Horror Romances - Balancing My Sweet and Salty

One of the great things about being an indie author is being able to write a book in a niche romance. Either by creating a new "spliced" genre, or by adding to one that few know exist, thus drawing fresh eyes to it.

I write horror as Gail Smith, but there have been occasions when I've taken the romance genre I normally dabble in and placed it in the horror realm. Or rather, I've taken a story of horror and added romantic elements to it. Case in point, BLOOD TENDERLY, which features a demon determined to remove a human female from his domain.

Horror with romance is really not so new. Movies have done it for years. For instance, Bram Stoker's Dracula, starring Gary Oldman, is, at its core, a love story. A story about love lost, and the chance to regain it. But it's considered a horror movie first and foremost. Not a romance movie that contains horror. (I also consider An American Werewolf in London another horror romance.)

Same goes for my book SILENT NIGHT, FINAL NIGHT, which deals with a family fighting for survival in an post-apocalyptic world. It's also a Christmas story. (Talk about sub-genres!) Again, it's a horror story first, but the familial love shared by the husband, wife, and their child is the driving force that helps them survive.

And, yes, believe it or not, both have a Happily Ever After...of sorts.

True, you can find plenty of stories in the romance genre that have horrific elements, especially if they deal with werewolves, vampires, and the like. But I'm always on the lookout for a gut-wrencher that also tears out my heart -- in a good way.

If you know of a story or film that's horror first, and romance second, share it with me! 

HERE BE NEWS for October 28, 2019

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Monday, October 21 - 
"HERE BE NEWS" - All the latest from the gang at Here Be Magic.

Thursday, October 24 -
“SURPRISE! IT'S A BOOK SALE!” – If you like vampires and family sagas and love stories that span centuries, read the Children of the Night series by author PG Forte. Check out the details on Here Be Magic. 

Friday, October 25 -
"SCARY MOVIES 4 - The Ones Where We Rooted for the Monster! + A GIVEAWAY" -  Either we wanted the creature to pleeease eat the dumb characters --- or we found ourselves sympathizing with the bad guy and wanting him to escape, win, or find love!  It's the final installment of our series, and the last chance for you to enter our great giveaway! (See below for the links to all 4 in the series) 

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In honor of Halloween, the Here Be Magic gang came up with a four-part "Scary Movies" series for October!  In them, we talked about the fun and the frightening, the ones we watch over and over - and the ones we never want to see again! We hope you enjoyed our posts. If you missed any of them, they're listed below.

NOTE - LAST CHANCE FOR YOU TO ENTER THE GIVEAWAY! 
The Rafflecopter is accessible from ANY of the four Scary Movie posts! Winners will be drawn at random on November 1, 2019.

Part One appeared on Friday, Oct 4: 
"SCARY MOVIES 1 - THE ONES THAT TERRIFIED US AS KIDS!" - When you're little, a movie doesn't have to be from the horror genre to scare the bejeebers out of you! 

Part Two came out on Friday, Oct. 11: 
"SCARY MOVIES 2 - THE ONES WE LOVE TO WATCH AGAIN + AGAIN" - Are there certain movies you simply MUST watch every Halloween?  Or any time?

Part Three appeared on Friday, Oct. 18: 
"SCARY MOVIES 3 - THE ONES WE WISH WE HADN'T SEEN!" - Some are dumb. Some are frightening. And some are disturbing enough to leave a mark...

Part Four, the final installment, was posted on Friday, Oct. 25:
"SCARY MOVIES 4 - The Ones Where We Rooted for the Monster!" -  Either we wanted the creature to pleeease eat the dumb characters --- or we found ourselves sympathizing with the bad guy and wanting him to escape, win, or find love! 

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SCARY MOVIES 4 - The Ones Where We Rooted for the Monster! + A GIVEAWAY

These movies fall into two distinct categories. Either we felt the script was so bad or the characters so dumb that we wanted the creature to pleeease eat them all and put us out of our misery --- or we found ourselves sympathizing with the bad guy and wanting him to escape, win, or find love!
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MAUREEN – “Bram Stoker's Dracula. To me, It's a love story.” ~ Maureen Bonatch, maureenbonatch.com
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ANGELA – “As a horror movie fangirl, I would be remiss if I didn't throw things back to the classic Universal Monsters here. "Frankenstein" and "The Bride of Frankenstein" are brilliant works of art that make viewers ask, "Who really is the monster - us or him?" I would say we are. Boris Karloff is perfect in the role, and there are some iconic scenes from both movies most people recognize for a reason.

"By the end of the movie, I'm cheering for Frankenstein's monster to escape the angry pitchfork-carrying townspeople because, doggone it, he's not really the bad guy!" ~ Angela Campbell, www.angelacampbellonline.com
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LINDA - "GODZILLA!" ~ Linda Mooney, lindamooney.com
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JODY - "King Kong, of course! He’s everyone’s hero! I did watch King Kong - Skull Island with my kids since it had Loki, I mean Tom Hiddleston, in it, and they 'stan' Loki, and we all rooted for King Kong together." ~ Jody Wallace, jodywallace.com
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NICOLE - "For me, this would be Cabin in the Woods. Because Bradley Whitford's character was trying to save in the world even as what he was doing meant very bad things for the main characters. And I found the way he cheered for his personal favourite monster (the seashell) rather endearing. Maybe it's because I liked him so much as Josh on The West Wing... ~ Nicole Luiken, nicoleluiken.com 
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PG - "Creature From the Black Lagoon. Another of the movies I used to watch with my grandmother late at night. The monster was clearly the hero, as far as I was concerned. The poor thing." ~ PG Forte, pgforte.com
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Dani - "I think the best movie monsters make us feel empathy for them. Every version of King Kong ever made breaks my heart. I was so glad when the Skull Island movie finally allowed the great ape to survive and live free! 

"My family will tell you that I'm a lot less soft-hearted when it comes to the human characters in some horror movies. When you see this many things going horribly, dangerously wrong in your new house (eg. "The Amityville Horror" and "Poltergeist"), why would you STAY THERE? Worse, why make your KIDS stay there?

"Of course, if characters made only sensible decisions, it would be really tough to create a full-length movie, LOL." ~ Dani Harper, daniharper.com
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CINDY - "This to me is any horror film where the characters a) split up or b) run back into the damn house. As the old Eddie Murphy sketch lampooning Amityville Horror said, "Nice house. Too bad we can't stay." And OMG, Death Becomes Her. Stupid, stupid, stupid!" ~ Cindy Spencer Pape, www.cindyspencerpape.com
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SHAWNA - "There was a version of Dracula--I think it was the one that came out in 1979, because when I saw it it was on network television and I want to say it was maybe four or five years later. I was probably in my early teens, just starting to develop a strong appreciation for the opposite sex. 

"The Dracula in the movie was darkly romantic and seductive, and his Lucy seemed rather more willing than not. I remember rooting for them to escape together. That movie might well be responsible for my predilection for well-dressed, dark, and dangerous (at least in my fantasy life!" ~ Shawna Reppert, www.shawna-reppert.com
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UPDATE - The contest is over and we have winners! 

1. BEVERLY wins an ebook from Jody Wallace - Catalyst: Cat Ship (Obsidian Rim Book 8) 

2. LOUISE wins her choice of one ebook from Dani Harper

3. GLENDA wins a deluxe canvas tote bag from Dani Harper

4. SHERRY wins her choice of one ebook from Linda Mooney

5. MARTHA wins her choice of one Audiobook from Linda Mooney

6. ANNE wins the grand prize, a $35 Amazon Gift eCard from all the authors at HERE BE MAGIC

We have the contact information for everyone and winners will receive emails within a couple of days.

THANK YOU to everyone who stopped by our Scary Movie blogs. We had a lot of fun putting them together!

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Surprise! It's a book sale!

I’ve been happily hybrid for several years now—with books that I’ve self-published (or mostly, re-published) and books that are still under the aegis of a publishing house. What’s nice about having a publisher is that someone else makes decisions about things like covers and blurbs, editing and (to some extent) promoting and marketing, leaving me free to concentrate on writing...to some extent, anyway. What’s not so nice is that sometimes those decisions are not always to your liking, or (perhaps even more frustrating) sometimes decisions are made that you aren’t even informed about.

Okay, in the interest of fairness, I should point out that I’ve been busy with The Move From Hell, as *ahem* I may have mentioned a time or two, so it’s vaguely possible that attempts were made to inform me, but BE THAT AS IT MAY, it was still a surprise to find out this evening that  APPARENTLY I’m having a sale this month! Woo-hoo! Yay! 

Yes, this month; the one that’s now three-quarters over. Do I have great timing, or what?

Anyway, if you like vampires and family sagas and love stories that span centuries, tortured heroes, and lovers who keep trying (over and over again) to get it right, and you still haven’t read my Children of Night series, this might be a good time to check it out — while they're on sale for only .99 each.  This series (which I WILL get around to finishing one of these — I swear!) is very dear to my heart. I started it at the request (okay, it might have been more like a challenge—same difference) of my daughter and features (among many other characters) two of my most tortured heroes ever. Click here for a free read detailing how they first met:

https://claims.prolificworks.com/free/qwyDJJqm

You can also read more about the series on my website: 

https://www.pgforte.com/children-of-night 

Or buy the series at Amazon: 

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B075TZY6Y4

There's also a short, Halloween-themed, cross-over novella--which is also only .99 (although that's its regular price): 

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07HHSM6TH

And if you like your vampire books a little shorter and spicier (and with a just little less family) there's this free read here:

https://claims.prolificworks.com/free/IcyL43Ib

HERE BE NEWS for October 21, 2019

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Monday, October 14 - 
"HERE BE NEWS" - All the latest from the gang at Here Be Magic.

Tuesday, October 15 -
"LOVE FAERIES? New excerpt from STORM CROSSED by Dani Harper" - The latest in the Grim Series won the 2019 PRISM award for Urban Fantasy.

Thursday, October 17 -
“HOW DO YOU HALLOWEEN?” – There’s no age limit on the fun you can have in October! Author Maureen Bonatch suggests some Halloween reads and other treats on Here Be Magic. 

Friday, October 18 -
"SCARY MOVIES 3 - THE ONES WE WISH WE HADN'T SEEN!" - Some are dumb. Some are frightening. And some are disturbing enough to leave a mark... A joint blog and contest by the authors at Here Be Magic.

With Halloween on the way, the Here Be Magic gang got talking about horror movies - both the fun and the frightening. Of course we had to share, so we came up with a four-part "Scary Movies" series for October!  We also have a month-long CONTEST you can enter on any one of these posts!

Part One appeared on Friday, Oct 4: "SCARY MOVIES 1 - THE ONES THAT TERRIFIED US AS KIDS!" - When you're little, a movie doesn't have to be from the horror genre to scare the bejeebers out of you! 

Part Two came out on Friday, Oct. 11: "SCARY MOVIES 2 - THE ONES WE LOVE TO WATCH AGAIN + AGAIN" - Are there certain movies you simply MUST watch every Halloween?  Or any time?

The latest installment, Part Three, was on Friday, Oct. 18: "SCARY MOVIES 3 - THE ONES WE WISH WE HADN'T SEEN!" - Some are dumb. Some are frightening. And some are disturbing enough to leave a mark...

Stay tuned for our final post, Part Four, next week!

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SCARY MOVIES 3 - The Ones We Wish We Hadn't Seen! + A GIVEAWAY

Some are dumb. Some are frightening. And some are disturbing enough to leave a mark...

DANI - "So much for being an adult --- I slept with the light on for three nights in a row after watching "28 DAYS LATER" in 2003!" 
~ Dani Harper, daniharper.com
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ANGELA – “I love horror movies, so this is hard for me -- I even get enjoyment out of the bad ones! I mentioned last week that John Carpenter's “HALLOWEEN” (1978) is one of my all-time favorite movies and that I have only been able to watch the Rob Zombie remakes once, so I am picking the Rob Zombie "HALLOWEEN" and "HALLOWEEN 2" as movies I wish I had never seen. 

"They tried too hard to take the mystery out of why Michael Myers was a psycho, and plus, they really honed in a "white trash" stereotype that was no fun to watch. I know those versions have their fans, but I think half of the fear that came from the original film was the not knowing why Michael Myers ran around killing people. Know what I mean?" 
~ Angela Campbell, www.angelacampbellonline.com
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LINDA - "Oh, there are several. At the head of the list is “THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE”, followed closely by “THE EXORCIST”." 
~ Linda Mooney, lindamooney.com
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JODY - "I could have lived without seeing "I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE" as well as "FACES OF DEATH" (more hijinks at my fancy neighbor’s house who had cable TV!) "FACES OF DEATH" wasn’t a movie, per se, so much as a collection of blood and death real-life videos in the 80s before YouTube existed. "I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE", of course, is more horrific violence against women, and I don’t care if she gets even, I just don’t ever need to SEE that." 
~ Jody Wallace, jodywallace.com
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MAUREEN – “NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET. I live on Elm Street- Enough said. I slept with the light on for at least a week after this. Also "PARANORMAL ACTIVITY". I watched until the end to make sure that it was a movie and not real, lol!” 
~ Maureen Bonatch, maureenbonatch.com
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PG - "Oh, there's no contest. I didn't even actually see this one, but Clockwork Orange is my go-to for movies (and books) that are too disturbing to sit through." 
~ PG Forte, pgforte.com
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SHAWNA - "I didn't even have to see the movie. . .the trailer was enough. It came out when I was about 10. I think it was called Silent Screams. There was something about a thing--demon, ghost, I have no idea--coming out of a mirror at night if you looked into it, or got too close. As you can tell, I'm a bit fuzzy on the details after all these years. Still, to this day I never look directly into a dark mirror if I can help it." ~ Shawna Reppert, www.shawna-reppert.com
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CINDY - "Anything involving snakes. It's a ridiculous phobia for someone who studied herpetology in grad school, but the friend sitting next to me for Raiders of the Lost Ark went home with bruises on his arm. Even the trailers for Snakes on a Plane were too much." ~ Cindy Spencer Paper, www.cindyspencerpape.com
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UPDATE - The contest is over and we have winners! 

1. BEVERLY wins an ebook from Jody Wallace - Catalyst: Cat Ship (Obsidian Rim Book 8) 

2. LOUISE wins her choice of one ebook from Dani Harper

3. GLENDA wins a deluxe canvas tote bag from Dani Harper

4. SHERRY wins her choice of one ebook from Linda Mooney

5. MARTHA wins her choice of one Audiobook from Linda Mooney

6. ANNE wins the grand prize, a $35 Amazon Gift eCard from all the authors at HERE BE MAGIC

We have the contact information for everyone and winners will receive emails within a couple of days.

THANK YOU to everyone who stopped by our Scary Movie blogs. We had a lot of fun putting them together!

.........................

How Do You Halloween?

by Maureen Bonatch 

Halloween doesn’t have to have an age limit. Even though some neighborhoods forgo the traditional costume wearing and trick or treating, or put an age limit on it, that doesn’t stop some of us.

It could be that there’s something about the leaves starting to change colors, the air getting cooler and the plethora of spooky movies filling the movie and television screen that makes us want to join in the festivities.

 Or maybe it’s just me?  

Have you taken advantage of the month of October to:

• Stock up on a plethora of edible treats for the cute little trick or treaters…or for us, admit it, most of the candy is for us
• Dress up as something scary, sexy, funny, or whatever strikes your fancy—no limits!
• Scare our friends and family
• Neglect housecleaning and leave some cobwebs—they're just festive decorations!
• Binge watch scary movies
• Devour every book related to magic, fantasy and horror
• Share ghost stories

Need Some Help Getting Into the Spirit of the Season?

If you like ghost stories that might tempt you to leave a light on at night, or to tread a little more carefully through the house, check out my book Evil Speaks Softly.

They were never supposed to meet. Fame came easy for Liv by following in the footsteps of the female writers in her family. The cycle repeated for decades…until Liv changed the story. Her villain doesn’t like the revision—and he isn’t a fictional character. In his story, the bad guy always wins.

They were never supposed to find love. Liv never questioned her demanding nocturnal muse, or the strange incidents in her old, family home until she met Gage. His job was to watch her from afar, not reveal the truth about the curse and the stories of the dead.

They’ve broken all the rules. Together they unravel secrets as they strive to stop the cycle. Liv’s ability to find love, and protect her loved ones, hangs on the fickle whims of the dead—and they’ve got nothing to lose.

Look Halloween in the Eye and Laugh?

If you prefer to keep the humor in Halloween and find the fun in all things magical, check out my book, Grandma Must Die.

Carman has worn out more towns and last names than impractical shoes protecting the secret of her magic blood. But when a friend goes missing, and another is infected with a deadly spell, Carman must choose. Expose her magic blood by curing the spell—or stop the infection from spreading by killing the source…the grandmother.

Magic bounty hunter Dylan has scoured libraries of banned magic paraphernalia seeking a method to distinguish genuine witches from impersonators. He suspects unorthodox librarian Carman might hold this information tighter than the hair he’s dying to unleash from her bun. With a past as hidden as his sleeve of tattoos, Dylan discovers he’s been used to gain Carman’s trust and their passion risks more than mixing mortals and magic.

Win Some Treats of Your Own?

The authors at Here Be Magic looooove sharing treats this time of the year—and we want to help you fill your list of movies to binge watch this month, or avoid if you don't like to be scared. Check out our weekly Friday posts about Scary Movies this month (and enter to win some treats!)

Here's what you've missed so far this month:

• Part One appeared here on Friday, Oct 4: "SCARY MOVIES 1 - THE ONES THAT TERRIFIED US AS KIDS!" - When you're little, a movie doesn't have to be from the horror genre to scare the bejeebers out of you! 

• Part Two came out here on Friday, Oct. 11: "SCARY MOVIES 2 - THE ONES WE LOVE TO WATCH AGAIN + AGAIN" - Are there certain movies you simply MUST watch every Halloween?  Or any time?

Be sure to stop back Friday for the next Scary Movie installment this month.

Hungry for More Spook-tacular Reads?

Visit My Author Page or Website for some more stories perfect for the Halloween Season.

Want to talk about everything Halloween?

Put the word “Halloween” in the search field on this blog and you’ll find everything and anything Halloween! What can we say? When you write fantasy and paranormal, you usually geek out a little this time of the year with all things Halloween.

So Tell Me, How Do You Halloween?

Author Bio: Maureen Bonatch grew up in small town Pennsylvania and her love of the four seasons—hockey, biking, sweat pants and hibernation—keeps her there. While immersed in writing or reading paranormal romance and fantasy, she survives on caffeine, wine, music, and laughter. A feisty Shih Tzu keeps her in line. Find Maureen on her website, Facebook & Twitter

Be the first to know about Maureen’s book sales and new releases by following her on BookBub, Amazon and/or signing up for her newsletter