Beware The Shadows

“Along the shore the cloud waves breaks,

The twin suns sink behind the lake,

The shadows lengthen

………………………………….In Carcosa.

Strange is the night where black stars rise,

And strange moons circle through the skies,

But stranger still is

…………………………….Lost Carcosa.

Songs that the Hyades shall sing,

Where flap the tatters of the King,

Must die unheard in

………………………………Dim Carcosa.

Song of my soul, my voice is dead,

Die thou, unsung, as tears unshed

Shall dry and die in

……………………………..Lost Carcosa.”

Cassilda’s Song in The King in Yellow. Act I. Scene 2.

For those of us who love weird fiction, Lovecraft, Derleth, Chambers, and all the great and talented ones who have come after, we have waited for years for our literary movement to break into the mainstream. We came close when Guillermo del Toro attempted to bring The Mountains of Madness to the big screen. But then budgetary concerns killed that dream, and we wondered what the next break through might be. And then came True Detective from HBO.

At first, True Detective seemed like a very good police procedural. Then came Episode Two, when it was revealed that our victim had met a man who opened her eyes to a whole new world. He was, she said, “a king.” But not just any king. He was a king in yellow, and he came from a city called Carcosa. Then in Episode Four, we learned that our main suspect was a part of a cult, one that worshiped certain forbidden gods with sacrifices on ancient stone slabs spread throughout the dark lands beyond civilization. Given that the show is set in Louisiana, all I need is an  Inspector Legrasse and I’ll be in heaven.

How far will True Detective dive into the unimagined truths that lie at the edge of man’s understanding? We cannot yet know, but no matter what the answer, for millions who have never seen the Yellow Sign, a new journey into heretofore unknown worlds of mystery has begun.

Heard about the King in Yellow on True Detective and don’t know what to think? It’s time to experience it, first-hand… (Just to warn you, the format is a little wonky with this book, but the stories are all there and if you can get past that you should enjoy it. You can also get the original King in Yellow for free, but it does not include Chambers’s later weird fiction, such as “The Maker of Moons”).

Sign up for my email list! I promise not to spam you, and I’ll never give away your information. This is only for BIG announcements like new book releases or Pulitzer prizes won. That sort of thing. Click here to sign up!

And you get Harry Shannon’s Biters as a bonus. 🙂  If you are a member of LibraryThing, just click on this link and scroll down. You’ll see our books and will be able to enter for a free one. We are giving a ton away, so your chances of winning are actually pretty good. Good luck!

Here’s the book trailer again if you forgot what it’s about…

There are a lot of things that are fun about writing a book. Making the book trailer may be the best part. I hope you enjoy this introduction to my new book, The Reborn.

After leaving Siem Reap, I took a boat down the Mekong River all the way to the capital of Cambodia, Phnom Penh. A gritty, vibrant city, I expected to find the normal hustle, bustle, and inordinate amount of  motorbikes that one is apt to see in a Southeast Asian city. I did not expect this.

So what brought twenty thousand Buddhist monks and countless more ordinary citizens out to the square in front of the national palace? It turned out we had just happened to arrive on the day of the official public funeral of the King of Cambodia, Norodom Sihanouk. For a westerner generally unfamiliar with Buddhist customs, it was altogether fascinating. Here is a video I took of some of the proceedings.

It was quite an experience, and despite the fact it was a funeral, a joyous event. I can’t say the same for what we did the next day. I’m a big believer that you shouldn’t treat the world as your own personal Disneyland. So if you see the good, you should experience the bad, too. And you can’t go to Cambodia without visiting the Killing Fields.

Lorde’s “Royals” is without a doubt my favorite pop song of the last year, but I actually like Kina Grannis’s cover better than the original. What do you think?

During our swing through southeast Asia, we visited the great treasure of Cambodia—Angkor Wat. The ancient site boasts the ruins of the largest religious complex in the world. It did not disappoint. It was a treat of Lovecraftian proportions.

Sunrise

Bike Share

Reminds me of Star Wars

Wearing the appropriate shirt

Spooky, and awesome

The great explorer

From Bangkok we journeyed to Siem Reap, Cambodia, but it was no easy road to get there.  It began with a 5:55 a.m. train from Bangkok, one that was as third class as it could be. It was a cool morning, however, and with the windows open, the breeze kept the trip from being unbearable. That is, until the fires. We’d seen them burning in the distance and didn’t think much of them. Just farmers burning their fields, releasing nitrogen, whatever it is that farmers do. Then all of the sudden the fires weren’t off in the distance; they were all along the railroad track. Our train drove straight into a tunnel of flame. Smoke and ash and fire were leaping into the train car, while we huddled on the floor, trying to avoid all three. But the fun was only beginning.

After exiting the train a little more well-done and covered in soot than when we entered it, we took a tuk-tuk to the Cambodian border. After dodging the scam visa office, we exited Thailand, bribed a Cambodian border guard, and made our way to a tourist holding pen where buses routinely left for Siem Reap. Twelve of us or so ended up piling into a mini-van. I was blessed with the front seat. I had air-conditioning. I wasn’t packed like a sardine in a can. I thought I was pretty lucky. I was wrong. I was so wrong.

While the rest of the passengers chattered away in the back, I had a front row seat to a spectacle of terror that defies proper description. I have seen bad driving before. I though the Thai’s were rather reckless. They have nothing on the Cambodians. We fired along a Cambodian highway at 100 clicks an hour, swerving in and out of traffic like we were in a NASCAR race. It was a two-lane road, but you would never know it. I’m not sure what was the most terrifying–going three wide on the road (i.e., the car on the right, the car passing the car on the right, and us passing both cars) while a huge truck was heading directly towards us, flashing his lights like a mad man; shooting the gap between two cars, one heading towards us and one we were passing, something we did five or six times; or the fact that we did all this while our drive answered his cell-phone and fumbled with his iPod. For 200 km, with no seat belts, we drove. At some point, I resigned myself to the fact that if I was going to die, there was nothing I could do about it.

By some absolute miracle, we made it to Siem Reap. Wonders never cease. But the true wonders were to follow.

So I’m stuck here in the great frozen tundra of Washington, D.C., but I sure wish I was where I was this time last year–Thailand. I think I’ll let the pictures–and the videos–do the talking for me on this one. Next up, Cambodia, one of the most amazing places I have ever been, but also one of the darkest.

Monkeys, hanging out on the kayak I took through the mangrove forests of Krabi (those are not my feet).

They eat a lot.

And they will kiss you, too.

And you don’t even need a saddle!

My next book, The Reborn, is now with the publisher. The edits are finished, and it’s ready to go. The book is coming out on April 11, 2014, and I hope you will check it out. It’s different from everything I’ve done before, but I also think it may be my best. Here’s the Goodreads page, if you want to add it to your To Read pile. I’ll keep you up to date as things develop.

This time last year, I was on my way to Singapore. When you think of Singapore, you probably think of enterprise and money. You’d be, well, on the money.

Singapore is one of the world’s great business centers. It is, in many ways, America without the Bill of Rights and pesky government interference with industry. Personal liberty is not particularly valued in the great city-state. Freedom of speech is non-existent, punishments for crime are harsh, and chewing gum is illegal.

But economically, Singapore is one of the freest countries in the world. All you need to know about Singapore is nicely summed up in an episode of The Pupil, Singapore’s version of Law & Order, that we watched while waiting for the flight to Thailand. The prosecutor, in classic Jack McCoy fashion, extolled the court that the accused could not go free. His offense struck Singapore to its very core, and was a betrayal of everything the nation stood for. His crime? Was it murder? Rape? Human Trafficking?

Nope.

Bribery. And, as the show made sure we knew, Singapore is the least corrupt country in the world. Even on television, it’s always business, business, business.

Personally, though, I was more interested in Singapore’s more…cultural offerings, particularly the famous Raffles Hotel Long Bar.

Raffles is one of the finest hotels in the world–well out of my price range. But its long bar is also the birthplace of one of the world’s finest drinks.

And for only $30, you can have your own Singapore Sling.

All and all, a fun night in Singapore. But the trip really began at the next stop–Krabi, Thailand.

My journey began in Hong Kong, where, after a sixteen hour flight from Chicago, I met up with my very good friends, Wallace and Mayu. At the time, they were living up the ex-pat life, residing in an apartment in Discovery Bay with a nightly view of Hong Kong Disney’s fireworks show.

Hong Kong was, for the most part, a port in the traveling storm, a place to adjust from the massive and unforgiving jet-lag that accompanies a trip where entire days vanish. And while I would recommend that any traveler visit Hong Kong at least once, there isn’t all that much to recommend it. My favorite part might have been the raccoon in the city zoo.

Apparently, we call them Washing Bears.

Which isn’t to say that Hong Kong isn’t an impressive city. Seen from Mount Victoria, the highest peak in the region, it’s stunning to believe that such a large metropolis was more or less carved from the rock.

It also has its share of strange Chinese-to-English translations, like this Burger King where you can get a Heineken and “Mexican Drum Sticks,” whatever that is.

And occasionally, you run into a friendly face…

Hong Kong, however, was only the beginning, the gateway into a much grander adventure. Next stop, Singapore!

Hong Kong at night

One year ago today, I left Birmingham, Alabama to begin a journey that would take me across 29,853 miles and through fourteen countries on a trip around the world. Over the next several weeks, I am going to chronicle that journey here, with pictures, just for you. I hope you enjoy.

Siberia

Something completely different today. As most of you know, I spend a lot of my time reading horror. But I’m also always on the lookout for literary fiction that has a heart. The Time Regulation Institute by Ahment Hamdi Tanpinar is just such a book.

How this book came to be published in English is almost as interesting as the story itself. Released 50 years ago in Turkey, The Time Regulation Institute has been rediscovered and translated into English for a new generation and a new audience. There’s a lesson there for writers, readers, and all of society. Literature is timeless, and it can speak to us in different ways throughout the decades. Here’s the synopsis.

Old Istanbul aristocrats, Turkish teashops, imperial diamonds, and great and humble mosques are juxtaposed with the almost non-descriptive portrayals of neighborhood friendships, family relations, and local public figures who could be found in any city in Turkey or, perhaps, any Eastern setting where the old way of life adopts new and Western counterparts. Ahmet H. Tanpinar’s portrayal of modern, post-Ottoman Turkey weaves a theater of the absurd, suggestively representative of the early days of the young Republic. This translation is introduced by an essay by the late Berna Moran, a leading Turkish literary critic.

The Time Regulation Institute is an ironic and biting satire of a period in Turkish history where Turkey was locked between the old world of the Ottoman Empire and the new world of the West. Much as Turkey still straddles two continents and multiple cultures, the Turkey of the 1930s straddled two ways of life, as different and incompatible as one could imagine. The shock of that transition–with the rise of new bureaucracies and even a new language–forms the basis of the story in The Time Regulation Institute. It’s hard to adequately describe the plot of The Time Regulation Institute. Just take my word for it–you won’t find a more beautifully written book, which is a credit to the translator as well as the author, and you will get a great look into a culture you probably don’t know that much about.

4 Stars

P.S. I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review, and is my policy, I’d like to give it away to one of my lucky readers if they will also post a review on Amazon and Goodreads. So, the first person to email me about it gets the book!

2013 Top Ten In Horror List