Celebrating the holiday with an extra day off tacked onto your weekend?

Spend your Monday with zombies in prison and get Dead Man Walking for free today.

The holiday deal ends at midnight tonight so what are you waiting for? Hop over to Amazon and find out how the zombie apocalypse starts.

UPDATE:

Well, just call me stupid. I accidentally set the free promotion for tomorrow instead of today, and it’s too late to make corrections because Amazon only allows promotions to start at midnight.

Soooo…. hope you stop by on Tuesday to get your free download of Dead Man Walking. Sorry about the mix-up

Looking for something new to read?

Dead Hunger II: The Gem Cardoza Chronicle

As Flex, his niece Trina, Gem, Hemp and Charlie brave the wild world teeming with the walking dead, they make up the rules as they go along. Flex Sheridan was an electrician before the world took a nasty turn; Gem, an artist. Hemp is a scientist who specializes in epidemics and also carries in his bag of tricks a mechanical engineering degree. Charlie is a metal and punk rocker in her mid-twenties who has learned how to take out two zombies at once with her crossbow. Each one of them has their own story.

This one is Gem’s chronicle.

They know they need to stay safe. But they also know that to hole up and hide away is to allow the creatures who crave human flesh to walk the world forever. Join with them as they struggle to balance their natural tendencies toward self-preservation with their strong desire to rid the world of the zombie scourge. Our band of machine gun-toting nomads moves from place to place in fortified vehicles, keeping their eyes peeled for survivors, and zombie battles ensue at nearly every turn. But this is not a world where love dies. This is a moment in history when human connections and things of beauty are more important than ever; things to be embraced and held tightly to.

So hop in the Crown Victoria with the ballistic steel body and the swiveling AK-47 on the top, and hang on to your seat as Gem powers the car through hoards of zombies and gets her precious Trina and Flex where they need to be. Learn what Hemp and Charlie discover in the lab – a huge clue to what caused the epidemic that has 90% of the world hunting the rest. But after you meet this group, youll begin to wonder: Who are the hunters, and who are the hunted?

Come on! It has a Crown Vic with a machine gun mounted on it. What more could you possibly want?

The Vegan Revolution… with Zombies

Presenting Stress Free Food!

Animal suffering is a thing of the past. Hipsters can now enjoy bacon without guilt. Thanks to a new miracle drug the cute little pig no longer feels a thing as she is led to the slaughter.

The only problem? Once the drug enters the food supply anyone who eats it is infected. From fast food burgers to free-range organic eggs, eating animal products turns people into shambling brain-dead zombies – not even vegetarians are safe!

In Portland, Oregon, vegans, freegans, abolitionists, hardliners and raw fooders have holed up in Food Fight, one of the country’s premier vegan grocery stores at the vegan mini-mall. There they must prepare for their final battle to take back the city from the hordes of roaming undead. Will vegans filet the flesh-eaters or will they become zombie chow?

When there’s no more meat in hell, the vegans will walk the earth.

Science runs amok and only vegans are left in non-zombie form? I’ll be honest and admit that I’d be among the first of the walking dead because I have to have my steak and chicken.

Hansel and Gretel Are Dead (Zombie Fairy Tales #2)

After being infected by the zombie pestilence, Hansel and Gretel are left to die in the woods. Sick and hungry, they find their way to the home of a lonely old woman who happens to be a cannibal. But when Hansel and Gretel refuse to stay dead, the old hag finds she may have bitten off more than she can chew.

About Zombie Fairy Tales:

Hansel and Gretel Are Dead is the second in a monthly series of short stories set in a dark fairy tale universe plagued by zombies. Surreal and full of black humor, installments feature familiar childhood characters as they encounter a world of stark violence and horror – Cinderella is worked to death before the ball, Pinocchio is made from children’s corpses, and Little Red Riding Hood finds more than wolves in the forest.

New titles will appear on the 13th of each month throughout 2012. The series features overlapping elements, characters, and places for a more immersive experience for the dedicated fan, but can also be read as stand-alone entries in any order. Get infected now.

I love mash-ups and twisted fairy tales so I’m going to have to add the whole series to my TBR pile.

Intruder, starring Clive Owen, introduces a new character that goes around stealing the faces of children, but is he real or just the figment of a young girl’s imagination? Reality and fantasy become blurred in the new horror-thriller by director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo.

This looks like it will be a real nail-biter because there always seems to be an extra edge to the terror when children are the targets… and I love that wicked poster.

Intruders hits theaters on March 30.

Hey gang. Sorry if it appears that I dropped off the face of the planet for a little while. In addition to making some revisions on my upcoming urban fantasy, Little Demons, I’ve also been busy with the day job because those bills just keep on coming.

You don’t have to miss me too much though because you can always hop over and check out my guest posts on other blogs. I recently chatted about how zombies have changed over the years at Mandy’s Morgue of Horror, and let’s not forget about my very first guest post with the talented Jesse Petersen, author of the Living with the Dead series.

In the toot-my-own-horn news, Dead Man Walking is holding its own, with 8 4-star reviews over at Amazon. WooHoo! You can check out the Review page to see what people are saying about it and then, if the mood strikes you, you can hop over and buy it for only 99 cents.

As the schedule slowly gets whipped into submission, I’ll be back to posting on a more regular basis. In the meantime, thanks for being patient with me.

Think you know about zombies? They weren’t always the flesh-eating creatures you might be familiar with today. Stop by Mandy’s Morgue of Horror for my guest post, Zombies: From Undead Muscle to Brain-Eating Stars.

Looking forward to seeing you over there.

The new trailer for Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter recently hit the web, and this movie looks like it’s going to be awesome.

I haven’t read Seth Grahame-Smith’s 2010 mashup novel of the same name that the film is based on, but I think I’ll be adding it to my TBR pile now. While the title makes it seem like something that would be a little tongue-in-cheek, the movie trailer shows that the 16th President of the United States battling an undead army is being viewed as the real deal, with what appears to be a smooth blending of fact with fiction.

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter hits theaters on June 22.

LZR-1143: Perspectives

In a world overrun by the living dead, every victim has a story. These are some of those stories. This collection of six short stories from a world ravaged by the LZR-1143 virus tell the tale of six different people, all of whom fell victim, in different ways, to the deadly plague.

From the pilot of a commercial aircraft, overwhelmed in midair, to the lonely soldier stranded high above a world of the undead, the six characters each face their own fears and mortality in different ways.

The collection includes The Pilot, The Boy, The Inmate, The Fry Cook, The Subway Passenger, and The Sniper. In The Pilot, a commercial aviator sees his last flight end in a way he never could have imagined. In The Boy, a family trip is cut short, and a lonely homecoming is not at all as he anticipated. We see the surprising genesis and true identity of a traveling companion in The Inmate, while The Fry Cook reveals the final moments of a teenage fast food worker. In The Subway Passenger, we learn that in the case of zombie apocalypse, you’d probably rather be aboveground. And in The Sniper, the surprising truth that there are some fates that cannot be fought, even with a fifty caliber rifle.

The Horribles

Since witnessing the brutal death of his parents, Sheldon Delaney swore to never step foot outside again. The Horribles are out there. They’re everywhere, threatening the residents of Poe’s Creek. Sheldon’s life changes again when a savage motorcycle gang parades through town with a deafening roar, leather, chrome, and evil. They’re here for the children. Nothing will get in their way. The Horribles have arrived for real this time and for Sheldon to do anything about it, he has to confront every fear he’s ever had or risk being choked by his poisonous memories.

House Guest

Chastity Bream doesn’t dance anymore. She also can’t walk, speak or think. She’s fed through a tube, turned twice a day and left alone in her bed. That is except for him – the one in her closet, who comes out to tend to her needs. And his.

This is just too funny, and I love the way it sticks with the zombie apocalypse theme, asking for canned goods or potable water as payment instead of cash.

It’s a little bloody, in a B-movie type of way, so don’t watch if you’re a little on the squeamish side.

While it looks cool, I think I’ll stick with the tried-and-true shotgun/chainsaw combo because the Zomb-EZ doesn’t seem to help the woman very much at the end of the commercial… or maybe that’s just because she let her guard down.

Source: CraveOnline

In addition to loving vampires, zombies, and all those other creatures that go bump in the night, I have a strong interest in serial killers (make of that what you will). I especially like those stories that have the killer using his unique skills on other killers, and this upcoming title looks like it will scratch that itch perfectly.

I Hunt Killers
by Barry Lyga

What if the world’s worst serial killer…was your dad?

Jasper (Jazz) Dent is a likable teenager. A charmer, one might say.

But he’s also the son of the world’s most infamous serial killer, and for Dear Old Dad, Take Your Son to Work Day was year-round. Jazz has witnessed crime scenes the way cops wish they could–from the criminal’s point of view.

And now bodies are piling up in Lobo’s Nod.

In an effort to clear his name, Jazz joins the police in a hunt for a new serial killer. But Jazz has a secret–could he be more like his father than anyone knows?

The book comes out on April 3 and I’ll be keeping an eye on this one with eager anticipation. According to Barry’s website, an excerpt will be coming soon. I’ll let you know when the sneak peek is available because it looks like this could be a bloody good time.

It’s time for a few more freebies to help get you over the mid-week hump. Horror doesn’t always have to involve the supernatural so today’s collection also includes some realistic thrills in the form of serial killers, and one interesting tale that involves eager college students that won’t take no for an answer.

Still Coming

Every year the best colleges reject thousands of the brightest young minds in the country. But what might happen if a large number of them refused to take no for an answer?

One morning, Shepherdton College receives 437 envelopes from twenty-eight states. Each contains the same two-word message: Still coming.

That’s just the beginning. The college president’s house burns down; the water in the country club swimming pool turns red; the ghost of a local war hero appears.

Another message is received: We’re Here.

Nerves fray, and if the “comers” aren’t trouble enough, a Peeping Tom turns into a home invader, and shows signs of becoming a full-blown sexual predator.

The town fragments and people take up arms after one last message is received…

Won’t Be Long Now.

Still Coming is a psychological thriller for anyone, student or parent, who’s ever sweated a college admission decision.

Serial

Remember the twin golden rules of hitchhiking?
# 1: Don’t go hitchhiking, because the driver who picks you up could be certifiably crazy.
# 2: Don’t pick up hitchhikers, because the traveler you pick up could be raving nutcase.
So what if, on some dark, isolated road, Crazy #1 offered a ride to Nutcase #2?

When two of the most twisted minds in the world of horror fiction face off, the result is SERIAL, a terrifying tale of hitchhiking gone terribly wrong. Like a deeply twisted version of an “After School Special,” SERIAL is the single most persuasive public service announcement on the hazards of free car rides. Beyond a thrilling piece of horrifying suspense, SERIAL is also a groundbreaking experiment in literary collaboration. Jack Kilborn wrote the first part. Blake Crouch wrote the second. And they wrote the third together over email in 100-word exchanges, not aware of each other’s opening section. All bets were off, and may the best psycho win.

Circus of the Dead

Twenty years ago, the dead destroyed the world of the living. The survivors scattered in the wake of the Scourge, erecting small towns in the worlds’ most sparsely populated areas.

For young Gabriel, the walking dead are merely the memories that haunt the eyes of those old enough and lucky enough to have survived. He is more concerned with his hard life in America’s desert, where his chores keep him busy and the husks of books stashed beneath the cellar of the library are his only freedom.

Until the circus comes to town.

“Circus of the Dead” is a novelette of approximately 10,748 words.

Underneath: Short Tales of Horror and the Supernatural

Vengeance…desperation…murder-for-hire…horror in real-time…a healthy dose of zombies…spectrophobia…even a little bit of hope. They all come together in a place underneath the one we know. Ten tales of horror and the supernatural, plus a 17,000 word preview of the upcoming zombie thriller “Orpheus.”