I realized I’ve failed to make any kind of announcement on my blog about the new novel, despite babbling about it nonstop via social media. Most of you suspect blogging is dead. You might be right, which explains why I want to quit all social media and focus only on blogging. I feel like a lot of us are embarrassed about blogging because the word “blogging” sounds extremely childish. You would never tell your parents you have a blog. They would disown you. Or maybe that’s exactly why you would tell them.
Regardless, my sixth novel, Touch the Night, is coming out in June through Cemetery Dance. CD will be publishing the book as a limited edition signed hardcover and also an ebook. Check out the cover art below, from my good friend Dyer Wilk:
I will most likely be self-publishing the paperback edition around August, unless some other publisher swoops in with bags of cash at the last minute wanting to take the rights off my hands, but at this point I do not see that happening. But that’s cool. I am perfectly okay with self-publishing my own work. Those familiar with my history will recall the numerous times various small presses have screwed me over (*cough* Darkfuse *cough*). I do not consider Cemetery Dance a bad publisher by any stretch, but they only asked for the HC and ebook rights, and that’s totally cool with me. Self-releasing the paperback edition will give me wider freedom in always having extra copies on hand at conventions. Sometimes that can be tricky with some of my books published by other presses. Sometimes I have to send multiple emails begging for an invoice because a convention is approaching and I receive crickets and then I do not have any copies ready in time. Self-publishing will prevent such embarrassing encounters from recurring.
I am extremely excited to be working with Cemetery Dance on Touch the Night. When I first started getting published back in 2012, CD was always referred to as a “white whale” in publishing, and honestly it is still considered one. They’ve published some of the greatest writers in the horror genre and for them to be releasing Touch the Night, well…it’s a goddamn dream come true.
I’ve talked about Touch the Night on the blog before, I am sure; although, back then, it was most likely referenced under alternate titles (Cirrhosis and Who Will Survive and What Will Be Left of Them and The Evocation of Mother were the three big titles I’ve used for the book at one point or another). I’m still fond of those titles, but I do think Touch the Night best represents this specific book. It is my longest novel, at 400 pages and 113,000 words. I do not recommend writing a long novel, because–like any book–you will have to reread it numerous times. And even after it’s been accepted and edited, you will probably get stuck reading it two or three more times again. I just finished what I think is my final read-through of the interior proof, and while I did find it exhausted, I was also reminded that it’s actually a pretty kickass book. Sometimes when you reread something you’ve written, you’re hit with a deep sense of shame (the same kind of shame one feels when admitting to having a blog, probably). I’ve certainly experienced this shame. However, none of that was present while rereading Touch the Night. If anything, it reignited my excitement to share it with readers.
After finishing my latest proof, I tweeted about sending my revisions back to the publisher, like any blogger does, and a website called Morbidly Beautiful wrote up an insanely detailed news article about the tweet. I do not know why my tweet warranted this, but I remain very grateful and humbled that someone would want to spend so much time putting together an article about myself and my work. Plus, I’ve never been involved in a BREAKING NEWS report before. I will never stop laughing about this. Read the awesome article over at Morbidly Beautiful. They are now my new favorite place on the internet.
There are some cool, exciting things happening behind-the-scenes with this book, involving Hollywood, but obviously nothing even remotely set in stone yet. There is a very good chance nothing actually happens. But I have a good feeling. I think shit’s going to get wild. At least, I sure hope so. Fingers crossed, right?
Here’s the official book synopsis:
MOTHER! MOTHER! RISE FROM THE GROUND!
Stranger Things and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre unite to form a blood-soaked matrimony of violence and corruption.
Something sinister’s hiding in the small town of Percy, Indiana, and twelve-year-old Joshua Washington and Alonzo Jones are about to find themselves up close and personal with it. After a harmless night of petty property damage leads to the unthinkable, the red and blue lights of a cop car are the last things these boys want to see. Especially a cop car driven by something not quite human.
Enter Mary Washington and Ottessa Jones. Their sons have been best friends for years, and now Josh and Alonzo have been abducted in the dead of night. Worst of all, the local sheriff refuses to believe they’re missing, leaving it up to Mary and Ottessa to take the law into their own hands before a family of ungodly lunatics can complete a ritual decades in the making.
Together they will embark on a surreal and violent journey into a land of corrupt law enforcement, small-town secrets, gravitational oddities, and ancient black magic.
Through Cemetery Dance, the signed hardcover edition is limited to 750 copies. I have no idea how many copies have been pre-ordered at this point. I do know it would be fucking cool to sellout before the release date in June. Especially since I miiiiight be working on a sequel, and it would certainly help convince the publisher to take a chance on it if they know the first book sold out so quickly.
Anyway, yeah, that’s it, I’m done talking. Go pre-order Touch the Night. It’s going to scare the shit out of you.