire. I’m not sure exactly what it is. But it’s short, which I think it needs to be for this sort of thing.

There are erotic elements to the story, and mostly the “threat” of violence. That’s why I didn’t put it up directly as a blog post. If you find those elements distasteful then you may not want to click on my link. If I’ve done my figuring right, however, clicking on This Link should take you to the story. I hope you enjoy.

The book is available at both Amazon and Barnes & Noble, with the links below.



Barnes & Noble
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Tougher Days are Here Again

Grading time is upon me. I’m grading a test now in my Capstone class, and on Monday I’ll have two tests to grade. Senior grades—and most of my students are seniors—are due Tuesday at noon so that means Monday will definitely be a nose to the grindstone kind of day. Probably most of the night too.

In the meantime, It’s been a while since I’ve talked up my own books so I thought I might leave you with some samples from a couple of my available works. Soon I hope to be able to turn my mind to writing some ‘new’ stuff.

Here’s the opening to “Showdown at Wild Briar,” from my Kindle collection Killing Trail. As you might guess, things aren’t going to be as easy as the end of this teaser suggests. In the west, going home ain’t for the faint of heart or the slow of hand.

“You Josh Allen Boone?”

Leaning back in his chair in the Bucket of Blood saloon, a man looked up from under the brim of a battered Stetson. His gray eyes studied the speaker, noted the briar-scarred chaps, the faded red bandana at the neck, beaten smooth and soft with many washings, and the sun-worn face under a sweat-stained hat. A Remington New Model Army .44 rested in a holster high on the man’s right hip. Except for the boots, which were hand-tooled and expensive, the outfit shouted cow puncher.

“Who’s asking?”

“Don’t matter,” the cowboy said. He tossed what looked like a newspaper clipping onto the table beside Josh’s beer. “Figured you’d like to know. A Texas ranger down Brazos way shot a horse thief. One, Terrance Morelli. Seems old Terrance wanted to clear his conscience afore he died. Told about a man name of Frank Caine he’d killed in Wyoming. I believe you knew Frank.”

A tiny smile quirked the corner of Josh Allen’s lips. “Knew him,” Josh agreed. “They say I murdered him.”

“Now they’ll say you didn’t. You can go home.”


*****

Here’s a piece from the collection Midnight in Rosary, also available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. This is from a story called “Love in the Time of Cybersex.”

The shapeshifter prowled toward him, as if her bones and muscles weren’t quite human. And they weren’t. Persona vats could grow anything. He’d seen a dragon here last night for sweet sake, though the cost of downloading one’s mind into something like that was astronomically high. But the shifter body was almost standard, and with practice the person inhabiting it could make it change shape. In the lighter gravity of the moon, the werewolf myth could come howling to life.

This shifter was named Smokeheart, a werepanther instead of a wolf, and she hadn’t been here quite long enough to learn how to fully control her body. She remained mostly human, except for pointed and tufted ears and a rampant grace, and a tail as strong and flexible as satin rope. Boone recalled that tail fondly.


*****
Killing Trail is a collection of western stories and some nonfiction stuff about the west. The stories were most strongly influenced by Louis L’Amour. Since this is a self-published book, it’s exactly as I want it to be. Now, whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing the readers will have to say.

Midnight in Rosary is a collection of mostly vampire stories with some werewolf stuff thrown in. It’s also got a fair amount of erotica in the mix.

Thanks for listening!
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Vampires and Sex at Novel Spaces

I'm posting over at Novel Spaces today on "Vampires and Sex." I hope you'll check it out.
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Love in the Ruins

There were seven bells ringing, three of iron, three of brass—one of silver. Their sound was as chaotic and cold as the wind that blew at Kainja's back, as sharp and dark as the scimitar shapes of the mountain vultures circling above his head in the dimming sky of evening. Those vultures had a purpose here, but it wasn't that they were waiting for him to die. That would have been futile. They were waiting for him to leave so they could settle again to the feast he had interrupted.

Framing the meticulously ordered canvas of the dead that lay before him were a monastery's ruins. Smoke helices lifted over broken walls and orange and black kites fluttered on the ground like raped angels. A row of stone monkeys had lost their heads. Even worse was the water cistern filled with blood, a conspicuous waste. Someone had created a sadistic landscape here. They had done it deliberately, out of some need or passion that Kainja did not understand and which horrified him. And the worst thing of all was that only one person could be responsible, the woman Kainja loved more than anyone else living in the world.
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This is a little piece of a story called “Wanting the Mouth of a Lover.” The vampire Kainja visits the Himalayas and finds an old enemy and an old lover, and for a while it seems they may both be the same person.

There are three Kainja stories in Midnight in Rosary. The other two are “In a Cold of Snow and Ghosts,” and “Vessel for the Holy.” All of them appeared first in Prisoners of the Night, the anthology series edited by the inimitable Alayne Gelfand. There’s a secret about Kainja that is revealed in “Wanting the Mouth of a Lover.” I won’t tell you what it is but someday I hope some of you will tell me! :)



Barnes & Noble
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Tales of Crimson and Black

Midnight in Rosary...............

Tales of Crimson and Black...................

Predation is in the bones, in the marrow. Even when sated a carnivore will still hunt. It wants the wet taste of life, the sweetness of watermelon flesh. Its need to kill isn't rational. And it won't be denied its blood.

Midnight in Rosary is out. It was released yesterday and I’ve finally had a moment to savor and appreciate it. I’m proud of this collection of vampire and werewolf tales. Naturally I’d like everyone to read it. But I want you to know in case you do that it’s a little different than the other stuff you may have read by me.

These stories are not heroic fantasy like the Talera novels or Bitter Steel. Some of them are horror, although not as graphic as Cold in the Light. Most would be defined as dark fantasy or Urban Fantasy. And there is quite a lot of sex, which ranges from the graphic to the romantic. The characters in these stories are much more conflicted than Ruenn MacLang (Talera) or Thal Kyrin (Bitter Steel). They carry a lot more doubt around with them. Many of them have made bad mistakes and they are paying for those mistakes every day. With their blood. With their souls.

Here are some of the story titles:

Wanting the Mouth of a Lover
The Cold of Snow and Ghosts
In Memory of the Sun
The Poetry of Blood
River Road; Night Music
Innocent Little Sin

If you’d like to read the book, you can find it at:

Barnes & Noble

Or Amazon:



It’s a bit cheaper at Barnes & Noble at the moment.

And I hope you’ll bear with me while I talk about the book more over the next few days.

Best wishes to all,
Charles
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When it Rains it Pours

Lots of forward movement in my writing world in the past few days. I'm happy to say.

Sold a story called "Lily White and Red" to Trembles. I also got word from Borgo's editor that "Midnight in Rosary," my collection of vampire and werewolf tales, has been sent to the folks who will print it. I don't have any idea as to the cover yet. I'm also going over the galleys for Wings Over Talera, which will soon be published in ebook. I did not make any forward progress on my science book over the weekend. In fact, I was pretty lazy and played quite a lot of video games, as well as doing some reading. I think I needed it, though, since last week was extremely busy, what with normal schol stuff and three extra research proposals to consider by the IRB committee that I chair. This week is gearing up to be a nightmare. Today, for example, I was up at 5:50 and won't get home till probably 10:30 tonight. Or later.

And, unfortunately, I've just acquired another university committee. So, forward progress on anything is likely to slow to a crawl for at least the next few weeks.

Lana and I did also watch Inception this weekend and I thought it was quite good. Lots of cool ideas and great special effects. I was actually pretty amazed that what was a complicated story was told so clearly that I didn't have trouble following it at all.

Last weekend, Lana and I watched two other movies, The Social Network, which I thought was pretty lame, and The Expendables, which I liked better but which wasn't anything to write home about.
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Midnight in Rosary

I appreciate everyone’s input on my title issues. Midnight in Rosary and Midnight in Crimson were the top choices from the responders. Several liked “Mouth Torn with Sorrow,” which I also think is an evocative line but perhaps too “vague” as a title for the collection. A number of folks were strongly against the use of “holocaust” in the title. I can understand that, although the word to me does not instantly evoke the Nazi holocaust against the Jews. I think it’s because I learned the meaning of the word from reading years before I learned the history of WWII.

I decided after much cogitation to go with Midnight in Rosary. I believe it evokes a kind of feeling that appears in many of the stories within the collection. However, I know Borgo Press likes subtitles so I’m thinking of presenting them with: Midnight in Rosary: Tales of Crimson and Black. Maybe that’ll cover all the bases.

In other news, I watched A Princess of Mars on the SYFY channel this evening. There were some elements I liked. I actually thought most of the characters were pretty good and I developed some interest in them. I particularly thought the Tharks were well done as characters, despite having only four limbs instead of six. I wish they’d given the Dejah Thoris dark hair and some expression other than sour lemon, but I could live with it. One of the things I loved about ERB’s Barsoom books was the swordplay and this had very little in it. That’s probably for the best seeing as how the one sword fight was pretty badly handled. Overall, though, it certainly didn’t do ERB’s story justice and I don’t think it will jumpstart a new Sword & Planet revolution. If you haven’t read the first three Barsoom books then you’ve missed something. In my opinion, at least. Here’s a piece from ERB’s original story:

“As I stood thus meditating, I turned my gaze from the landscape to the heavens where the myriad stars formed a gorgeous and fitting canopy for the wonders of the earthly scene. My attention was quickly riveted by a large red star close to the distant horizon. As I gazed upon it I felt a spell of overpowering fascination--it was Mars, the god of war, and for me, the fighting man, it had always held the power of irresistible enchantment. As I gazed at it on that far-gone night it seemed to call across the unthinkable void, to lure me to it, to draw me as the lodestone attracts a particle of iron.”
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