Author: Melody E McIntyre

Epeolatry Book Review: Ghost Apparent by Jelena Dunato

Disclosure:

Our reviews may contain affiliate links. If you purchase something through the links in this article we may receive a small commission or referral fee. This happens without any additional cost to you.

​Title: Ghost Apparent
Author: Jelena Dunato
Genre: Dark Fantasy
Publisher: Ghost Orchid Press
Date: 24th September, 2024

Synopsis: Betrayed, deposed and presumed dead.

When her father is killed in a bloody coup and her uncle seizes the city, Orsiana pleads for help with the only power still willing to listen, unaware that the gods will use her as a pawn in their own game.

Thrown back on the streets of Abia, armed with the gods’ double-edged gifts, Orsiana must thwart her uncle’s plans and learn what it takes to rule a proud, stubborn city that thrives on artifice and wit. She will plot, fight and use lethally tuned verse to stir a rebellion. But just when her uncle’s Machiavellian schemes start to topple, a new player will enter the game, and the gods will raise the stakes. It’s easy to fight an enemy you hate, but how about an enemy you fall in love with? If she wants to win, Orsiana will have to risk the last precious thing in her possession: her heart.

A story of revenge and recovery, Ghost Apparent blends the history and folklore of the Eastern Adriatic with the bloody treachery of the Renaissance courts and is a perfect read for the fans of dark political fantasy.

(more…)

Hush, It’s Interview Time With Leigh Kenny!

Hush, It’s Interview Time With Leigh Kenny!

By Melody E. McIntyre

 

Leigh Kenny is a horror writer who lives in Ireland with her family. She is the author of two books, Cursed and Hush, My Darling, as well as several short stories. Cursed is a possession story described as The Grudge meets Drag Me to Hell. Hush, My Darling is an Irish horror thriller perfect for fans of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I have read Hush, My Darling and enjoyed it even as it frightened me. Kenny’s writing is gripping and her villains are repugnant, but engaging. She is also a finalist for two awards in Instagram, Author of the Year and her novel, Cursed, is up for Horror of the Year. I was recently given the opportunity to interview her and get to know her a little better.

(more…)

Epeolatry Book Review: The Night Guest by Hildur Knútsdóttir

Disclosure:

Our reviews may contain affiliate links. If you purchase something through the links in this article we may receive a small commission or referral fee. This happens without any additional cost to you.

Title: The Night Guest
Author: Hildur Knútsdóttir
Translator: Mary Robinette Kowal
Genre: Horror 
Publisher: Tor Nightfire
Publication Date: 3rd September, 2024
Synopsis: Hildur Knútsdóttir’s The Night Guest is an eerie and ensnaring story set in contemporary Reykjavík that’s sure to keep you awake at night.

Iðunn is in yet another doctor’s office. She knows her constant fatigue is a sign that something’s not right, but practitioners dismiss her symptoms and blood tests haven’t revealed any cause.

When she talks to friends and family about it, the refrain is the same ― have you tried eating better? exercising more? establishing a nighttime routine? She tries to follow their advice, buying everything from vitamins to sleeping pills to a step-counting watch. Nothing helps.

Until one night Iðunn falls asleep with the watch on, and wakes up to find she’s walked over 40,000 steps in the night . . .

What is happening when she’s asleep? Why is she waking up with increasingly disturbing injuries? And why won’t anyone believe her?

(more…)

Epeolatry Book Review: This World is Not Yours by Kemi Ashing-Giwa

Disclosure:

Our reviews may contain affiliate links. If you purchase something through the links in this article we may receive a small commission or referral fee. This happens without any additional cost to you.

Title: This World is Not Yours
Author: Kemi Ashing-Giwa
Genre: Scifi/Horror
Publisher: Tor
Publication Date: 10th September, 2024
Synopsis: After fleeing her controlling and murderous family with her fiancée Vinh, Amara embarks on a colonization project, New Belaforme, along with her childhood friend, Jesse.

The planet, beautiful and lethal, produces the Gray, a “self-cleaning” mechanism that New Belaforme’s scientists are certain only attacks invasive organisms, consuming them. Humans have been careful to do nothing to call attention to themselves until a rival colony wakes the Gray.

As Amara, Vinh, and Jesse work to carve out a new life together, each is haunted by past betrayals that surface, expounded by the need to survive the rival colony and the planet itself.

There’s more than one way to be eaten alive.

(more…)

Epeolatry Book Review: Haunt Sweet Home by Sarah Pinsker

Disclosure:

Our reviews may contain affiliate links. If you purchase something through the links in this article we may receive a small commission or referral fee. This happens without any additional cost to you.

Title: Haunt Sweet Home
Author: Sarah Pinsker
Genre: Horror/Paranormal
Publisher: Tordotcom
Publication Date:3rd September, 2024

Synopsis: “Don’t talk to day about what we do at night.”

When aimless twenty-something Mara lands a job as the night-shift production assistant on her cousin’s ghost hunting/home makeover reality TV show Haunt Sweet Home, she quickly determines her new role will require a healthy attitude toward duplicity. But as she hides fog machines in the woods and improvises scares to spook new homeowners, a series of unnerving incidents on set and a creepy new coworker force Mara to confront whether the person she’s truly been deceiving and hiding from all along―is herself.

Eerie and empathetic, Haunt Sweet Home is a multifaceted, supernatural exploration of finding your own way into adulthood, and into yourself.

(more…)

Epeolatry Book Review: Nine Levels by Elana Gomel

Disclosure:

Our reviews may contain affiliate links. If you purchase something through the links in this article we may receive a small commission or referral fee. This happens without any additional cost to you.

Title: Nine Levels
Author: Elana Gomel
Genre: Horror/Fantasy
Publisher: Mirror World Publishing
Publication Date: 17th July, 2024

Synopsis: Waking up on the beach in Greece after a midnight party, Cleo, a British-Greek tourist, sees a stranger sitting next to her. The stranger has a giant spider on his forearm.

So begins an incredible odyssey through the nine levels of the mysterious mountain populated by an odd assortment of monsters, demons, and avatars of dead gods. Still grieving the unsolved disappearance of her twin sister Cora, Cleo is thrust into the world whose rules she does not understand and whose inhabitants confound everything she thought she knew about Greek mythology. Confronted by Woven Women, masked huntresses, sentient graffiti, and Mother of Monsters, Cleo has to make sense of it all. And meanwhile, a mysterious Call reverberates in her brain: You have to go up. You have to find your sister.

A story of self-discovery, courage, and breathtaking adventure, Nine Levels is a highly imaginative, innovative, and engrossing retelling of familiar legends with a twist you won’t see coming.

(more…)

How to Write Epistolary Fiction

How to Write Epistolary Fiction

by Melody E. McIntyre

 

Epistolary fiction includes stories told through documents instead of a regular narrative. Although the term “epistolary” derives from the Greek word epistole “letter”, this term is often extended to include works comprised of other documents, too, such as diary entries, newspaper clippings, memos, etc. Sometimes this style of writing is called “found fiction” like the movie version, “found footage”. Instead of a narrator telling the story, the reader must piece it together by examining fictional documents. This style of writing can be challenging but can also be rewarding to write and to read.

Epistolary fiction has a long history, dating back to at least 1485 when the first truly epistolary novel, the Spanish “Prison of Love” by Diego de San Pedro was written. Despite drifting in and out of fashion through the centuries, epistolary novels continue to be written and enjoyed. Likely the most famous example is Dracula, which uses letters, diaries, dictation cylinders, and newspaper articles to tell its story. Today, we are going to look at some examples for ideas on how you can use epistolary fiction in your own writing.

(more…)

How To Write A Prologue

How To Write A Prologue

There are few things more controversial in fiction writing than prologues. Conduct a search for information about prologues, and you are bound to find articles, lists, etc. all about how prologues are bad and you should never use them. But writing rules are often more like guidelines, in that they don’t apply to everyone and every situation. Plenty of well-written novels, particularly in the fantasy genre, utilize prologues to great effect. In this article, I’m going to look at the pros and cons of prologues, and how you can best use them (or not) in your own fiction.

(more…)