In case you didn’t already know, I have new releases coming soon! Little Green Dreams arrives soon on December 12th (I moved the date up a week!); Malcolm on January 16th; and What Happens in Bozeman on February 20th! Malcolm is the next Montana Bounty Hunters: Dead Horse, MT, story, and What Happens in Bozeman is the next We Are Dead Horse, MT book. Little Green Dreams is a standalone title, for now. Depending on how readers enjoy it, there may be more stories that follow. Believe me, I have some ideas…
I hope you’re looking forward to them all and that you’ll take a moment to pre-order each one so you don’t miss them when they release! I promise there’s humor, sexiness, and small-town adventures in each.
The Gurdon Light
Central to my next release, Little Green Dreams, is a local phenomenon that occurs some 20-odd miles down the road from me called The Gurdon Light. The TV show Unsolved Mysteries even did an episode featuring the legend, which I mention in my story because it was a big deal back in the day that lent some legitimacy to the legend since they couldn’t find a scientific cause for the Light. And just so you know, I’ve seen it, too.
The Gurdon Light is Arkansas’s most famous legend. There’s a certain length of old, abandoned railroad track near Gurdon, Arkansas, where a mysterious light can be seen when you walk down the tracks. It’s a bright orb that appears to swing side to side. And it’s not shy. It appears often. Local universities have taken students out there to try to find the source of the Light, but they’ve pretty much ruled out things like swamp gas because the light doesn’t dissipate in the wind.
The legend the locals tie the Light to is a sad story. This is a snippet from the book where I explain the supposed origin of the Light:
“William McClain was a foreman working for the Missouri-Pacific railroad. Late one evening, he was finishing up when he was approached by one of his workers, Louis McBride. It was during the Depression…1931, as I recall. Times were hard, and Mr. McBride, although he had a job, wanted more hours because he needed money. The railroad had strict rules about how many hours a man could work, so Mr. McClain said he couldn’t give him any more. They got into an argument, and McBride raised his shovel and struck McClain in the head. Then he beat him to death with a spike maul—it’s a tool a railroad man uses, like a sledgehammer. It was an awful thing.”
Ever since Mr. McClain’s murder, the light appears on the tracks. Locals say it’s the railroad lantern he carried.
So, that’s the legend I piggybacked my book on. Although, I have a very different explanation for the phenomenon because, hey, I’m a storyteller and that’s what I do—I make stuff up. 🙂
Watch this very short episode from a local newscast, interviewing someone who has seen the Light.
Contest
For a chance to win a $5 Amazon gift card, tell me about a legend from your “neck of the woods!”
My daughter found the image, and I love it! And yes, it doesn’t look like any other cover I have, and I guess that’s the point. This story isn’t about an ex-military man keen to protect a woman. It’s about a reporter going after a story, who happens to fall for a small-town girl who’s trying to protect her crazy mother. And it’s a setting and a legend I’m well-familiar with while I’m poking fun at it and twisting it all out of recognition. So, while you might think this cover makes it look like it’s out of the 1950s or 60s, it’s quirky enough to suit the story.
I’m busy working on a book this NaNoWriMo! It’s one I’ve been wanting to write for forever. Seriously. I shaped the opening of the story back in 2002—twenty-one years ago, and those first chapters were sent to many, many writer’s contests, and gained awards, but something happened that pushed this project to the back of the line—I got published. And then I got published again, and again, and again.
I learned what I could write that would sell, and every time I saw Little Green Dreams in my “Future Projects” folder, I’d sigh because I knew (know) it would be a hard sale.
So, why now? I love this story for a whole lot of reasons I’ll try to explain here.
#1 — It’s the only story I’ve set in Arkansas, where I currently live, and where I spent my high school and college years.
#2 — My father, who passed in 2019, led me down the train tracks in his hometown of Gurdon, Arkansas, so that I could get “the lay of the land” when I wrote about the Gurdon Light. He was delighted I thought the legend was “worthy” of a book.
#3 — Many of the characters I write about in the story are modelled after real people I’ve met. If you read the story, you may think I’ve written some over-the-top characters, but yes, they’re that funny and odd.
#4 — It’s a story that’s hard to pin into one genre. It’s contemporary, a romantic comedy, and it’s both a sci-fi and paranormal tale. So, there!
Despite all the reasons I know I should concentrate on something you’ll be eager to read, I’m stubbornly, finally, writing this story—a strange little homage to my roots and my dad.
Little Green Dreams
Still no official cover, but I’m working on it!
Sometimes, Joe Franchetti hates his job at the National Informer, especially when he’s sent on assignment to cover a story involving aliens from another world. When he is sent to investigate the story of a woman in rural Arkansas who claims her husband was abducted by aliens, he vows to debunk her story, no matter how much the truth might hurt her attractive daughter.
Sandra Billingsley has a problem. Her stepfather is missing, and her mother is the prime suspect in his disappearance. In addition to protecting her eccentric mother from a possible murder investigation, now she must contend with a national tabloid reporter set on exposing her mother as a murderess or a madwoman.
While the investigation turns up more suspects and the local townspeople scheme to profit from the “alien invasion”, Joe and Sandra work together to unravel the mystery, knowing their attraction is doomed to end in pain when the truth is revealed.
I’m a huge fan of Sci-Fi movies and TV. My favorites include ALL THE STAR TREKS, Arrival, Aliens, Farscape, and Firefly.
For a chance to win your choice of story from among my backlisted books, tell me which science fictions movies or television shows you would recommend!
This month on May 26th, my mother turned 92. As I thought about an African-American woman I wanted to honor in my post this month, Catherine Louise Williams Taylor Phillips came to my mind.
Lately, I’ve been asking her questions from a book/journal called My Mother’s Life: Mom I Want To Know Everything About You. I speak to her every morning and after our check-in ritual, I ask her if she’s ready for the question of the day. She says yes, answers what she can recall then shares anecdotes that have nothing to do with the question. That’s my momma.
I don’t know how many of you are familiar with the turn of the 20th-centuryth century song “M-O-T-H- E- R (M Is For The Million Things She Gave Me).” Here’s a vintage recording if you want to give a listen. It’s a schmaltzy ditty that touches my heart because of the mother I was fortunate to have. So today, I want to celebrate a few of the million things my mother gave me.
My mom was born on May 26, 1930 and was sent to live down South with her grandmother when she was a few months old. She shared with me that she didn’t even know there was a depression and regales me with stories of being the spoiled red-haired fox her uncles chided and chastised.
When Alex Haley’s Roots was televised, she wondered what the big deal was then proceeded to tell me about the Pitt family that owned her grandparents. When I let her know I’d decided to pursue a Masters degree two years after graduating from college and having worked in the big bad world of advertising, it was only then she shared that she had been hoping I would go back to school. She even declared, “Why who knows? You may want to go on and get a PhD.” That was the first time I realized my mother wished things for me, but by her restraint showed she respected that what I wanted when and if I wanted it was what was important.
In things small and large, she made it plain—not only to me but to my sister as well—that we were to be who we wanted to be. We weren’t put on this earth to live up to anyone’s expectations. She recalled a time my sister came to her with a picture she had drawn and said, “I couldn’t do it as good as Anna.” To which my mother assured her she wasn’t supposed to do it as good as Anna. She was supposed to do it as good as Muriel. When I felt unconfident or about to settle for less than what I was worth, I recalled her telling me with great vehemence, “You can scrub toilets before you kiss anybody’s ass.” She doesn’t remember saying this but I do, and I will always be grateful for the confidence those words instilled.
As a minister, I’ve helped families in which the relationship between mothers, daughters and sons was strained and far from loving. They can’t sing without reservation as I can the last line of the song I shared above but thanks to the love I have from my mom, I’ve found ways to help honor their struggles and woes.
The last line of M-O-T-H-E-R goes, “Put them all together they spell MOTHER. A word that means the world to me.” I will forever be grateful to my mother who means the world to me. For a chance at a $10 Amazon gift card, share in the comments about someone who was a mother to you or perhaps you have mothered.
HauntedSerenade – by Anna M. Taylor
All the women in Anora Madison’s family have lived haunted by the curse of Poor Butterfly: women still longing for but deserted by the men they loved. Determined to be the first to escape a life of abandonment, Anora fled Harlem for Brooklyn, not only severing her ties with her mother Angela, but also ending her relationship with Winston Emerson, her lover and the father of her child.
Six years later, Anora comes home to make peace, but an unseen evil manifests itself during the homecoming and targets not only Anora, but her little girl Cammie.
With nowhere to run, Anora must confront the evil now trying to destroy her life. She vows to protect her daughter at all costs, but if that protection can only be found with Winston back in her life, how will Anora protect her heart?
Excerpt from Haunted Serenade…
In September 15, 1963, the one year anniversary of my aunt Diana’s death, four young girls in Birmingham, Alabama died when their church was bombed for its involvement in the Civil Rights movement.
My mother called that evening and inquired after my health and the health of my daughter Cammie – the granddaughter she vowed never to acknowledge.
Fear, anger and sorrow sounded in her voice. Mine too. We mourned those girls, their families and the sister/aunt we both loved. In that spoken grief, I silently mourned what had died between my mother and me.
The following month she called again, this time inviting me to bring Cammie to dinner. Like some sulky child, I felt tempted to ask what took her so long. Instead, I swallowed my hurt and came home.
Some years ago I read a book by Paula Giddings entitled When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race and Sex in America. The stories I read about women who made history from Ida B. Wells to Shirley Chisholm inspired me then and inspire me still. But the book had an unexpected outcome on me. At least unexpected by me, but I suspect not by the author.
Giddings’s title made me stop and think about where and when I enter history as well. School has trained us to think of history as something made by others, but you and I make history in small and large ways every day. As a minister, I have worked with at least a hundred churches and their ministers and lay people seeking how to share their faith and resources with their communities. As part of a community organizing group, I helped address issues of inequality in the communities in which I lived and worked.
As I look back on the last year and a half, I am filled with awe and pride by the creative ways neighbors have helped one another get through the tragedy of this pandemic. These acts of kindness—both random and intentional—will be included in books written about this time. Those who acted will be cited by name just as Giddings’s book names women like Anna Julia Cooper and Mary McLeod Bethune, who chose to challenge the racism and sexism of their day.
However, there are many more who will remain unnamed but whose acts will have touched hearts and minds and spirits, enabling everyone to be encouraged during this difficult time. The smile you share with a stranger from a distance or a phone call you make to someone who is homebound create ripples of goodness that touch the universe in many pay-it-forward ways we may never know. I wonder if this isn’t why history has always had my heart.
My initial idea for this post was to share unsung Black history events that took place in June, events that aren’t getting the attention June 19th—Juneteenth—is getting. Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, when in Galveston Bay, Texas, the Union army announced the official end of slavery to more than two hundred and fifty thousand enslaved people. There’s a move to make Juneteenth a national holiday but is anyone commemorating June 17, 1775 when Peter Salem and Salem Poor were commended for their service at the Battle of Bunker Hill? As I made my list of such lesser-known events for this post, I realized even Peter Salem and Salem Poor had their names recorded in a place where I could find them and their deeds. Inspired by the title of Giddings’ book, I switched gears and decided to make this post a place where you and I could share when and where we enter history. That way someday someone can come across this post and read about where and when you entered history.
So for a chance to win a $10 Amazon gift card, but more importantly to be remembered for posterity, share a moment in your life when you made an impact on the history we call everyday life.
Haunted Serenade
All the women in Anora Madison’s family have lived as “Poor Butterflies”: women still longing for but deserted by the men they loved. Determined to be the first to escape a life of abandonment, Anora fled Harlem for Brooklyn, severing her ties with her mother, Angela, and with the man who broke her heart, Winston Emerson, the father of her child.
Six years later, she comes back to Harlem to make peace, but a malignant spirit manifests itself during the homecoming, targeting her mother, her aunt, Winston, and their little girl. Determined to stop the evil now trying to destroy all she loves, Anora must finally turn to Winston for help. But will their efforts be too little too late?
On September 15, 1963, the one-year anniversary of my aunt Diana’s death, four young girls in Birmingham, Alabama died when their church was bombed for its involvement in the Civil Rights movement.
My mother called that evening and inquired after my health and the health of my daughter Cammie—the granddaughter she vowed never to acknowledge. Fear, anger and sorrow sounded in her voice. Mine too. We mourned those girls, their families and the sister/aunt we both loved. In that spoken grief, I silently mourned what had died between my mother and me.
The following month she called again, this time inviting me to bring Cammie to dinner. Like some sulky child, I felt tempted to ask what took her so long. Instead, I swallowed my hurt and came home.
Cammie squeezed my fingers and stared at 13 141st Street with a wide-eyed wonder only six-year-olds possess.
“Wow. Grammie has a real house.”
I don’t know what excited her more: the prospect of meeting her maternal grandmother or visiting a real house. Single-family homes with front stoops, porches and backyards were things she saw only on television. We lived in a Brooklyn housing project with eight apartments to every floor and eight floors in every building.
All last night she ooo’d and ah’d over the photo of Number Thirteen my mother had sent her. Too wound up to sleep, her pudgy little body tossed and turned like a happy puppy on the double bed we shared. She shook me awake each time a new possibility occurred to her. Did her Grammie really own the whole house? Could she have a room of her own when she spent the night? Could she have a puppy there? No cats or dogs were allowed in the projects. How many staircases were inside the house? Did it have a doorbell she could ring?
The sound of her excitement cleaved my heart. She showed no signs of discontent with our life, yet the smile she wore as she slept told me my daughter had desires of which I was unaware.
I never make New Year’s resolutions. They only turn out to be promises I never keep. But being fortunate enough to survive the hell that was 2020, I’ve decided it’s time to change my ways. I have resolved to share what I’m calling “Aspirational songs for the heart” on my Twitter and FB accounts every day.
My resolution started back on August 2nd, when I began posting “Democracy Reset” quotes to keep my spirits up as we here in the US headed toward the November election. I alternated between words from men and women of all races and all nations, words like Eleanor Roosevelt’s, “It seems to me that the least a citizen can do is to vote” to present-day quotes like John Lewis’, “Democracy is not a state. It is an act, and each generation must do its part to help build what we called the Beloved Community, a nation and world society at peace with itself.”
With the advent of then-President-elect Biden’s win, I switched to songs of all types and from all sources that I labeled, “Aspirational songs for the heart until noon Inauguration Day January 20th.” I enjoyed anew the messages of songs like Frank Sinatra’s rendition of “The House I Live In,” the Beatles’ “I Get By With A Little Help From My Friends,” and Chris Williamson’s “Song of the Soul.” Even Broadway favorites like Grand Hotel’s “Let’s Raise A Glass” and Rent’s “Seasons of Love” got into the act.
In December, I switched to hymns and carols that focused on the birth of Jesus, the event Christians like myself use to remind ourselves to be hopeful as we do justice, love mercy and walk humbly before God (Micah 6:8). By the time I reached December 31st and had posted “O Come All Ye Faithful,” I knew I would return to posting songs of aspiration and encouragement as I looked forward to Inauguration Day. My song for January 1st was Sam Cooke’s “Change is Gonna Come.” It was then I made my new New Year’s resolution. I wouldn’t stop on January 21st but would keep posting inspirational and aspirational songs for the heart and spirit for the rest of the year. The unfortunate events of January 6th in Washington D.C. made it all too clear how easy the human spirit can be turned to do wrong when its focus has been warped.
My songs may seem like a drop in the ocean or a ripple against a tide of negativity and uncertainty, but it’s a start. Finding ways to say yes each and every time no keeps jumping in your face is what keeps the moral arc of the universe bending toward justice. Music has always done that for me, and I hope it helps those who read my social media posts to do the same.
My goal is to post 365 different songs, so for a chance to win a $10 Amazon gift card, suggest a song or two that lifts your heart that I can share.
Happy New Year.
Haunted Serenade
All the women in Anora Madison’s family have lived as “Poor Butterflies:” women still longing for – but deserted by – the men they loved. Determined to be the first to escape a life of abandonment, she fled Harlem for Brooklyn, severing ties with both her mother and with the man who broke her heart, Winston Emerson, the father of her child.
Six years later, Anora returns to make peace, but a malignant spirit manifests itself during the homecoming, targeting her mother, her aunt, Winston and their little girl. Determined to stop the evil now trying to destroy all she loves, Anora must finally turn to Winston for help. But will their efforts be too little too late?
Excerpt from Haunted Serenade…
“I never understood how you and Elizabeth could stay here after Diana…” I couldn’t bring myself to say the word. My mother didn’t finish my sentence for me. Apparently, she couldn’t say the word either.
Suicide.
We waited in the shared silence, unable more than unwilling to offer terms of peace.
“A person can will themselves to die,” my mother said. Her gaze drifted to the album cover in my hands. “It’s not so hard where unforgiving spirits reign.”
My gut clenched. “Do you really believe you’re dying, Ma?”
“According to my doctor, I’m sound as a dollar. But when you’ve got more days behind you than in front of you, that’s not saying much.” She directed her gaze to me. “That’s why Cammie is so important. She’s the future. I feel better just having been in her presence a little while.”
“I should have known.” I gripped the album cover with fingers trembling with anger and disappointment. “All that display of affection…you’re only using her to make you feel better.”
“No, Anora.” My mother came over and grabbed my arm with an earnestness that surprised me. “It’s not like that. I—I want the ghosts keeping us apart to die. Don’t you?”
I wanted it so much it hurt. I grimaced but nodded.
“Cammie took one look at this house and asked if it was haunted.”
My mother snorted. “Out of the mouths of babes.”
“Exactly what I thought.” I returned the album cover to its resting place.
Resting place.
The term troubled my mind. Can the spirit of anyone who dies the way my aunt died ever rest?
The question went unanswered, interrupted by my daughter’s screams.
It is cold, and winter is here. You’re mostly stuck indoors because it’s warmer. So, what do you do? Why read, of course! It’s an excellent time to catch up on all those books you received for Christmas. It’s the most wonderful time of the year to read some scary ghost stories.
Wait a moment; you are saying Halloween is long past, and Christmas was last month. It’s chilling, dreary weather, maybe even it snowed where you lived last night, so you want to read something light and fun. What better time for spooky tales, especially those even happening during the winter season in the story itself?
Humans have always sought out horror stories: reading, writing, and watching horror is an entirely rational response to the world. By the end of a book or movie, the crisis will be over in some way, and the danger will have passed: this applies, of course, to fiction, that when the stakes are at their highest, the catharsis is all the more wonderful. Winter horror reminds you that spring will arrive.
It is not about escaping reality but raising the stakes on the fear by adding a dash of a monster, ghosts, or even a serial killer, and then seeing what happens to the characters in wintry conditions that will make things even worse. Most books or stories end happily for the heroes unless there is a sequel in the works. And don’t worry—you are safe and warm, in your home. Right? Wait a moment! Do you hear that?
Some books you might like to check out for that wintertime reading…
The Shining by Stephen King: This is a great book to read. Stephan King is a master of his characters and storytelling. Jack, Wendy, and their son, Danny Torrance, move to the remote Overlook Hotel for the winter as caretakers. For the next few months, Jack, a recovering alcoholic, spirals into murderous insanity. Then there are the ghosts, too. Although the hotel is nominally the malevolent force in this story, for me, it comes down to Jack Torrance as, like a Shakespearean tragic hero, he unravels from within himself. To quote the book: “Monsters are real. Ghosts are too. They live inside of us, and sometimes, they win.”
The Turn of the Screw by Henry James: It might not be winter as the season in this masterful classic ghost story novella from 1898, and yet the story can still chill a reader from 2021. Characters like a man called Douglas relates the story of an unnamed governess who takes a job at Bly to look after two seemingly angelic children on behalf of their uncle, whose only stipulation is that she must never contact him. Miles, the little boy, arrives home from boarding school having been expelled for unknown reasons. Flora, the girl, has an ‘extraordinary charm’, but the governess becomes entirely besotted with Miles. When the governess sees the ghosts of both Quint, a former worker, and Miss Jessell, the former governess, things begin to spiral out of control. Are the spirits truly there? Is the governess to be trusted? Read the book and find out.
The Terror by Dan Simmons: It is a fictionalized account of Captain Sir John Franklin’s lost expedition of HMS Erebus and HMS Terror to the Arctic, in 1845–1848, to locate the Northwest Passage. The ship enters a second summer in the Arctic Circle without a thaw, and they become stranded in a nightmarish landscape of encroaching ice and darkness. Endlessly cold, with diminishing rations, 126 men fight to survive with poisonous food, a dwindling supply of coal, and ships buckling in the grip of crushing ice. But their real enemy is far more terrifying. There is something out there in the frigid darkness: an unseen predator stalking their ship, a monstrous terror always clawing to get in.
Snowblind by Christopher Golden: Twelve years ago, the small town of Coventry, Massachusetts, was in the grasp of a fierce winter, then came the Great Storm. It hit hard. Not everyone saw the spring. Today the families, friends, and lovers of the victims are still haunted by the ghosts of those they lost so suddenly. If only they could see them one more time, hold them close, tell them they love them. When a new storm strikes, it doesn’t just bring snow and ice; it brings the people of Coventry exactly what they’ve wished for, plus the realization that their nightmare is only beginning.
Who Goes There by John W. Campbell: This science fiction horror novella by American writer John W. Campbell Jr., written under the pen name Don A. Stuart, was first published in the August 1938 issue of Astounding Science Fiction. It formed the basis for The Thing movies. You can find this at Amazon, even as a free PDF, and I know a current publisher who got the original version, which had more to the story and published it in its entirety.
That is Frozen Hell: The Book That Inspired The Thing: Recently discovered among Campbell’s papers, this version adds another 45 pages to the story. It also includes a Preface by Alec Nevala-Lee and an Introduction by Robert Silverberg.
A group of scientific researchers, isolated in Antarctica by the nearly-ended winter, discover an alien spaceship buried in the ice, where it crashed twenty million years before. Thawing revives the alien pilot of the ship. This being can assume the shape, memories, and personality of any living thing it devours while maintaining its original body mass for further reproduction. And once it does, who is really the alien and who is the real person, as they must stop it from getting out of Antarctica.
*~*~*
Pamela K. Kinney
Journey to worlds of fantasy, beyond the stars, and into the vortex of terror with the written word of Pamela K. Kinney.
Take a journey along Virginia’s scenic Routes 10 and 460 eastbound to enjoy the lovely countryside and metropolises that spread around these two roads. Most of all, discover that some historical houses, plantations, battlefields, parks, and even the modern cities, have more than touristy knickknacks, ham, and peanuts to offer. Many have ghosts! Bacon’s Castle has spirits haunting it since the 1600s. Stay in a cabin overnight at Chippokes Plantation State Park and you might find you have a spectral bedfellow. The city of Smithfield has more to offer than the world’s oldest ham; it also has some very old phantoms still stalking its buildings. Take a ghost tour of Suffolk and see why the biggest little city is also one of the spookiest. Discover the myths and legends of the Great Dismal Swamp and see what phantoms are still haunting the wildlife refuge. And if that’s not enough, Bigfoot and UFOs are part of the paranormal scenery. These and other areas of southeastern Virginia are teeming with ghosts, Sasquatch, UFOs, and monsters. See what awaits you along 460 south and 10. No matter which road you take, the phantoms can’t wait to SCARE you a good time.
And for fiction for a winter night, HWA Poetry Showcase Volume VII. It is an anthology, not with short stories, but dark poetry that tells terrifying stories. Includes my Lovecraftian horror poem, “Dementia.” It is available in both Kindle and paperback.
The Horror Writers Associations presents their seventh annual Poetry Showcase, featuring the best in never-before-published dark verse. Edited by Stephanie M. Wytovich, this year’s featured poets are K. P. Kulski, Sarah Read, and Sara Tantlinger, plus dozens of poems from the talented members of the Horror Writers Association.
Author Pamela K. Kinney gave up long ago trying not to listen to the voices in her head and has written award-winning, bestselling horror, fantasy, science fiction, poetry, along with nonfiction ghost books ever since. Three of her nonfiction ghost books garnered Library of Virginia nominations. Her third ghost book, Virginia’s Haunted Historic Triangle: Williamsburg, Yorktown, Jamestown, and Other Haunted Locations, had reached a second printing and is now a 2nd edition with extra new stories and ten new ghostly images added, plus a new ghost book, Haunted Surry to Suffolk: Spooky Takes Along Routes 10 and 460 released in 2020 from Anubis Press. Her horror short story, “Bottled Spirits,” was runner-up for the 2013 WSFA Small Press Award and is considered one of the seven best genre short fiction for that year. Her latest novel was an urban fantasy, How the Vortex Changed My Life. In 2019, her science fiction novella, Maverick Heart, released from Dreampunk Press, along with a horror story, “By Midnight,” in the Christmas horror and fantasy anthology, Christmas Lites IX, and a nonfiction story, “The Haunted Cavalier Hotel,” in the paranormal nonfiction anthology, Handbook for the Dead. Five micro horror stories of hers in the anthology, Nano Nightmares, a horror short story, “Hunting the Goatman,” was included in the anthology, Retro Horror, plus a horror short story, “A Trick, No Treat,” plus three horror poems of hers, were included in Siren Call Publications’ Halloween issue, released October 2020. She has a poem, “Dementia,” accepted for Horror Writers Association’s horror poetry anthology, HWA Poetry Showcase, Vol. VII. Of course, she is working on various horror and fantasy short stories and has finished a supernatural horror novel and is also working on a nonfiction book, Werewolves, Dogmen, and Other Shapeshifters Stalking America, for Anubis Press.
Pamela and her husband live with one crazy black cat (who thinks she should take precedence over her mistress’s writing most days). Along with writing, Pamela has acted on stage and film and investigates the paranormal for episodes of Paranormal World Seekers for AVA Productions. She is a member of both Horror Writers Association and Virginia Writers Club. You can learn more about Pamela K. Kinney at http://www.PamelaKKinney.com.
I’m busy working on a book this NaNoWriMo! It’s one I’ve been wanting to write for forever. Seriously. I shaped the opening of the story back in 2002—twenty-one years ago, and those first chapters were sent to many, many writer’s contests, and gained awards, but something happened that pushed this project to the back of the line—I got published. And then I got published again, and again, and again.
