| Monday 22nd Feb. Colin Davies https://www.theworldofcolin.com | Friday 26th Feb. Blackpool Horror Society http://blackpoolhorrorsociety.co.uk/ |
| Tuesday 23rd Feb. Samantha Dawson https://www.sjdawsonauthor.co.uk | Saturday 27th Feb. @autoerraticism https://www.autoerraticism.com/ |
| Wednesday 24th Feb. Simon Bestwick http://simon-bestwick.blogspot.com/ | Sunday 28th Feb. Simon Jay https://sywipe.co.uk |
| Thursday 25th Feb. Jenny Kane https://jennykane.co.uk | Monday 1st March Ashley Lister https://ashleylister.com |
As I mentioned last week, Cursed, the latest in my series of Dark Tales from Innsmouth, is a book about people sharing scary stories. This is a common theme in my writing and my first horror novel, Raven and Skull, was also about storytellers telling stories. My second horror novel, Doll House, was about a writer of scary stories living through a scary story. Blackstone Towers was described by one reviewer in the following way:
At first, I thought it was a collection of short stories. Good ones. No, great ones. I kept reading, and it wasn’t long before I noticed the shorts were connected. Then they became entangled. I had been hooked quite a while, but now I’d been sucked in. It’s a wonderful read. I highly recommend it.
Blackrose Press, Amazon 5/5*
Consequently, it should come as a surprise to no one that Cursed is another story about stories and storytellers.
As some of you may know, when I’m not reading stories or writing stories, I’m teaching students how to create and craft stories. This means that the manufacture and sharing of stories is always important in my life. And this is probably one of the reasons why I see storytelling as a useful trope as a framing narrative for shorter fiction.
Why am I mentioning this instead of hurling a (not so) subtle sales pitch at you, urging you to rush out and buy Cursed, the latest novella in my Dark Tales from Innsmouth series, available on Amazon for immediate download?
I’m mentioning this because, at the moment, I’m very interested in hearing true ghost stories, and I’d love to hear one that you’ve experienced. Partly this is an academic interest. I recently wrote a paper about the hedging strategies we unconsciously use when describing our encounters with the supernatural. It’s also partly because I have a genuine curiosity to hear true stories about things that defy logical explanation. I’ve recently been sharing some on my blog and I’m always keen to share more. If you’ve had an encounter with the supernatural, or simply experienced something you can’t explain, please put it in a message and send it to me@ashleylister.co.uk.
And, finally, if you prefer to read scary stories rather than write them, I’d urge you to rush out and buy Cursed, the latest novella in my Dark Tales from Innsmouth series, available on Amazon for immediate download.
As well as the Cursed Blog Tour, to celebrate the book launch on March 1st, there will be a live event (online) where we share ‘true’ ghost stories. This will come after a week of sharing some real ghost stories online, having a handful of giveaways, and revealing some of the exciting parts of Cursed to tempt innocent reads into the dark world of Innsmouth. Which leads me to ask, when we’re online and sharing our ghost stories, would you be interested in participating? Would you be able to read a short, true ghost story? Would you want to listen? And do you know of anyone else who would like to share a short, true ghost story?
This will be taking place at about 7.00pm until 9.00pm on the evening of March 1st and I’d be honoured if you could be there. Drop me an email, me@ashleylister.co.uk, if you fancy being involved or simply listening to some scary stories.
ashleylister.com 