His name means WAR (and it's FREE)

FREE for your Kindles. 'Darkest Hour' is a blend of monsters and warfare. Think 'Van Helsing meets 'Saving Private Ryan'.http://www.amazon.co.uk/Darkest-Hour-ebook/dp/B006P2BHAE/ref=pd_sim_kinc_3

For halloween I'm giving away 'Darkest Hour' absolutely FREE for Kindle readers. This is not Joe Hunter. It's Ludis Kristaps and his name means WAR.

For US readers, simply follow the link, then change co.uk to .com in the search bar to take it to your site.

Enjoy!

Dead Fall - a Joe Hunter exclusive short story

I've recently written my first e-book exclusive short story for the US market, featuring ex-military operative Joe Hunter, and it will be released on 25th October this year.

DEAD FALL
When the bodies of two friends are found near the penthouse apartment of a known crime boss, Joe Hunter has revenge on his mind. He's never tolerated bullies, but this time it's personal. And no matter how many heads he has to bash to do it, Joe will find his man.

Includes a sneak preview of Blood and Ashes, the exhilarating fifth novel in the Joe Hunter series.

The ebook will also be released for the UK (and rest of the world market via Hodder and Stoughton relatively soon afterwards - although possibly with a different cover). Also watch out for another ebook exclusive Joe hunter short story coming soon called RED STRIPES (more news on that before long).

SEMPRE VIGILE PRESS - a new venture for Me.

Here's some news on a few projects I've been working on for quite some time. Most of you here know me as the author of the Joe Hunter thriller series. Others also know that I write other stories in different genres - primarily that of horror under various pen names (Vallon Jackson, Jack Norton, J A Norton). I'm one of those authors who can't bear NOT to have a book on the go. Therefore when I'm not writing the latest Hunter thriller, I will work on other standalone books.

Now, then, when I've offered these books to publishers, there has been a little problem that gets in the way. The 'Matt Hilton" brand is infinitely connected to Joe Hunter, and there is no desire to cause confusion either for the buyers or readers of Joe Hunter's adventures, so my publishers have politely declined to bring out the stand alone books, though I've received their blessing to bring them out elsewhere.

So here's what I'm doing instead:

I'm going to bring out my books as eBook originals, through my own self-publishing efforts called SEMPRE VIGILE PRESS. If demand is large enough I may look into the possibility of bringing out hardcopy editions - unless some nice horror publisher is reading this and makes me an offer.

A few weeks ago I published a young adult horror novella under the pen name J A Norton called 'Deliver us from Evil', primarily as an exercise into the hows, why, and wherefores of self publishing an eBook, while also working to get ready my first full length adult novel.

My first stand alone horror/thriller is called DOMINION, and it is now available through Smashwords.com to the US market, as well as all Amazon platforms.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B006GT3NPI

Spec-Ops soldier, First Sergeant Ellis Kirby leads a JSOC unit into the Tora Ghar cave system in Afghanistan in search of WMDs, but finds something much worse. Infected by an ancient power summoned by an evil cleric Kirby and his companions are whisked back to secret military laboratories in the US. The plague of creatures - known as rakes - that is subsequently unleashed threatens to wipe out the entire population of the United States and perhaps the world.

Kirby wakens in his room to discover that everyone in the lab has been slaughtered, and the monstrous flesh-eating creatures are loose and rampaging throughout the land, killing and propagating their species with abandon.

Through a country rapidly overwhelmed by the ravenous creatures, Kirby aims to return home to his parents’ farm in Iowa, but on his return – following a perilous cross country journey through rake-infested lands - he discovers that they are dead, so chooses instead to take the fight back to the monsters and their master.

Across the same devastated landscape travel Bree and Jill Adams, sisters at odds, who must face their past to survive the future, and three misfits collectively known as the Ruby gang. Each must endure their travails before all of them are thrown together, and then with Kirby, in a race to the eastern seaboard where the final conflict between man and beast is destined to play out in a battle encompassing modern warfare and ancient magic.

The book isn’t a techno-thriller; it focuses on the human stories, and the terror of the plague seen through the eyes of the central characters, and is one of fear, horror, hatred and violence, but also of adventure, humour, courage, loyalty and hope. It runs at over 175 K words, so is quite a hefty read.

One industry insider has described DOMINION as being like "28 Days later" meets "Aliens", an accolade I'll gladly take.

Hope you enjoy my first venture into self-publishing. 

Six of the Best - Joe Hunter short stories

Coming in January next year is a collection of brand new never-seen-before Joe Hunter short stories that will be released by Hodder and Stoughton as an ebook via Amazon Kindle. Before anyone asks, no I'm not getting on the bandwagon of authors who are now releasing short stories onto Kindle as a way of making an extra buck (though admittedly it's not bad recompense) but that I wanted to share these stories with Joe's fans - old and new - in a wider format.

Regular followers of my books and blogs etc know that I'm a voracious writer, and that when I'm not penning the latest Joe Hunter book I can't allow my writing fingers to settle and often come up with short stories or flash fiction. I share some of these stories here at the blog, or put them out into the world under pen names, but there are some I've held on to for some time - plus some brand new stories scripted for this collection - that deserve a wider audience. The collection will go out under the title "SIX OF THE BEST".

No, it's not a spanking book, though there might be a few sore butts after Joe's done kicking them.

The title comes from the lead story, and yes, there are six stories in total, so it's a double-header really.

Included in the collection are:

1. Six of the Best
2. Homecoming
3. Sand Dance
4. UV Ray
5. Instant Justice
6. The Other Side of the Street

plus there will be sample chapters from the upcoming Joe Hunter 7 - No Going Back - to whet your appetite.

Some may wonder about the process of writing short stories versus novels, so here's my take on it:

The long and the short of it is this:

I’m one of those authors that simply love to write and the medium isn’t as important as putting words on paper. Therefore I’ll write in any style that suits the story I’m attempting to narrate. Often it will be suited to a full novel, but as regularly a story can be told in much fewer words, and its as likely for me to come up with a Joe Hunter story as a flash piece or short story as it is a full novel. Writing a novel takes many hours of slogging away at the keyboard, but that doesn’t mean that a short piece is any less a feat of endurance. With a short the rules of structure still apply, but in this case there is less room for error, so it has to be that more concise. Words cannot be wasted yet characterisation, setting, plot and – for a Joe Hunter story – pace are still essential to the telling of the tale. In other words, penning an effective short isn’t an easy get out, in fact they can be more troublesome than writing a full novel where you have more ground to establish the finer details.

So why do it?

The reason I write short stories is because they challenge me. I’ve written more than a dozen novels so I know I’ve got what it takes to deliver a full book. The novels are my bread and butter, my “must do’s”. However, with the short stories it’s different. I tend to write these as a form of enjoyment, and have fun with them along the way. It’s not unknown for me to pen shorts in different genres that include noir, crime, thriller, horror and sci-fi, but one thing that binds them all is that there’s a hefty dose of humour running throughout. That doesn’t mean to say that they’re laugh out loud funny, but that they have a quirk or turn of phrase, and I have fun coming up with a particular emphasis on a sting or twist in the tale. Often the story begins with a single word or phrase. Take the lead story from my collection “Six of the Best”: It’s an old English term that describes a form of corporal punishment. I couldn’t resist the idea of someone receiving their just desserts, I just had to find a way of incorporating the phrase into the narrative, without it becoming obvious from the get go. My Joe Hunter books are known for their fast-paced action, and with the Hunter short stories this remains true, where the phrases that influenced them help determine the forms of action. With this collection of stories I believe I’ve achieved what I set out to do. That is to deliver the same fast-paced action Joe Hunter’s readers have come to expect, while also being true to myself and having fun along the way. Hope you enjoy them as much as I did writing them.

The collection - Six of the Best - will be available from January 5th 2012 (and for pre-order soon) and will be very competitively priced, and initially will go out in the Amazon Kindle format. Further news about other formats will be made available as I receive it.

The Full Moon is about to grow Brighter

When a full moon fills the night sky, P I Roman Dalton becomes a werewolf and prowls the dark streets of the city battling creatures of evil. Paul D Brazill's Drunk On The Moon is an intense and hard-boiled noir / horror series, brought to you by some of the finest dark fiction writers around, including Vincent Zandri, Julia Madeleine, Benjamin Sobieck, Richard Godwin, Katherine Tomlinson, Frank Duffy, B R Stateham, Jason Michel, John Donald Carlucci and Cormac Brown....and not to mention PDB himself.

For those of you unfamiliar with PDB's writing...where have you been?

Spinetingler Award nominee Paul D. Brazill was born in England and lives in Poland.His stuff has appeared in loads of classy print and electronic magazines and anthologies, including the 2011 Mammoth Book Of Best British Crime. His short story collection '13 Shots Of Noir' will be published in 2011. He writes a column for Pulp Metal Magazine and contributes to Mean Streets Magazine and has won a legion of readers at his blog 'You Would Say That, Wouldn't You?'.

Paul is the kind of noir/crime fiction/hard boiled/mystery/horror/humour writer who makes others jealous of his inimitable style (yep, and that includes me). Some have even dubbed him the 'Noir Bukowski'. Add to that he's also a great guy who selflessly promotes and supports other authors' work. Drunk on the Moon is Paul's brainchild - a series of ebooks from Trestle Press - that follows his main character Roman Dalton - Ex-Detective, Current Werewolf - through the Sin City-ish landscape of 'The City', and it is a great, rollicking fun read, full to the brim of Paul's usual gritty noir, northern humour and fiendish horror. But PDB being PDB, he didn't want to keep all the fun to himself. he opened the floodgates to other top authors in the field, and future editions of the ongoing series will be penned by those illustrious names above. More will likely join the ranks. I intend being along for the ride (reading the editions as they come out at the very least).

You can get the first part of the series here at Amazon UK for only £0.86. or at Amazon USA for only $1.38.

"A crackling fun read that puts werewolves in a Sin City/hardboiled world" --Dave Zeltserman

"A great, rollicking fun read, full to the brim of Paul's usual gritty noir, northern humour and fiendish horror." - Matt Hilton

  

A newbies guide...

http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/

J A Konrath is the author of 'AFRAID' - albeit under the peusonym of Jack Killborn - and the 'Jack' Daniels series of crime thrillers. Aside from this he is also one of the most succesful and innovative authors concerning ebooks which, despite many authors' reticence to accept, is going to be huge in the future and may well replace traditional publishing before we know it. There isn't much that Joe - that's his name - doesn't know about publishing ebooks, or for that matter writing and publicity, so if this is an area of interest to you, why not take a look over at his blog 'A Newbie's Guide to Publishing'. From there you can surf to his website, where you can download free ebooks, or buy some if that's your wish. Alternatively you can just glean some amazingly good advice from his writing tips. Well worth a few minutes of your time, I bet.

By the way 'Afraid' is just about the most intense horror/thriller I've read in years and his ebook 'Serial' is an awesome novella that is guaranteed to give you a buzz. (you can download it at his site).