#HorrorForLibraries Giveaway #31: The Hobgoblin of Little Minds

The #HorrorForLibraries Giveaway today  features a book I reviewed in Library Journal last month. But first, a refresher on the basic rules to enter:

1. You need to be affiliated with an American public library. My rationale behind that is that I will be encouraging you to read these books and share them with patrons. While many of them are advanced reader copies that you cannot add to your collections, if you get the chance to read them, my hope is that you will consider ordering a copy for your library and give away the ARC away as a prize or pass it on to a fellow staff member.
2. If you are interested in being included in any giveaway at any time, you must email me at zombiegrl75 [at] gmail [dot] com with the subject line "#HorrorForLibraries." In the body of the email all you have to say is that you want to be entered and the name of your library.
3. Each entry will be considered for EVERY giveaway. I will randomly draw a winner on Fridays sometime after 5pm central. But only entries received by 5pm each week will be considered for that  week.
4. If you win, you are ineligible to win again for 4 weeks; you will have to re-enter after that time to be considered [I have a list of who has won, when, and what title]. However, if you do not win, you carry over into the next week. There is NO NEED to reenter.

Click here to see giveaway #31. Our winner was Kate from Woodford County [KY] Library.

Today I have an exciting, release day giveaway of a title I reviewed in the January issue of Library Journal-- The Hobgoblin of Little Minds by Mark Matthews. Here is the draft version of my review:

Three Words That Describe This Book: mental health, visceral, multiple points of view

Framed by the well known Emerson quote referenced in the title and informed by Matthews’ 20+ years working in the mental health industry, this fast paced thriller, set in an abandoned mental hospital, tells the story of the effects of mental illness from the point of view of those who suffer and their families, but within the frame of a wholly original addition to the werewolf cannon. Readers will fall into the story quickly, connecting with the main characters as each point of view is explored. This is a tale that makes the reader squirm both because of the well executed, and visceral horror and because of the discomfort from a peek into the minds of people trying to live with mania. Verdict: Pairing an honest and respectful discussion of bi-polar disorder and how our current treatment options often fail its patients with a compelling, and action packed werewolf story, this is an obvious suggestion to fans of The Last Werewolf Trilogy by Duncan but also a great comp for thought provoking creature tales that contemplate the character’s trauma as part of the horror like Frankenstein in Baghdad by Saadawi.

This is a finished copy that you can add to your collection right away, and it will be shipped to you by the author directly. For the rest of you, this book is available through Ingram, so not that hard to get.

Thank to Matthews for agreeing to participate in this giveaway. I work hard to support independently published horror that is worth your attention. This is one you need to add.

Good luck!

#HorrorForLibraries Giveaway # 31: The Phlebotomist

The #HorrorForLibraries Giveaway is back after a holiday hiatus, and I have a great month of giveaways planned beginning with a title I gave a STAR review in the January issue of Library Journal.But first, a refresher on the basic rules to enter:

1. You need to be affiliated with an American public library. My rationale behind that is that I will be encouraging you to read these books and share them with patrons. While many of them are advanced reader copies that you cannot add to your collections, if you get the chance to read them, my hope is that you will consider ordering a copy for your library and give away the ARC away as a prize or pass it on to a fellow staff member.
2. If you are interested in being included in any giveaway at any time, you must email me at zombiegrl75 [at] gmail [dot] com with the subject line "#HorrorForLibraries." In the body of the email all you have to say is that you want to be entered and the name of your library.
3. Each entry will be considered for EVERY giveaway. I will randomly draw a winner on Fridays sometime after 5pm central. But only entries received by 5pm each week will be considered for that  week.
4. If you win, you are ineligible to win again for 4 weeks; you will have to re-enter after that time to be considered [I have a list of who has won, when, and what title]. However, if you do not win, you carry over into the next week. There is NO NEED to reenter.

Click here to see giveaway #30. Our winner was  Kim from Grafton-Midview [OH] Public Library.

This week I have a finished copy of the first book in a brand new SF- Horror hybrid-- The Phlebotomist by Chris Panatier. I received a copy of this book from the publisher- Angry Robot [whose SF books I have reviewed for Booklist and I  tend to really enjoy].

I requested this book from the publisher precisely because it was a debut and I was reading it for an award. While I don't think it was "Horror" enough to be in the running for that award, I still really enjoyed it...a lot. This is a SF dystopia set in a world where people are required to give blood and of  course, there are nefarious behind the scenes actors taking advantage. 

I would say it is 90% solidly in the SF genre with the other 10% hitting on horror tropes. I  am purposely not giving  away much of the plot because I  want  readers to enjoy the ride, but if you click through to the Goodreads record other reviewers do give details [including at least one that gives the "horror" spoiler].

But what I  enjoyed here was the original dystopia world building combined with a mature woman as the protagonist. What a joy it was to read a book of an older woman who was a bad ass, who used her brain and  experience to be the hero, who also also able to move physically when needed. 

You can click here for more about this book by me.

Every library should order this first book and know that there are clearly more to come in the series. But one of you can win  this copy and add it to your collections right away.

Good luck!

Announcing the HWA Diversity Grant Recipients

As I have mentioned here in the past, I was part of a team that created the Horror Writers Association Diversity Grant. From the information page:

The Horror Writers Association (HWA) believes barriers—often unseen but very real—exist which limit the amount of horror fiction being published by diverse voices. The goal of these Grants is to help remove some of the barriers and let those voices be heard.

While the HWA Board worked on the guidelines [myself included], I recruited library leaders to seed the first of the $500 grants. With $500 donations from ARRT, LibraryReads, NoveList and my company, RA for ALL, we guaranteed there would be 4 recipients in year one. But then, we also encouraged others who agreed with the mission of the grant to donate what they could. Our coffers filled up, from companies like Night Worms and Cemetery Dance to just individual library workers and horror authors, and after we were inundated with applicants we were able to offer 6 grants this year.

Below is the official press release, but before I get to the recipients, I want to call out the committee and publicly thank them for their work. Fellow board member, Linda Addison led the team. Linda is one of the founders of the HWA's Diverse Works Inclusion Committee which produces our monthly Seers Table. She is also the definition of a living legend. She has the help of HWA members Grady Hendrix, Larissa Glasser, V. Castro, and Maxwell I. Gold.

For more information about the HWA Diversity Grants, please visit here.

To see the official announcement on the HWA website, click here. But I have also reproduced it below. Please look up these authors' work and consider adding them to your collections.

***************************

The Horror Writers Association (HWA) is pleased to announce the recipients of the 2020 HWA Diversity Grants:

Jacqueline Dyre (they/them) is the editor and publisher of Novel Noctule. You can find them in the sunshine state, drinking poorly-made coffee and consuming psychological horror in lieu of meals.

Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki (he/him) is a Nigerian speculative fiction writer, slush reader and editor. He has been awarded an honourable mention in the L Ron Hubbard's Writers of the Future Contest, twice and won the Nommo award for best short story by an African with his short story The Witching Hour. He has been published in the Selene Quarterly, Strange Horizons, Tor, Omenana Magazine and other venues, and has works forthcoming in several anthologies and magazines. He has co-edited several publications, including the Dominion Anthology (2020), the Best of African Speculative Fiction Anthology and the Bridging Worlds non-fiction anthology, forthcoming in 2021. He is a first reader in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, and a member of the African Speculative Fiction Society, Horror Writers Association, Codex, BSFA, BFA, and the SFWA. 

Gabino Iglesias (he/him) is a writer, editor, professor, and book critic living in Austin, TX. He is the author of Zero Saints and Coyote Songs and the editor of Both Sides. His work has been nominated to the Bram Stoker and Locus awards and won the Wonderland Book Award for Best Novel. His nonfiction has appeared in the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. His fiction has been published in five languages and optioned for film. His reviews appear in places like NPR, Publishers Weekly, the San Francisco Chronicle, Criminal Element, Mystery Tribune, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and other venues. He's been a juror for the Shirley Jackson Awards twice and has judged the PANK Big Book Contest, the Splatterpunk Awards, the horror category of the British Fantasy Awards, and the Newfound Prose Prize. He teaches creative writing at Southern New Hampshire University's online MFA program and runs a series of low-cost online writing workshops. You can find him on Twitter at @Gabino_Iglesias.

Nicole Givens Kurtz (she/her) is an author, editor, and educator. She's a member of Horror Writers Association, Sisters in Crime, and Science Fiction Writers of America. She's the editor of the groundbreaking Slay: Stories of the Vampire Noire. She's written for White Wolf, Bram Stoker Finalist in Horror Anthology: Sycorax's Daughters, and Serial Box's The Vela: Salvation series. Nicole has over 40 short stories published as well as 11 novels and three active speculative mystery series. You can support her work via Patreon and find more about her at http://www.nicolegivenskurtz.net.

Tejaswi Priyadarshi (he/him) is a dreamer in the horror/thriller genre. He derives inspiration from Stephen King, Michael Crichton, Dean Koontz, Takashi Miike, Alexandre Aja, Eli Roth, Quentin Tarantino, and the Ramsay Brothers.

His first book The Psychopath, The Cannibal, The Lover was India’s first splatterpunk novel. It was released in July 2020, and has since remained on multiple bestselling charts, scaling its way up to be Amazon India’s highest rated Horror Thriller with 175+ ratings.

He is currently working on his second novel, trying to amalgamate Horror, Crime, Thriller, and Social Satire. You can often find him writing fiction at a bar counter, appreciating Independent Pop music gigs, and holding screenings of all sub-genres of horror/thrillers. However, nobody knows why he adamantly screens Purani Haveli so often. Email him at tejaswi.priyadarshi@gmail.com if you want to discuss anything under the sun; “How to Prep for a Zombie Apocalypse” is his favorite topic, because, what if!

Sumiko Saulson (they/them) is an award-winning author of Afrosurrealist and multicultural sci-fi and horror. Ze is the editor of the anthologies and collections Black Magic Women, Scry of Lust, Black Celebration, and Wickedly Abled. Ze is the winner of the 2016 HWA StokerCon “Scholarship from Hell”, 2017 BCC Voice “Reframing the Other” contest, and 2018 AWW “Afrosurrealist Writer Award.”

Ze has an AA in English from Berkeley City College, and writes a column called “Writing While Black” for a national Black Newspaper, the San Francisco BayView. Ze is the host of the SOMA Leather and LGBT Cultural District's “Erotic Storytelling Hour.”

Congratulations!!

About The Horror Writers Association

The Horror Writers Association (HWA) is a nonprofit organization of writers and publishing professionals around the world, dedicated to promoting dark literature and the interests of those who write it.

#HorrorForLibraries Giveaway #30: The Searching Dead by Ramsey Campbell

 The #HorrorForLibraries Giveaway is back after a holiday hiatus, and I have a great month of giveaways planned beginning with a title I gave a STAR review in the January issue of Library Journal.But first, a refresher on the basic rules to enter:

1. You need to be affiliated with an American public library. My rationale behind that is that I will be encouraging you to read these books and share them with patrons. While many of them are advanced reader copies that you cannot add to your collections, if you get the chance to read them, my hope is that you will consider ordering a copy for your library and give away the ARC away as a prize or pass it on to a fellow staff member.
2. If you are interested in being included in any giveaway at any time, you must email me at zombiegrl75 [at] gmail [dot] com with the subject line "#HorrorForLibraries." In the body of the email all you have to say is that you want to be entered and the name of your library.
3. Each entry will be considered for EVERY giveaway. I will randomly draw a winner on Fridays sometime after 5pm central. But only entries received by 5pm each week will be considered for that  week.
4. If you win, you are ineligible to win again for 4 weeks; you will have to re-enter after that time to be considered [I have a list of who has won, when, and what title]. However, if you do not win, you carry over into the next week. There is NO NEED to reenter.

Click here to see giveaway #29. Our winner was Micah from the Louisville [KY] Free Public Library.

This week I have another book that I recently reviewed in Library Journal. This one is by living legend, Ramsey Campbell and it is entitled, The Searching Dead.

My review appeared in the  January 2021 issue of Library Journal: 

Three Words That Describe This Book: epic, coming of age, slow burn

Draft Review:

Campell, Britain’s most decorated horror novelist presents, for the first time in America, the opening novel of a trilogy of biographical novels documenting the horrors of growing up in conservative, post World War II Liverpool and featuring a great and powerful cosmic evil, as one man, Dominic, confronts it over the course of his lifetime. Focusing this volume on Dominic at age 15 as a teacher’s over eager interest in visiting a WWII French battlefield where some say the dead appeared, and a religious cult gaining strength in his bomb battered neighborhood, Dominic must figure out who to trust and how to battle the evils of his world, both real and supernatural. This novel is not only the start of an awesome horror epic by a master, but it is also a compelling coming of age story about a budding writer finding his way in a terrifying world. Verdict: The Searching Dead, a finalist in the Horror category for the British Fantasy Award, is a slow burn with a fantastic pay off, this intense and menacing story framed by superior world building is a good suggestion for fans of It by King or the African Immortals series by Due.

This ARC is courtesy of the publisher, Flame Tree Press.

Good luck!

#HorrorForLibraries Giveaway #29: Children of Chicago

The #HorrorForLibraries Giveaway is back after a holiday hiatus, and I have a great month of giveaways planned beginning with a title I gave a STAR review in the January issue of Library Journal.But first, a refresher on the basic rules to enter:

1. You need to be affiliated with an American public library. My rationale behind that is that I will be encouraging you to read these books and share them with patrons. While many of them are advanced reader copies that you cannot add to your collections, if you get the chance to read them, my hope is that you will consider ordering a copy for your library and give away the ARC away as a prize or pass it on to a fellow staff member.
2. If you are interested in being included in any giveaway at any time, you must email me at zombiegrl75 [at] gmail [dot] com with the subject line "#HorrorForLibraries." In the body of the email all you have to say is that you want to be entered and the name of your library.
3. Each entry will be considered for EVERY giveaway. I will randomly draw a winner on Fridays sometime after 5pm central. But only entries received by 5pm each week will be considered for that  week.
4. If you win, you are ineligible to win again for 4 weeks; you will have to re-enter after that time to be considered [I have a list of who has won, when, and what title]. However, if you do not win, you carry over into the next week. There is NO NEED to reenter.

Click here to see giveaway #28. Our winner was Lisa from the Allegany County [MD] Library System.

Now on to this week's giveaway, a title: Children of Chicago by Cynthia Pelayo. From my STAR review: 

Three Words That Describe This Book: strong world building, relentless place, harrowing

Lauren Medina is new to the rank of Detective in the Chicago Police Department but her roots run deep as the daughter of a CPD legend. Dealing with her Dad’s recent death, the dissolution of her marriage, and a history of trauma involving the death of her mother and sister, Medina immerses herself in her work trying to stop the epidemic of violence against Chicago’s children. But there is a dark force stronger than any gang, and powered by Grimm’s Fairy Tales, stalking its young victims, and Medina unfortunately knows the Pied Piper, his strength, and the great cost of weidling his power. Pelayo, a lifelong Chicagoan presents a well researched modern fairy tale, peppered with nuggets of fascinating information that inform the story without sacrificing the pace or atmosphere. Even more remarkable is how she works the unreliable narrator trope, expertly from the first page to the final shocking twist. Verdict: With superior world building, a relentless pace, a complex heroine, and a harrowing story that preys off of current events as much as its well developed monster, this is a stellar horror novel that fires on all cylinders from the first page through to its horrible conclusion. For fans of dark fantasy based on fairy tales such as MaGuire’s Wayward Children series or novels by Helen Oyeyemi with just the right touch of Paretsky’s VI Warshawski. 

This is an advanced reader copy sent to me for review by the publisher. I am very excited about other people getting to read this book. It has wide appeal. Also, look for news coming soon from the Chicago Public Library and the Chicago Chapter of the Horror Writers Association about a virtual event with Pelayo this March. 

Good luck.  

All the Horror Coming Out in 2021 via Tor Nightfire

Emily Hughes from the the Tor Nightfire blog started her post for 2021 listing all of the horror coming out by month. 

Click here for the post, but know that she updates in regularly. She does her best to gather as much as possible, and she does update and add titles if you leave a comment on the post. It is more than a sufficient start though; in fact, it is quite comprehensive.

This is THE resource to see what is coming out across all publishers, big and small. She also includes titles that overlap with horror even if they are 100% in the middle of the genre. 

Seriously, a huge THANK YOU to Emily Hughes. This is the horror resource libraries need. Click on the graphic below or here to see for yourself.

And I have some of the early year releases already queued up for the next few weeks of the #HorrorForLibraries giveaways which return 1/7!