Month: November 2021

AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Jamie Lee

megHan

Meghan: Hi, Jamie. Welcome to Meghan’s House of Books AND our annual Halloween Extravaganza. Thanks for stopping by today. What is your favorite part of Halloween?

Jamie: The uptick in horror movies, which is odd considering the number of streaming services that I subscribe to. But I have fond memories of getting my schoolwork completed and taking a long nap, all so I could stay up obscenely late to watch late showing of Hammer movies.

Meghan: What is your favorite Halloween tradition?

Jamie: It’s one that I’ve let lapse, sadly, but want to pick up again. I used to read Bram Stoker’s Dracula, every year, for Halloween.

Meghan: If Halloween is your favorite holiday (or even second favorite holiday), why?

Jamie: Halloween is the time of year I pick up my new, home décor.

Meghan: What are you superstitious about?

Jamie: Opening an umbrella. I was eight the first time I did this and my mother informed me that it was bad luck, so I proceeded to do it several more times. Later that day I was chased down the road by several feral dogs, which my grandfather intercepted by swinging a cane like a club. Since then, I haven’t felt the need to test the validity of bad luck, with a repeat performance.

Meghan: What/who is your favorite horror monster or villain?

Jamie: I love Sam, from the movie Trick R Treat. He’s the perfect gentleman, if you’re celebrating Halloween appropriately; otherwise, he tends to get a tad stabby.

Meghan: Which unsolved murder fascinates you the most?

Jamie: The Torso murders. It’s what Elliot Ness did, when he wasn’t chasing Al Capone.

Meghan: Which urban legend scares you the most?

Jamie: The ankle slicing, car thief. Because, ouch!

Meghan: Who is your favorite serial killer and why?

Jamie: Mine is fictional, Hannibal Lecter. He eats the rude.

Meghan: How old were you when you saw your first horror movie? How old were you when you read your first horror book?

Jamie: I saw The Exorcist when I was five, which is probably more a statement about parenting. It gave me waking nightmares all-night, so much that I couldn’t tell, if I was awake or dreaming.

I believe I was twelve, when I first read The Stand, by Stephen King. I couldn’t put it down, so much so that I finished it in a day.

Meghan: Which horror novel unsettled you the most?

Jamie: I remember the Splatterpunk genre and had an anthology of short stories, entitled funnily enough: Splatterpunk. I had to read it in small doses and don’t know if I ever completely finished it.

Meghan: Which horror movie scarred you for life?

Jamie: See The Exorcist, above. Although, Creepshow is a contender, after I saw it when I was six or seven.

Meghan: What is your favorite Halloween costume?

Jamie: I bought one of the “paint your own” Halloween masks when I was in college. It was a red skull. I spent days working on it and didn’t think the brushes were good enough, so I started using some of my Warhammer brushes for detail work. Anything that allows me to mix hobbies is just magical.

Meghan: What is your favorite Halloween-themed song?

Jamie: I am listening to “I Am Halloween” by Midnight Nightmare, as I type this.

Also, the Munsters theme song!

Meghan: What is your favorite Halloween candy or treat? What is your most disappointing?

Jamie: Caramel apples, even if I’m such a fastidious eater now that I’d cut one into slices before eating.

Smarties: they are colored chalk, but that never stopped them getting used as a staple of Halloween bag filler, as a child.

Meghan: This has been great fun. Thank you again for participating. One more thing before you go: What are your go-to Halloween movies and books?

Jamie:
Movies: Halloween (original), Trick R Treat
Books: Dracula

Boo-graphy:
Jamie Lee has been writing fiction for 30 years. His debut release, Harmony, has been 25 years in the making. While he holds a degree in Microbiology and welcomes comparisons to a mad scientist, writing has always been his first love and interest.

After a successful private release in 2019 of short stories, Harmony was finally ready to debut in March of 2020.

However, life had other plans.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused the release, rollout, and convention travel in support of Harmony to come to a screeching halt.

With an unexpected year-long hiatus, Jamie chose to work on final edits and begin to focus on the second book in the Harmony series, Cacophony.

When not writing, Jamie is a fervent, life-long gamer. He can be found every Friday night with long time friends playing any number of online RPGs and, during the week and weekend, building and painting his countless Warhammer armies, playing any chance he gets. He also enjoys health and fitness, reading, music, traveling, searching or the best bar-b-que and being fueled by endless coffee and kombucha. He is forever searching for the perfect haunted home to live in since his condo is simply not large enough for a proper library or laboratory.

AUTHOR INTERVIEW: M. Ennenbach

megHan

Our next author, as long as he takes part in our annual Halloween Extravaganzas, will always be on November 1st. Why? Because today is his birthday – and what better way to celebrate than to have him on to share more about the awesomeness that is he.

Meghan: Hey, Mike!! Welcome back! It’s always a pleasure to have you on the blog. Thanks for stopping by. Now that all the niceties are out of the way, let’s get started. What is your favorite part of Halloween?

Mike: It is different in Texas, less a spectacle, but that may be because I have gotten old and lost the joy. As a kid it was the cool autumn air, the threat of snow lingering, and of course, my birthday being the next day. Most kids just get candy, bit I got paraded to relatives’ houses and showered with gifts as well in my scratchy plastic Spiderman costume.

Meghan: What is your favorite Halloween tradition?

Mike: I grew up poor, so we didn’t do pumpkins or decorations. Halloween was always a rush to get ready and then stomp through the leaves as my parents sat smoking in the rusted red Chevy Nova down the block. I try to read one horror book in October, time permitting. I am lame. I don’t do holidays.

Meghan: If Halloween is your favorite holiday (or even second favorite holiday), why?

Mike: It would definitely be my favorite because I am a child of Autumn. The pressure isn’t there like other holidays to scrabble together a meal or buy gifts. An excuse to dress up and get wasted.

Meghan: What are you superstitious about?

Mike: So much. My anxiety is fierce. I don’t know if I am superstitious, or just so used to things going badly. I toss salt over my shoulder and avoid going under ladders. But I love black kitties and go out of my way be in one’s path.

Meghan: What/who is your favorite horror monster or villain?

Mike: I like it when man is the villain. Dr. Decker from Nightbreed. Hannibal Lecter. Though I have a great affection for the Universal Monsters, the tragedy of them resonates.

Meghan: Which unsolved murder fascinates you the most?

Mike: Black Dahlia or Jack the Ripper.

Meghan: Which urban legend scares you the most?

Mike: Any of them with a siren luring men to their doom. I know just how much of a hopeless romantic I am, and that I would for sure heed the call.

Meghan: Who is your favorite serial killer and why?

Mike: HH Holmes. He built a murder house in the middle of the World’s Fair.

Meghan: How old were you when you saw your first horror movie? How old were you when you read your first horror book?

Mike: First movie was The Hand with Sir Michael Caine. I was so young. Every shadow was that effing hand scurrying in the darkness for weeks after. First book was a collection of Poe in first grade. It didn’t scare me, but it opened my eyes to a whole new world.

Meghan: Which horror novel unsettled you the most?

Mike: The first half of Heart Shaped Box, when it was still a ghost story. It went to crap when he over explained everything and it turned into one of his dad’s books. But that first half was amazing.

Meghan: Which horror movie scarred you for life?

Mike: I grew up with Faces of Death, so nothing really affected me after. I think The Autopsy of Jane Doe might have scared me the most.

Meghan: What is your favorite Halloween costume?

Mike: One year I got a zoot suit and that was pretty awesome.

Meghan: What is your favorite Halloween-themed song?

Mike: I don’t know really. I guess anything by the Misfits.

Meghan: What is your favorite Halloween candy or treat? What is your most disappointing?

Mike: I like sour fruity candy. Anything else is just gross.

Meghan: This has been great fun, as usual. Before you go, what are your go-to Halloween movies?

Mike: Halloween 1 and 2 (original) are the best.

Boo-graphy:
M Ennenbach. Poet. Author. Member of Cerberus. Mike has four collections of poetry, two chapbooks, a collection of shorts, a Splatter Western, the debut by Cerberus, and thirty some anthology appearances in his three years of writing. He writes a lot of horror, but depressing and absurd literature is his sweet spot. He writes on his blog on a daily basis, mostly poetry with a smattering of fiction and news. He works with Eleanor Merry at Macabre Ladies Publishing, and they have exciting things on the horizon.

(un)poetic —
Unscaled highs, perilous lows; this is a journey filled with both. A free form dance in the form of poetry; tended with loving care that drips sorrow. Darkness tinged with hope, forged in the fires of life. Of the sea, of the stars, of the night air as the sun breaks on the horizon. A desperate love, in the guise of loving desperation.

(un)poetic is anything but.

No rules. Just pure expression poured on the page with shaking hands and envisioned through tear-filled eyes. This is different, this is new. Raw. This is poetry, here and now.

(un)fettered —
to soar free of inhibition. a collection of poetry that skims the surface of fathomless emotion, leaving waves across the placid sea. m ennenbach plumbs these ripples in search of connection. sometimes the only answer is to tear down everything and examine it in its basest form. (un)fettered.

(un)requited —
unwanted. unfulfilled. unworthy. in the moment you offer every bit of yourself, mind body and soul, only to find you were not enough. broken hearted and alone. (un)requited.