Showing posts with label Loren Rhoads. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Loren Rhoads. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 6, 2023

DECK THE HALLS WITH BOOKS HOLIDAY EXTRAVAGANZA - SPOOKY WRITER'S PLANNER by Loren Rhoads



10 Tricks for Writing During the Holidays
by Loren Rhoads

Sometimes, especially around the holidays, it’s hard to find time to do the creative work you want to do. I’ve used a bunch of tricks to carve out time to write. I hope these will inspire you.

1. Make a list. Whether it’s topics you want to explore or scenes that need to be written, it’s easier to begin writing when you have a prompt.

2. Set an alarm. Promise yourself that you will settle down to write as soon as the alarm goes off. Giving yourself the anticipation of writing time can be inspirational.

3. Set a timer. Anyone can write for 15 minutes. There’s something about the tiniest amount of time pressure that tricks your brain into thinking it’s on a deadline. Start a timer on your computer, phone, or in the kitchen. You might find yourself pounding out the words to beat the bell. If the words are really flowing, you can always add a second 15-minute sprint.

4. Make a date with a friend. Whether you sit down together in a cafe or meet online for a video chat, it really helps to know that someone else is working alongside you. The key is to find someone who will write, rather than chat.

5. Put your headphones on. Many writers make a playlist that they listen to only when they work on a particular project. Listening to the same music every time you write can train your brain to provide inspiration on command.

6. Write somewhere else. If you normally write at a desk, try moving to the sofa or the kitchen table or sitting in bed. The simple act of shifting to new surroundings can shake loose the words.

7. Try a different writing tool. Do you usually write on a laptop? Try writing by hand in a notebook or attach a keyboard to your phone. Some writers swear by word processing keyboards like AlphaSmart or FreeWrite, which only allow you to see a small amount of the text you’re working on. That way you're forced to move forward, rather than editing what you've already done.

8. Write first thing in the morning. It’s tempting to start the day by checking email or scrolling social media, but what might you come up with if you listened to your own thoughts first thing in the morning?

9. Write last thing at night. Take a notebook to bed and draft one more scene before you turn out the light. Do the words feel different as you’re settling in for the night?  Maybe your subconscious can solve a writing problem for you in your dreams.

10. Chart your progress. Whether you put a check on the calendar, color in a box on a habit-tracking chart, or note your word count in your planner, record the days you write. It’s addictive to see your progress.

What other tricks have you found for getting the work done? Make your own list, so you'll have some tools to use next time you feel at a loss for words.

Spooky Writer’s Planner
by Loren Rhoads & Emerian Rich
Date of Publication:  November 2020
Publisher: HorrorAddicts.net
Cover Artist: Emerian Rich
Genre:  nonfiction planner
ISBN: 9798560168698
Number of pages:  361

Tagline:    Get organized this year!

BLURB
Are you a horror author who wants to take your career to the next level? Do you write dark fantasy, paranormal romance, spooky poetry, or morbid nonfiction? 

Would you like to advance farther in the direction of your dreams?

The Spooky Writer's Planner includes:
  • 13 months of monthly and weekly calendars
  • Monthly goal and recap sheets
  • Weekly check-ins and note pages
  • Writing challenges, prompts, and brainstorming pages
  • Trackers for submissions, pitches, and contacts 
  • Marketing, newsletter, and blog planners
  • Check-off sheets for website maintenance, social media updates, and expenses

Available in Digital and Print





The quick-download version gives you a digital copy so you can print the pages you need and print multiples of those you'll use the most. Create your own Frankenstein's Monster of a planner! These black & white pages are designed to be printed on 8.5 x 11-inch paper. Put them in a three-ring binder or bind them with disks or a spiral, your choice. Use it year after year after one purchase!  

Available from Etsy

The Spooky Writer's Planner is perfect-bound with a glossy cover, printed on high-quality 8.5 x 11-inch paper. Everything you need is included in one handy book that you can grab and go!

Available from Amazon






Author Info
Loren Rhoads writes dark fantasy, horror, and science fiction, sometimes all at once. She’s the author or editor of 18 books, including 199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die and Unsafe Words. She serves as a writing mentor for the Horror Writers Association. She has taught workshops on reading your work in public and submitting proposals and pitches to publishers. Find out more about her work at LorenRhoads.com          



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Sunday, December 19, 2021

HOLIDAY EXTRAVAGANZA w/EXCERPT - PNR - AS ABOVE, SO BELOW BOX SET by Loren Rhoads


How to Blend Teas for the Holidays

I drink a lot of tea. I learned the habit from my mom. Recently, one of the things I discovered that I love to do is to blend teas to represent the characters in my books and stories. I've given those tea blends away as holiday presents, so I'll walk you through the process so you can create your own gift teas.

The main character in my As Above, So Below books is Lorelei. She’s a young succubus, who is only several hundred years old when she falls in love with the angel Azaziel. In order to make a tea to represent her, I thought about what teas I like that I could adapt. You could start with the person for whom you're making a present: think about their personality in flavors.

If Lorelei drank tea, it would bea spicy chai. I started my blend with a hearty Masala Chai as a base. In my novels, Lorelei’s signature cocktail is vodka and cranberry juice, so I added dried cranberries to the tea, along with dried apple pieces to symbolize temptation. Then I boosted the ginger in the chai to make it hotter on the tongue. Lorelei’s tea has a wonderful spicy aroma, full of cinnamon and clove. It tastes slightly fruity, with a buzz of ginger at the finish.

Adagio Teas (adagio.com) makes it really easy to blend your own teas. First off, you'll need to make an account, which is free.

Once that's done, click on Blends in the menu bar. One of your options is Create a Blend.

 

Click on that and it opens a page headed Create Your Own Blend. This allows you to name the tea, then pick up to three of Adagio's flavored teas from drop-down menus. You can adjust how much or how little of each flavor you'd like to include using the slider bar. Adagio has a lot of teas to mix and match.

 

You're also allowed to choose up to three "Accents." These range from dried fruit to flower petals to sprinkles or candy pieces. Just remember that the more Accents you mix in, the less tea you'll get in each cup.

 

I use the website Canva.com to create labels for each of my blends. Adagio requests that the label images be 700 x 437-pixel jpegs. They want you to own the copyright for the images you upload, but Canva has a lot of copyright-free templates that you can choose from. I find Canva easier (and cheaper!) to use than Photoshop.

 

Once you've uploaded your label artwork,you are allowed to make your teas private or available for sale. If you sell them, Adagio gives you points that you can spend on tea samples or free shipping or small gifts in a future order.

 

You can make a whole series of related blends, say, one for every member of your family? If you put two blends into a "ship," then anyone who orders both teas will get a discount.

 

I put Lorelei's tea into a 'ship with Azaziel's tea, which is flecked with petals of pink peony, blue lavender, yellow marigold, and red rose, to symbolize the Fields of Heaven. All those flower petals make a really pretty tea. It has a base of Adagio’s Assam Melody tea, to which I added Adagio’s vanilla-flavored Cream Tea to indicate Heaven and purity. Azaziel's tea has a wonderful flavor, friendly and welcoming, and makes a nice contrast to Lorelei’s spicy, fruity tea.

 

Adagio allows you to order a sample tin of each tea or to buy them in 3-ounce pouches or 5-ounce tins. My preference is the handsome reusable 5-ounce tin, the perfect size for holiday presents.

 

If you're curious to see what I've done with my teas, here are the links:

 

Lorelei’s chai: https://www.adagio.com/signature_blend/blend.html?blend=162653

 

Azaziel’s heavenly tea: https://www.adagio.com/signature_blend/blend.html?blend=162654

 

Check out all of my tea blends:  https://www.adagio.com/signature_blend/list.html?userId=566763LR



As Above, So Below Box Set
by Loren Rhoads
Date of Publication: November 30th 2021
Publisher: Automatism Press
Cover Artist: Carmen Masloski
Genre:  Paranormal Romance
ASIN:  B09KW5HWCC
Number of pages:  477
Word Count: 190646


Tagline:  If Romeo had wings and Juliet a barbed tail, could they find love in the City of Angels?

Book Description: 

If Romeo had wings and Juliet a barbed tail, could they find happiness together in the City of Angels?

Combining the books Lost Angels and its sequel Angelus Rose, As Above, So Below tells the whole story, from the moment Lorelei met Azaziel in her master's dance club to the conflagration in the cemetery following the discovery of Azaziel's hoard of unsaved souls.

"Any angel can be tempted, any devil as well." -- Succubus.net


Excerpt
Lorelei licked the last traces of soul from her lips, then smoothed the knee-length hobble dress over her thighs. The black Lycra snuggled around her like a living creature. The barbed tip of her tail twitched as she scanned the dance club, seeking more prey.
Her violet eyes locked on the creature seated at the end of the zinc bar, dressed in a rumpled khaki trench coat. Through the smoke and flashing lights of the dance club, she saw him for what he was: an angel of melancholy. Hers. His wings weren’t manifest, but the unmistakable glow of his halo enforced a margin of emptiness around him. Shoulders hunched over his glass, he was doing his best to ignore what was going on around the club. Clearly not having fun, which was a damned shame, considering that fun was what Lost Angels was all about. Lorelei wondered what it would take to put a smile on his face.
She patted hair over the nubs of her horns and adjusted the dress’s zipper to be demure as could be, only the pale white column of her throat revealed. Once she’d made certain that the seams on her stockings were straight and her mortal glamour was flawless, she stepped out of the shadows. Let’s see if this one could be won without a fight.
The angel ignored her when she leaned across the bar at his elbow, straining the lycra dress just so. Lorelei waved the bartender over. “My usual,” she shouted above the music, “and whatever he’s drinking. On my tab.”
When another Crown Royal appeared in front of him, the angel made no move toward it. Lorelei breathed into his ear, “Say thank you.”
Vaguely in the bartender’s direction, the angel repeated, “Thank you.”
Lorelei touched her glass against the angel’s, then downed a good mouthful of her drink. More Absolut than cranberry, just the way she liked it. However, the angel continued to ignore her, tense and miserable, wanting his whiskey but apparently afraid to touch it.
“Thank you, Lorelei,” she prompted. She leaned against the angel, nestling his shoulder between her breasts. She reached around his waist to hold him close. He could escape her, certainly, if he wanted to cause a scene. She licked her lips, so close to his ear that he quivered at the sound. “What’s your name, Angel?”
He sipped his drink before answering, “Aza.”
There should be an ‘el’ on there somewhere. Amused by the dropped honorific, she echoed, “Just Aza?”
“Aza will do.”
The nickname made him sound accessible. Not fallen yet, but unimaginably lonely. Lorelei asked, “Looking for company, Aza?”
The angel put his glass down very precisely on the bar. She was unprepared when his stormy green eyes turned to her. “Maybe I came looking for you, Lorelei.”
The timbre of his voice shivered through her like lightning.

When she was sure of her composure, she purred, “Here I am, Angel.”







Author Info
Loren Rhoads is the co-author of Lost Angels and Angelus Rose -- the As Above, So Below duology -- with Brian Thomas. Loren's stories about the succubus Lorelei have appeared in the books Sins of the Sirens, Demon Lovers, and Unsafe Words, and most recently online at The Fabulist. 

Check out more of her work at: 

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Thursday, September 16, 2021

SPOTLIGHT w/GUEST POST - NONFICTION - This Morbid Life (No Rest for the Morbid, #1) by Loren Rhoads

This Morbid Life
No Rest for the Morbid, #1
by Loren Rhoads
Date of Publication: August 22nd 2021
Publisher: Automatism Press
Cover Artist: Lynne Hansen
Genre: Non-Fiction/Memoir/Horror
ISBN:  978-1-7351876-2-4 (paperback)
ISBN: 978-1-7351876-3-1 (ebook) 
ASIN: B09C11J43W
Number of pages: 200
Word Count: 58 K

Tagline: What others have called an obsession with death is really a desperate romance with life.

BLURB
What others have called an obsession with death is really a desperate romance with life. Guided by curiosity, compassion, and a truly strange sense of humor, this particular morbid life is detailed through a death-positive collection of 45 confessional essays. Along the way, author Loren Rhoads takes prom pictures in a cemetery, spends a couple of days in a cadaver lab, eats bugs, survives the AIDS epidemic, chases ghosts, and publishes a little magazine called Morbid Curiosity.

Originally written for zines from Cyber-Psychos AOD to Zine World and online magazines from Gothic.Net to Scoutie Girl, these emotionally charged essays showcase the morbid curiosity and dark humor that transformed Rhoads into a leading voice of the curious and creepy.


Living in a World of Ghosts

by Loren Rhoads


One summer when I was a kid, my mom tried to find things to entertain me and my younger brother. She decided it might be fun to go to the cemetery down the road and make rubbings of the gravestones there.


As we roamed around with the roll of butcher's paper and a box of crayons, Mom showed us our grandfather's grave. He had died of a heart attack before I was born. Next to his headstone stood a little gravestone for my cousin Karen.


Karen had died as an infant, killed in a car accident while I was a toddler. She would've been the closest cousin to me in age, even closer than my brother, who was born the year she died. Her headstone had a carving of a bird flying out of an opened cage. It said, "Think of her still as the same and say she is not dead. She is just away."


You know how you can feel those moments where your life changes? Standing in front of this little gray headstone changed mine. It was the first moment where I understood what death was, that it could take away babies as well as old men. It was the moment where I stopped feeling safe.


I wanted to believe that Karen and I were still connected in some way, even though I don't have any memories of her. In reality, I have nothing more than a photo of the two of us as babies, lying on a soft white blanket. Still, I wanted her to be my guardian angel, watching over me, moving through life with me. I wanted her to be a ghost, someone who could look at life from the outside and advise me. I wanted some kind of protector.


Weird things happened to me as a kid, but nothing I could point to as an actual haunting. That's why I was so surprised, years later, when my friend Blair showed up as an actual ghost. I tell that story in my memoir, This Morbid Life. Here's an excerpt:



Excerpt from "The Ghost of Friends"

On Thanksgiving morning, I was making coffee when Jeff strolled out of his room. I debated what I should say. When my hands were busy filling the pot in the sink, I said, “I saw Blair’s ghost last night.”
“I haven’t seen him,” Jeff said, “but I’ve been pretty sure he was here.” I don’t know what I expected to hear, but that wasn’t it. Jeff is very down-to-earth, feet on the ground. If he could sense the ghost, then something must surely be there.
He told me, “One morning I was lying in bed in that half-awake state, thinking about the ghost. I felt a blast of wind blow straight up the length of my body into my face. When I opened my eyes, there was nothing to be seen—and nowhere for the wind to have come from.”
I shivered. Jeff slept in the bed where Blair suffered and died. It was all I could do to make myself sit on the bed when we watched a movie.
“Did he speak to you?” Jeff asked.
“No.”
“I wonder what he wants.”
Of course, it could all be shrugged off as the power of suggestion on susceptible minds. I was very high, then sleepy; Jeff was half-awake. But it makes sense to me that if you don’t have a corporeal body to affect real space, you have to work in those times and spaces when people will be most likely to sense you. Or maybe he’s there all the time and we’re only able to perceive him when we’ve lowered our resistance.
*
The last time I saw Blair’s ghost, he was full color. He wore a red flannel shirt over black jeans, just as in life. His hands were linked behind his head as he lounged on the bed, ankles crossed. His black hair had grown out to the velvet stage. He looked healthier than he had in the entire last year of his life. His dark eyes sparkled as he grinned at me: Gotcha.
Immediately, I turned back to the stereo. It was Monday. Blair had died on a Monday. He’d died in the afternoon, in this room, on that same side of the bed.
All that flashed through my mind, followed by a rush of fear. I did not want to have my back turned to Blair’s ghost.
I whirled around so fast that I stumbled against the bookshelf and had to reach out to steady myself. The bed was empty again. Blair was gone.
I reached the incense down from the bookshelf and lit a stick of Blair’s favorite sandalwood. I waved the smoke over the bed and myself before leaving it to burn on the bedside table.
“Be at peace,” I wished him, but I had the sense that he was.






Author Info
Loren Rhoads is the author of 199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die, Wish You Were Here: Adventures in Cemetery Travel, a space opera trilogy, and a duet about a succubus and her angel. She is also the editor of Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues: Tales of the Unsavory, Unwise, Unorthodox, and Unusual and Tales for the Camp Fire: An Anthology Benefiting Wildfire Relief. This Morbid Life, her 15th book, is the first in the No Rest for the Morbid Series. Book 2, Jet Lag and Other Blessings, will be out in 2022.

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Monday, October 5, 2020

SPOTLIGHT w/INTERVIEW - HORROR SCIENCE FICTION - UNSAFE WORDS by Loren Rhoads


Unsafe Words
by Loren Rhoads
Date of Publication: September 20th 2020
Publisher: Automatism Press
Cover Artist: Lynne Hansen
Genre: Horror, Science Fiction, Dark Fantasy Short Stories
ISBN: 978-1735187600
ASIN: B08HHNQ6XV
Number of pages: 174
Word Count: 55K

Tagline: Once you’ve done the most unforgivable thing, what will you do next?

BLURB

In the first full-length collection of her edgy, award-winning short stories, Loren Rhoads punctures the boundaries between horror, dark fantasy, and science fiction in a maelstrom of sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll.

Ghosts, succubi, naiads, vampires, the Wild Hunt, and the worst predator in the woods stalk these pages, alongside human monsters who follow their cravings past sanity or sense.

Amazon      BN

 Excerpt from "Here There Be Monsters" from Unsafe Words by Loren Rhoads

Something brushed her leg. Violet kept treading water, legs pedaling below her, but wondered: did the pool have leeches in it? Snapping turtles? Her thoughts darted into paranoia: were there sharks? Piranhas? Anything that might bite?

Not that it mattered. She would stay in this water and be gummed to death by goldfish rather than get out and take her chances with the mountain lion watching her from the side of the pool.

Whatever it was below her tangled in her toes. It felt for all the world like hair. Violet shuddered, losing her rhythm momentarily, but then forced her legs to scissor once more.

She peered down into the murky water. Something below her glowed an icy white color, like moonlight. Like the moon had fallen into the old swimming pool. The temperature of the water around her plummeted. A cramp knotted her left calf. Violet whimpered.

Her head dipped toward the surface of the water. Violet fought to calm herself, to hold herself up by the determined stroking of her arms. She tried to stretch the charley horse from her muscle.

Something very much like a hand touched her thigh.

She shrieked. The sound echoed from the hills surrounding the pool and repeated from the mountain peak on the other side of the valley.

The mountain lion narrowed her eyes and stared at Violet.

Then a girl’s voice said in her ear: “Don’t be afraid.”

Ice flooded her veins and Violet lost the ability to control her limbs. Her head slipped under the surface of the water and she took a breath…and something caught her in its arms and lifted her, coughing, back to the surface. And held her there, safely, until she could breathe again.

Violet’s heart fluttered in her chest, struggling to regain its rhythm. She could see arms around her ribs, holding her up in the water. They were a pale grayish white. Not a natural color. She wondered if it was possible to die of fear.

“Don’t be afraid of me,” the ghost said gently. “I won’t hurt you.”

“I’m afraid to look at you,” Violet whispered. She didn’t trust her own voice, didn’t want to hear the sound of her own terror.

“I’m not horrible,” the ghost promised.

“Did you drown here?”

“A long time ago.”

Violet swallowed hard. Her throat was sore from the water she’d inhaled. She coughed once more, but it didn’t really help. Tentatively, she started to dog paddle.

The ghost released her. Violet turned slowly, to find a girl her own age bobbing alongside her. Her long, long hair was blond, where Violet’s was dark. It was slicked to her skull and green with streaks of pondweed. Her eyes were pale blue, maybe, or green, where Violet’s were brown. The drowned girl wasn’t horrible, even if her skin had gone the color of something kept from sunlight for a long, long time.

“Are you alone here?” Violet asked. The quaver in her voice unnerved her even more, if that were possible. She swallowed again and tried to concentrate on her kicking.

“My boyfriend is here, too,” the ghost said. “He doesn’t like to talk to people.”

“Did you die together?”

“We thought it would be romantic,” the ghost said. “We didn’t realize we’d be trapped here. That’s why I don’t want you to die. You will be trapped here, too.”

“Why are you trapped?”

“A creature roams these woods. A monster. It is hungry for company. It collects us.”

“How many of you are there?” Violet asked, even though she didn’t want to know the answer.

“Lots,” the ghost said sadly. “Lots.”

“I don’t want to be trapped here,” Violet said, “but I don’t know how to get past the mountain lion.”

“There is no mountain lion,” the ghost said. “That’s the monster. It takes many forms.”


Author Info

Loren Rhoads is the author of the In the Wake of the Templars space opera trilogy, co-author of a succubus/angel duology called As Above, So Below, and editor of Tales for the Camp Fire: An Anthology Benefiting Wildfire Relief. She's also the author of a nonfiction travel guide called 199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die. Unsafe Words is the first full-length collection of her short stories.



The Book Junkie Reads . . . Interview with Loren Rhoads . . .

1) How would you describe your style of writing to someone that has never read your work?

LR: I don't believe in hard and fast divisions between genres. Unsafe Words, my new collection of short stories, blurs the lines between dark fantasy and horror, or science fiction and horror, or literary fiction and horror. There's always a smidgen of horror involved. I believe there's a lot to be said for catharsis and memento mori.


2) What mindset or routine do you feel the need to set when preparing to write (in general whether you are working on a project or just free writing)?

LR: During the pandemic, I've made a lot of online writing dates. One of them is set up by a local writing teacher, someone I know from Facebook. A bunch of her students and friends meet up on Zoom on Monday mornings to write. It's weird, when you stop and think about it: everyone sitting in their own homes writing, with the camera on their computers spying on them. Even so, I find it really helps me to settle down to work when I know other writers are working, too. (Thanks for setting this up, Jenny!)

I've set up my own writing date with a friend, one on one, also over Zoom. That's fun because we chat a little bit about our work, then settle in. It's almost like meeting up for a writing date at a cafe.

I've also been dropping into Shut Up and Write sessions here and there. I used to attend a couple of groups in San Francisco, back when we could meet in cafes. The online groups are fun because people come from around the world. There's always a huge variety of projects being worked on at any given time.


3) Have you found yourself bonding with any particular character(s)? If so which one(s)?

LR: One of the stories in Unsafe Words is about the adventures of a succubus named Lorelei in the music industry in LA in the 1970s. "Never Bargained for You" is a prequel of sorts to my novels Lost Angels and Angelus Rose, about Lorelei and her boyfriend, the angel Azaziel.

I love writing for Lorelei because she's surprisingly compassionate. Since she is so much older than any of the humans she meets, she can see through their worries and concerns. Writing about her seducing people is really fun.


4) Can you share your next creative project(s)?

LR: I'm looking forward to Nanowrimo because I'm finally going to finish the first novel I ever tried to write. The Death of Memory is about a young witch reclaiming her power. She meets a vampire and explores San Francisco: so much fun stuff to write about.

I've been writing a series of stories about the witch, whose name is Alondra DeCourval. They've been published in Best New Horror, Weirdbook, Occult Detective Quarterly, and other places.

One of the first of Alondra's stories is reprinted in Unsafe Words. "Valentine" is about Alondra trying to steal an immortal's heart to keep her guardian alive. It's definitely on the horror side of dark fantasy.


5) Where would you spend one full year, if you could go ANYWhere, money is not a concern? What would you do with this time?

LR: I would love to spend a year in London. Mostly, I would write, but I'd love to see all the museums and learn my way around the city. It would be wonderful to take weekend trips to explore England, Wales, and Scotland. I want to visit the old country churchyards and the standing stones and get the feel for living somewhere outside the US. I might not ever come home.


Newsletter sign-up: https://mailchi.mp/aa9545b2ccf4/lorenrhoads

Website: https://lorenrhoads.com/

Blog:  https://lorenrhoads.com/blog/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/morbidloren

Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/LorenRhoadsAuthor/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/976431.Loren_Rhoads

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/morbidloren 

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/MorbidLoren/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvTI4Zh74nsCLGmOBqulRRQ

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Loren-Rhoads/e/B002P905PE/

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