Tag: Canadian short story

Announcing Our Latest Contest!

February 23, 2016 admin 3 Comments

great women anthology

It’s here, at long last… our latest anthology!

Just in time for Mother’s Day, StarkLight Press is saluting all brave, iconoclastic, fearless, intrepid women throughout history with a set of short stories about them!

We are accepting applications for this unique exercise in writing, only available at StarkLight Press. Send your email and a brief bio to us at starklightdesk@gmail.com by March 1, 2016.

Within forty-eight hours, we will contact the winning applicants with their famous historical woman and a quality… and our writers will craft gripping fiction from those two words!

Final submissions will be between 3000-8000 words and will be due April 18, 2016.

Send in your bio to starklightdesk@gmail.com today before all the spaces are filled for this remarkable anthology!

Events, Our Books, Uncategorized

Quality Time with L.E. Caine

February 5, 2016 admin No Comments

leanne caine author photo.jpeg

L.E. “Leanne” Caine is a recalcitrant author who has submitted some truly remarkable work to StarkLight Press. Her classic tale of a LoveBot who gets self-determined during Valentine’s Day is no exception.

Leanne Caine is from Kamloops, British Columbia. She has been a ghost writer for a number of years. Recently, she has started working under her own name and has published in various magazines as well as from Starklight Press. Her day job is in the world of customer service which is why she generally avoids all human contact when not at work. She has a young daughter who is the center of her world. Other than that she is a practicing pagan and eccentric witch. She practices herbology and has a garden that she has learned to use intensively to provide safe, healthy vegetables and herbs for her and her daughter.

You can read an excerpt of her story for Hearts Asunder here:

He put it on and I traced the profile of the woman on the cameo with my fingertips. I had glanced at her briefly but I pulled up the details in my inner screen and looked at the optic footage again. She was a lady, her head held high and her bearing one of dignity.

“Thank you, Del, it’s nearly perfect.” It was more somber than anything else I owned, my belongings were few and mostly designed for the bedroom. It was a grown up thing too. Oddly respectful of the man who had given me a ‘Mrs. Clause’ Corset and panty set with Santa hat for Christmas a few months before.

“Nearly?” He went and got another bottle of wine. He liked fine wine but always struggled with getting the cork out.

“Yes, I had imagined for a moment that it would be a ring,” I said.

He stopped his struggle to look at me, “You thought I was asking you to marry you?” He asked, his voice shocked.

“I didn’t really, because you only think of me of a thing, but I had hoped, just for a minute, that maybe you loved me.” I returned to my now cold lobster tail. It was nearly plucked clean now anyway but it was my new favorite food.

Leanne answered our interview questions below:

Do you have a real life horror story of love gone wrong in your life?
So many. I’m a single mom and honestly so jaded by the dating scene, I hate it. I’m not saying that I will never have a meaningful relationship, but I am thinking it. Seriously, I’ve met so many nuts out there that after a point I have to wonder how anyone is ever compatible ever. I had one guy break into my house in some sort of ‘grand gesture’ and scare the hell out of daughter. Thank gods he was just a needy freak and not a knife wielding psycho, or lobster fork wielding psycho.

What do you find makes the combination of love and horror such a potent combination
Because love sucks. It gets you all excited and if it fails it’s already that they’ve ripped your heart out and thrown it at feet. How to explain that to someone who has never experienced it?? You almost wish they’d kill you if you actually fall in love and then they leave you. Love is a horror story waiting to happen, writing one was more a matter of ‘which one’ than of finding inspiration for it.

What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentines Day horror story?
Blind dates. Or just dates. I’ve been on so many and yes, I have had violent fantasies about doing horrible things to the person who just ate my evening. Fortunately I’ve written them down to avoid doing hard jail time (I’ve got a daughter to think about).

If you’ve gone on a bad date you know how it is. You have the awkward. You have the weird. You have the sudden declarations of the bizarre, frightening or messed the hell up. I think that dating is traumatizing and to deal with it I’ve had to learn to disassociate. It’s not healthy.

I’ve felt this way on dates, I’ve felt like a robot on dates, I’ve felt like a cake on a platter waiting to be gobbled up by the wolf across the table from me.

Author Interviews, News, Our Books, Our Writers, Uncategorized

Will Norton: Roughneck, Writer, Historian

February 4, 2016 admin 2 Comments

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William Norton grew up in Vancouver B.C. and has spent the past few years working in the oil industry north of Fort Saint John. He usually writes stories that are uniquely and specifically from his perspective, his characters often share his name. He writes when he has time but spends most of his time working and being filthy. His hobbies include sleeping when he’s not working. Based off the current trend. he suspects he will soon have more time for writing and social media than in the past- which would be great if he didn’t have truck payments.

In addition to writing, Will enjoys looking into the history behind our current holidays, customs and society. It was through his researches that he developed his story for Hearts Asunder, which is a fictionalized account of the events surrounding the death of St. Valentine. Here’s an excerpt:

September had wandered into October by this time and Constantine treated Valentine as he would one of his own sons. He was impressed by the boy’s quick mind and envious of his charisma. Boniface had been charismatic as well and the boy orated and lectured in his father’s cadences. Valentine wasn’t the only one sending letters. Constantine had sent letters to Boniface, telling him of his sons poor situation and the fate that the one god had felt fit to thrust upon him. Boniface agreed to take him back as his heir if Constantine could get rid of the boy’s silly notions and get him agree to come home and to marry.

In a fit of genius Constantine negotiated with Boniface that Valentine would take his blind daughter has his bride if he succeeded in returning Boniface’s only son and heir to him. Constantine could see how badly Boniface missed his son when the man agreed to this term. If Constantine could only show Valentine the error of his ways, all would be well.

Lucy had noticed Julie’s prowess at finding her way around but even she underestimated how well Julie could find her way through her home when she chose.

It was late in October and her infatuation had increased. She had many conversations with Valentine and knew he was obsessed with the one god but she still wanted him for her own. Much of their conversations had been about the man on the cross. Valentine feeling that if he could convince the daughter he would have someone to help him convince Constantine to come around to the true faith.

The conversations bored her but his voice was what she listened to, not his words. Other times he would sit in the garden with her and they would talk about the flowers. He taught her to name them by touch, taking her small, childlike hands in his to guide her to their petals. He described their beauty and their colors, laughing at himself when he discovered how hard it was to explain these things to someone who had no sight.

He took to comparing them to textures. Pale blue was the cold water from the well and dark blue was the warm water of a bath. Red was the stones around the hearth. Brown was the feel of the bark of an olive tree.

Will also answered our interview questions:

Do you have a real life horror story of love gone wrong in your life?
I’m not sure if you’d call it a horror story, more misplaced intentions and a lot of ‘can’t believe my good luck’ and then shit went down. I met this girl at a local bar, took her home with me and she stuck around. I was pretty excited when I found out that having girl in the house meant I got sex way more than without girl in house. Having made this realization I made to effort to make her leave and then left for the bush. This happened a few more times and then one time I came home and we had been together long enough to be considered common-law. I was only at home for three weeks of the six months but never mind that. Legally she could claim we were ‘married’. I came home out of the bush and found all my stuff on the front lawn and she called the cops on me when I tried to come in and find out what the hell was going on. That was the most expensive girl I ever met at a bar and I still have to pay her some of my pay check. Bitch. (I hope she reads this because I’m petty), is this a horror story? With the oil industry slow down it’s sure starting to be. I miss my house.

What do you find makes the combination of love and horror such a potent combination

Trust. Like I said up above. You trust someone, I don’t pretend that I loved her. She was a girl I met at the bar and she did things to my body that I liked. Stupid. That’s it, love makes us stupid and because we all forgive stupidity in the name of love we are more stupid than usual.

What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentines Day horror story?

I almost wrote a vicious story about my ‘ex’ but then this idea was suggested to me by Leanne Caine. The cover for the book was screaming out for someone to write this story and for some crazed reason she thought of me. This story was completely out of my comfort zone, usually I write up close first person and the lead character is always just me letting my imagination and fear get free reign for what could happen or might be. Leanne’s cute though so I said I’d give it a shot. I’m glad I did it but I hope people are forgiving of my many historical inaccuracies and other mistakes. I took a lot of liberties with a legend that has almost no information about it. I don’t know much about 5^th century Rome and did a lot of research that a half-assed historian could probably poke a lot of holes in.

Maybe one day I’ll work on a more accurate version but my goal with this was to breathe life into a story that is so dusty and uncertain that even the catholics gave up on it as an official part of their calendar. I hope people will enjoy it for the story’s sake because in the end that’s what I did. It’s not meant to be a history of the era, just a story and I hope people can enjoy it that way.

Author Interviews, News, Our Books, Our Writers, Uncategorized

Virginia Carraway Stark Chats about Tentacles and Romance

February 3, 2016 admin 1 Comment

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The illustrious Virginia Carraway Stark is a prolific and popular author with a plethora of short stories and novels to her name. She turns her attention- and her pen- to the idea of romantic getaways with a Lovecraftian twist in her short story for Hearts Asunder.

Here’s a disturbingly titillating excerpt from Willows’ Corner:

He was against one of the filter output jets and the water pushed against him in a pleasing way. Elphonse smiled again and put her arms around him and the her legs wrapped firmly around him. If it wasn’t for his shorts he would have been inside her. She kissed him, he returned her ardor. Damn, he was starting to think he wasn’t going to get laid at all this Valentine’s weekend, at least that part was turning around.

He tried to wriggle out of her intensely strong grip to undo the velcro fly of his swimshorts but she held him too tightly to move. He wanted her so badly but the layer of material between them was driving him nuts. He was so caught up in the problem of his swimshorts that he almost didn’t notice that there was a second pair of legs wrapped around him, or something that felt much like legs. He looked into the murk of the dimly lit water and saw the pink and purple tentacles that started at Elphonse’s waist and made up the lower half of her body. One small tentacle crawled up his swim trunks and he shuddered, he shuddered and pulled away but what the tentacle sought and found was hard and ready.

Solomon Burke continued his song and Elphonse started to sing to him as she toyed with him:
You see now what you’ve caused
And I know just what I lost
And I know what the price
I paid, I paid, I paid
For loving someone like you

Do you have a real life horror story of love gone wrong in your life?
Yes. Yes in so many ways. I’m prone to stalkers and some strange people have come after me. One of the creepiest ones that isn’t a whole long story all on its own was a guy who drew pictures of some demon he said was following him and made him do bad things sometimes. There were swords and apparently his dad and his friends dressed up in robes and did things sometimes. I made sure not to be alone with him much after that. I felt like I was one dimension away from things getting really nutso.

What do you find makes the combination of love and horror such a potent combination
People who love you will do anything for you, I mean anything. People have a weird and twisted idea of both what the ‘anything’ might be and what love is. Love is intimately connected to the idea of possessing someone and having ownership of them. Love gives us all a sense of belonging and for people who things don’t go right for or for people who came with faulty wiring this can go from, ‘I love you, I brought you roses,’ to, ‘why are you trying to leave, I want to be inside your skin’.

Love is the most powerful emotion we feel (I think) and it lives on a teeter-totter with hatred. If you try to jump off your end when someone has you on this teeter totter they hit the ground with a tooth jarring pound of hatred.

It’s not just love that we’re talking about here either, it’s eroticism. Sex has always been associated with death. The idea of the orgasm being le petite mort. Like a sword he penetrates her and yet she does not die. The imagery of this is the basis for endless ‘secret’ brotherhoods and springs in the modern era from Crowley. The idea of penetration equaling death is an old one and it speaks powerfully to you no matter your gender. In my story it was the man who got penetrated, these things happen and for many it is understandably the greatest horror of all.

What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentines Day horror story?
I didn’t really have an inspiration for mine except that I got it into my head that a couple should have a horrific experience at a bed and breakfast. Those places kind of creep my out, the idea of walking into a strangers home and having no clue what sort of experience you’re going to have is akin to picking up hitch hikers in my mind. In fact, it’s more frightening because it’s in their demense. Who knows what traps or horrors they could set up for you in there? Maybe it would just be bed bugs and an unhygienic kitchen, I think I’d rather stay in a hostel than go to a B and B. I’m a private person and wouldn’t want strangers in my house and then be made to make breakfast for them. It seems like the sort of person who would be into that would be likely to have an ulterior motive.

BUT in all honesty I have heard nothing but good feedback about B and Bs. I have friends who use them and plan entire trips skipping from one to the next and say they have the loveliest time you could imagine. I think probably my brain did the writer thing where it threw the ‘what if’ into the mix and I’m thinking the worst of a group of people who are some of the most social, extroverted morning people on the planet.

Perhaps there should be a name for a fear of Bed and Breakfasts… or maybe there already is one. I’ll get back to you on that, whatever it is, I think I have that phobia.

Author Interviews, Our Books, Our Writers, Uncategorized

Jason Pere discusses Love and Blood

January 31, 2016 admin No Comments

Jason Pere is a native New Englander, currently residing in Connecticut with his wife and two rambunctious cats. He has had a long standing passion with the arts.

Jason discovered CWC early on in 2015 and has been a passionate member since, diving into multiple collaborative fiction projects with other authors. He has work published with CW Publishing and Starklight Press. He also has solo work self-published and published by Rambunctious Ramblings Publishing Incorporated. When not writing or enduring his “Real World Job” Jason enjoys, Netflix time with his family, breaking out obscure board games and dorking out with friends, firing up the his game console and surviving a Zombie Apocalypse or indulging in baked goods and sleep.

Jason wrote a chilling short story, Star Crossed, which appears in our Valentine’s Day horror anthology, Hearts Asunder. Here’s an excerpt:

They were stepping into the elevator when the high heel of Hailey’s shoe caught in the gap between then floor and the inside of the elevator. It took Brady fully by surprise. It was the first time that he had ever seen Hailey be anything other than graceful. Without thinking Brady’s hand shot out and stopped his friend from going down.

“Ow!” Hailey exclaimed as Brady’s hand grasped her upper arm. He let go once her feet were stable on the floor of the elevator. The short sleeve of her shirt had been rolled up onto itself when Brady had come to her rescue and it revealed a sizable bruise.

“Oh I am so sorry! I didn’t think. I just didn’t want you to fall down. I am so sorry. I didn’t think that I grabbed you so hard. I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” Brady blurted out as he look at the bruise on his friends arm.

“No. No. No. It’s not your fault, it’s mine. This is nothing. I just bumped this on a towel rail in the shower the other day. I really should be more careful,” Hailey said embarrassedly as she rolled her sleeve down and coved up the bruise again. “Now let’s go and get something yummy.”

“Ok. I’m glad you’re alright but that bruise did look pretty bad,” Brady said trying not to sound too skeptical. He had worked in sales and customer service for long enough than he had a strong enough sense of when he wasn’t getting the full story form someone.

“Thank you but it’s nothing. It really is. Don’t worry about it. I’m fine,” Hailey said in a way that seemed like she was trying to convince herself as much as her friend.

Jason had some revealing answers about his inspiration for his story in his interview questions:

Do you have a real life horror story of love gone wrong in your life?

Yes I do but oh which one to pick. I suppose the best example would be the story of a young woman I met online may years ago. A friendship rapidly turned into a long distance relationship. We saw each other in person on weekends and over the span of a couple months were convinced that we were destined to be together. I had the wonderfully horrid idea to leave my home in Connecticut and visit some friends in Georgia for an extended stay. I invited her to make the move with me and she said she would be happy to follow me. I should have realized that moving across the county with someone I hardly knew and never lived with before would end in disaster but I thought that we were the exception to the rule. We broke up nearly as soon as we got to Georgia and she then began dating and later marrying one of my friends that I moved down there to visit. Oh and that’s not the end of this little tale it gets better. After a very turbulent period things settled down for a while and I started dating someone else (Who I would later marry) until one day my ex-girlfriend and her husband orchestrated an armed home invasion, assault and kidnaping of myself and my current girlfriend. It was a poorly executed crime and all guilty parties were in custody in a matter of hours. So not only did this woman break my heart but she also held me at gunpoint. Still I cannot fully condemn knowing her because if I had not ever known her then I don’t know if I ever would have met the amazing woman that I went on to marry.

What do you find makes the combination of love and horror such a potent combination?

I think that love is probably one of the most profound and indescribable emotions that lies within the human spectrum. It would stand to reason that the greatest emotions we are capable of feeling can lead to the greatest pain, fear and sadness when they are gone, misinterpreted or twisted in some kind of perverted fashion. Love can be a powerful motivator for someone to do horrible things.

What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentines Day horror story?What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentine’s Day Horror story?

I wanted to do a tragic love story. I went to Romeo and Juliet for inspiration. I wanted a story of two people who really should have ended up happily ever after but just couldn’t get out of their own lives enough to make that happen.

3. What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentines Day horror story?

Thanks for the great story and interview, Jason Pere! You can find Star Crossed in Hearts Asunder, available from StarkLight Press in Feb.

Author Interviews, Our Books, Our Writers, Uncategorized

Mandi Millen on the Black Rose

January 28, 2016 admin No Comments

Words have always been AJ Millen’s friends. She started telling stories young, and she’s still at it. During the 1980s, she worked as a reporter in England, but in 1989, she left for a six-month semester in Greece. That was the plan, until a brown-eyed boy from Samos persuaded her to stay. Today, he’s her husband and father to their 19-year-old son.

Today, she lives in Athens and works in Corporate Communications. To date, AJ has participated in two collaborative novel writing projects and had stories published in three anthologies. Her work also featured in evenings of tales performed at independent theatres in Brighton, and she was a winner in the AuthorTrope “I Made The Darkness” writing contest.

Read more of her words at http://shemeanswellbut.blogspot.com

Here’s an excerpt from Mandi’s story, The Black Rose:

Susie didn’t say much at dinner. She didn’t need to. Will ordered for her, like he always did. She didn’t dare defy him by saying she didn’t fancy steak tonight.

She chewed diligently at the meat, trying to ignore the twinge of her bruised jaw, just as she had tried to avoid Will’s critical glare as she picked at the prawn cocktail starter he’d chosen for her. The lemon juice in the dressing had made her lip smart, and she really didn’t like prawns all that much. She looked up to see Will staring pointedly at her.

“Eat up, princess,” he said. “I’m spending good money on that sirloin. For you. You need the iron. Got to look after yourself, and my boy.”

“It might be a girl,” she murmured under her breath. She made sure it wasn’t loud enough to be heard above the tinkling piano in the corner of the candlelit restaurant packed with couples dressed up to the nines, desperate to convince themselves that they were all madly in love.

The thought flitted across her mind that Will’s treatment before they left the house probably did more harm to the child inside her than a slight iron deficiency that would be easily corrected with a prescription from the family doctor. She dismissed it before she acknowledged it, fearful that Will could read her conscious thoughts and take revenge for her imaginary betrayal. Again.

Her eyes strayed down to the single red rose laying on the linen tablecloth next to her dessert fork. It had come with a card, obviously dictated by Will to the florist, in a curling baroque script that bore no resemblance to his practical heavy hand:

Forever mine.

Will.

Susie shuddered inwardly as she read it again. No doubt, others would find it romantic in its simplicity. To her, it sounded like a life sentence.

Mandi also has some thoughts about love and horror:

1. Do you have a real life horror story of love gone wrong in your life?

Doesn’t everyone? Perhaps not in the “Hammer Horror” sense, but I’ve had my share of romantic disasters: a boy threatening to kill himself if I didn’t come back to him (he didn’t); being stood up on my birthday; the fun and games of my marriage breaking down when I was just 22 (yes, I know. We married at 19, I thought I was mature. I wasn’t.)

I’m a little cynical about the whole ‘heart & flowers’ romantic package, though I do believe in love in all its forms. It just worries me that so many people seem to accept “love” at any cost, for fear of being alone. Sometimes, alone is what we need to be to figure out who we are and what we really want. In fact, my best ever Valentine’s Day was when I was single, and it involved jumping fully clothed into a pool…. but that’s another story.

I believe the best love is not about fireworks and passion, it’s mundane, everyday, in it for the long haul. If you can survive seeing each other at your worst and bickering over the practicalities of daily life, and still feel at home when you look across the table at ‘your person’, you know something is right. Fortunately, that is what I’ve had for the past 26 years.

2. What do you find makes the combination of love and horror such a potent combination?
I think it is the juxtaposition of our high expectations for the ideal romantic scenario, usually fed into a frenzy by the media and commercial interests, colliding head-on with reality in all its dirty, sordid, painful glory. And the lengths we will go to the name of love.

3. What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentine’s Day horror story?
Again, we come back to why some people put up with the unacceptable in the name of love, and what it takes to break that habit. I was also inspired by a friend who spent some time in prison after attacking her then husband with a knife after years of systematic abuse, both physical and psychological. Strangely enough, her crime and her punishment were what finally freed her.

Thanks, Mandi!

Tony Stark,

Publisher and CEO,

StarkLight Press.

Author Interviews, Our Books, Our Writers, Uncategorized

Liz Butcher on Love and Obsession

January 27, 2016 admin 1 Comment

Our next author to share their thoughts on Love and Horror is Liz Butcher.

Ms. Butcher resides in Brisbane, Australia, with her husband, daughter and two cats, Pandora and Zeus. While writing is her passion, her numerous interests include psychology, history, astronomy, the paranormal, mythology, reading, art and music, and help fuel her imagination. She also loves being out in nature, whether it be walking through the trees or relaxing at the beach. Liz has previously published ‘Wrath’ in the “Lurking In The Deep” and “Haunting Gemma” in the “Twisted Tales” anthologies and currently has a number of projects in the works.

Here’s an excerpt from her story, See What I See:

Dahlia closed her eyes and forced herself to envision her fiancé in happier times, when he’d only had eyes for her. With renewed resilience, she got to work. Procuring the obscure ingredients took time and patience, yet she was satisfied by knowing she would soon have her love back. The spell stated intent was as essential as the ingredients themselves. Perfect timing would be useless without it. So she ensured she lived, breathed, and dreamed her intent, passing the time by following the doomed couple, watching them from safe distances, glaring through fences, and peering in windows. She took a perverted joy from knowing their happiness, and her sorrow, would be short-lived.

As the days passed, she progressed from mild to pounding headaches as her jaw fused into a permanent clench. Despite that, her focus and dedication to the task made her oblivious to the pain. Even the ache within her heart had dulled as she diligently worked on her potion. No longer aware of day or night, she could not afford for it to be less than perfect.

He must see what is in my heart. Share what is in my heart. Mine alone.

On the final day, Dahlia marvelled at her work, proud that she had mastered the forbidden potion on her first attempt at crafting. The only thing left to do was ensure the potion passed only the lips of her beloved, and she knew exactly how to do it.

Here are Liz’s thoughts on our interview questions:

1. Do you have a real life horror story of love gone wrong in your life? No – I have been very lucky – knock on wood!

2. What do you find makes the combination of love and horror such a potent combination? I think it’s a great combination because there is the potential for love to go horribly wrong, especially when the line becomes blurred between love and obsession. Love is a force that can’t be controlled, yet a whole lot of trouble can be unleashed when we try to.

3. What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentine’s Day horror story? Perception. The one-sided view point of someone whose love has become an obsession, where they become deluded rather than face the love is unrequited.

Thank you, Liz!

Tony Stark,

Publisher and CEO,

StarkLight Press.

Author Interviews, Our Books, Our Writers, Uncategorized

Jenn Spaulding Shares a Valentine Horror Story or Two

January 26, 2016 admin No Comments

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Our next author in the spotlight is Jenn Spaulding. Her visceral fiction is a big hit in the GAF Mainframe Universe. This time she has written a horror romance set in the present day for StarkLight Press’ Valentine’s Day Anthology, Hearts Asunder. Here is a little bit of backstory on Ms. Spaulding:

Jennifer Spaulding is an author, mother, scientist, and scholar. She has penned four books of poetry, numerous short stories, and she is currently writing articles for Outermost: A Journal of the Paranormal. She is also currently busy with several top-secret collaborations. Look for her poetry on Amazon under J.L. Estes. Her poem “Shattered” was selected to be in the 2012 International Who’s Who in Poetry. Jennifer was also a participant of the 2014 Poetry Marathon. Her poems are featured in In My Mind’s Eye along with many other internationally diverse poets.

Jenn also took a few minutes to answer our interview questions:

Interview Questions

Do you have a real life horror story of love gone wrong in your life?

When I was sixteen I met 21 year old Steve Jocko. He literally gave me no choice in the matter. He grabbed me and declared me his. He began kicking the shit out of me on a daily basis. Until one day he went too far and almost killed me by rupturing my spleen. I lost 4 liters of blood.

By the time I made it to the hospital the next day, I was on my last leg. I was so scared that he would kill me that I lied to the cops and said I got jumped. I spent two weeks in the ICU. He was beating the shit out of me again the next day. One night he grabbed a long, serrated bread knife and tried to slice my throat but I threw up my hand and he sliced my pinky damn near off.

Finally my mom came to get me after seeing my body covered in bite marks. My mother spent the day getting drunk and decided to go curse Steve out. I was 6 months pregnant and I begged and pleaded with her not to go, but she didn’t listen. She was so trashed I wouldn’t ride with her so her boyfriend’s nephew was sober so I rode with him. She went to my apartment where Steve was waiting outside with an ax-handle. Steve seen me in the van with another guy and his eyes filled with murderous rage. I told the guy to drive, but Steve was there smashing the passenger side window where I sat, so I dove in the back of the van and told him to go. Steve Jocko cowardly beat my mother with that ax-handle. The surgeons said it was like a jigsaw putting the pieces of her skull back together. She lost her eye. He barely got any time in jail.

What do you find makes the combination of the love and horror such a potent combination?

I think that love and horror make such a potent combination because both fear and love are very intense emotions.

What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentine’s Day horror story?

I got the idea for Killer Love from a dream that I had about an elusive female serial killer.

Jenn’s gripping tale can be found in Hearts Asunder, our Valentine’s Day anthology from StarkLight Press. It will be available Feb. 1, 2016!

Author Interviews, Our Books, Our Characters, Uncategorized

Sharon Flood in the Floodlights

January 25, 2016 admin No Comments

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StarkLight Press has found in Sharon Flood an excellent author and editor, whose timely work allows SLP to share even more thrilling, exciting fiction with our fans. Ms. Flood has penned a story called Forever in our Valentine’s Anthology, Hearts Asunder. In her own words, Sharon tells us a bit about herself:

I was born and raised in the St. Lawrence River Valley in the 1,000 Islands region. I graduated from grade 13 in Thousand Islands Secondary School in Brockville. I wrote some in high school, but after that, my talent lay dormant until I discovered http://www.protagonize.com/author/moonwalker in 2008. It’s a collaborative writers’ site that honed my skills. Through this site I met my publisher, The Masquerade Crew for my first anthology story – http://www.amazon.com/Forevermore-Travel-Anthology-Sharon-Flood-ebook/dp/B00XSBH4UW. I was chosen as a Mob Boss here: http://www.masqueradecrew.com/p/the-masquerade-mob.html Where I do book reviews for The Masquerade Crew, and on Amazon.com I am very proud to announce that I am involved with all four projects here – http://www.collaborativewritingchallenge.com you will find me in the Meet the authors option under the Projects button. It’s really worth checking out. Multiple authors write publishable books together. It’s amazing what Laura Callender has done with the place! I’m retired after working 40 years in retail. I now have more free time to do what I love best – reading and writing.

Here are Sharon’s answers to our interview questions:

Interview Questions

1. Do you have a real life horror story of love gone wrong in your life?

No, not really. I was married for the first time at 19, and it didn’t work out, but it wasn’t a horror story – just two very young people not ready for the commitment of marriage. I married again at 25, and that one worked out – I’m still married almost 39 years later. There are horror stories within the marriage about ill health, etc. but our love has stayed strong throughout.

2. What do you find makes the combination of love and horror such a potent combination?

I think maybe because they’re polar opposites. Love is supposed to be a positive emotion, where horror is definitely negative. It’s like opening a door expecting a party, and all you find is a dead body on the floor. The emotion of being horrified identifies all the bad stuff that’s going on in your mind at one time – like fear, nausea at the blood, the need to run away, disgust. Love in its best sense is giving, caring, and sharing. Horror pretty much kills those emotions.

3. What was the source of your inspiration for your Valentines Day horror story?

sharonvalentinestorypicture

In the Valentine Horror comments, someone suggested a title – bloody valentine, which was considered to be done to death, I guess, so it was abandoned. It gave me the idea of a bloody heart, and that morphed into a bloody heart locket. I’d decided to go with a vampire theme, and so was I thinking ‘forever young, forever beautiful, forever evil’. That became my title. Then as the story progressed, I realized that the vampire was not evil in the usual sense, just sucking blood to survive. He didn’t murder indiscriminately and create mayhem. He was just single minded. He wanted his relationship with his lady love to last forever, so that’s what I named it – forever.

Thanks for taking the time to talk to us, Sharon! You can find Sharon Flood’s story Feb. 1 2016 in Hearts Asunder, from StarkLight Press.

– Tony Stark,

Publisher and CEO,

StarkLight Press.

Author Interviews, Our Books, Our Writers, Uncategorized

A Mixture of Love and Horror

January 24, 2016 admin No Comments

This year, StarkLight Press has teamed up with some of our best, hand-picked authors to bring you a spine-tingling Valentine’s Day anthology. Hearts Asunder is a set of short stories that turn the classic romantic tropes of Valentine’s Day on their heads.

Part good old fashioned horror story, part dark romance, every tale in our latest anthology is guaranteed to make you look at this romantic holiday in a new light.

To kick off our release of this great title, StarkLight Press is featuring interviews with each of our authors. Check back here to catch the latest ‘heart-to-heart’ with our Valentine’s Day writers.

News, Our Books, Our Writers, Uncategorized