It's SPRING in the Southern Hemisphere and I'm sad to see Winter leave us behind as I prefer colder weather to warmer. Still Spring promises to bring forth a lot of exciting new beginnings for both the world and for me! For our Northern Hemisphere Nightmares I'm jealous, because Fall is my favourite season of the year and I know I have to wait at least eight months before I get to see it again.
When I say that there are a lot of exciting new beginnings for me, I really do mean it. This month see's us preparing for the launch of Buried in October with lots of exciting competitions going around and the chance to win some fabulous prizes.
Buried is by far the best book I have written to date and I cannot wait to share it with the world on October 15th! For those of you who live in Johannesburg, there will be a super special pre-publish launch party happening that you are all welcome to attend!
That being said, have you pre-ordered your copy of the best book ever yet?
Home is where the heart is ... or the hatred.
You can feel the love and care someone puts into their home just by walking into it. Equally, you can feel the hatred and malice when you step into a home where dark deeds have been done.
Alex and his team of so-called paranormal investigators are given the opportunity of a lifetime when they are able to film inside one of the most haunted, and cursed, locations in their area.
The Jackson Mansion.
The thing that makes this mansion truly unique is that it is built completely underground. Determined to uncover the dark secrets of the mansion's past, and prove himself a notable investigator, Alex doesn't care what it takes. The mansion, however, has other ideas, as well as some rather restless occupants.
You can get it from a variety of stores, just select which one you prefer at www.sianbclaven.com/buried
BUT WAIT! THERE IS MORE!
If you pre-order Buried now you could be eligible to enter one of these amazing competitions!
Amazon Bundle Give Away US
Want to stand a chance to win some cool horror related products? US Residents only!!! Enter now!
Amazon Bundle Giveaway UK
Want to stand a chance to win some cool horror related products? UK Residents only!!! Enter now!
Kindle Fire Give Away
Need a new Kindle Fire 7 7” tablet? Win one today! Open to UK, US and SA residents. Enter now!
If you don't qualify for the above competitions you can still stand a chance to enter the one below!
$20 Amazon Gift Card
Looking for some book money to buy your next great read? Stand a chance to win a $20 Amazon Gift Card! Open Internationally.
FEATURED AUTHOR - JO MACGREGOR
Living on the edge can be murder.
Garnet McGee returns to her small Vermont hometown, all set to finish her master’s thesis in psychology, and convinced that the paranormal experiences of recent months are now behind her. Then she stumbles across a body in the strangest of places, and starts getting unsettling visions of the woman’s life and death.
Local police assume it was suicide, but Garnet is sure it was murder.
Egged on by her eccentric mother, Garnet starts investigating. Police Chief Ryan Jackson is intrigued by the “readings” she gets about the case, but others are determined to stop her amateur sleuthing. Meanwhile some inexplicably strange things are happening at home.
Garnet is determined to find out who killed the beautiful woman loved by so many, but that will mean taking the leap into trusting not only others, but also her own growing psychic abilities. Yet every vision puts her in greater danger. As she gets close to discovering the truth, Garnet realizes that the killer will do whatever it takes to keep the truth hidden.
Even if that means killing again.
Gripping and unpredictable, The First Time I Fell is a suspenseful and haunting murder mystery with a psychic twist.
Great reading for fans of Paula Hawkins, Gillian Flynn, Ruth Ware and Liane Moriarty.
This is the second book in the Garnet McGee series that started with The First Time I Died, but can be read as a standalone novel.
So this month is all about Buried because it is the best book I have written (I think I've only mentioned this a million times since I finished writing it).
However, there is more than just that happening. I have Comic-Con Africa happening in September and cannot wait to see my Johannesburg fans there! I'm on a panel for Comic-Con on Saturday and am so excited because it's the first one I am doing!
Aside from that, September also see's the pre-publish special launch party for Buried where I will have Limited Edition numbered and signed copies of the book available!
Consider this your personal invite!
Not in the country? I am going to livestream the launch from my Facebook group! So don't forget to join Nightmares & Spacehikers or you'll miss out!
FEATURED AUTHOR - KATHERINE GILBERT
A cursed ring. A forgotten grave. A magical enemy. Can Annabella escape her family's fate?
Annabella has done her best to put behind her all memories of her childhood being raised as an unwanted ward in the gothic family mansion. As the secretary to the flamboyant Errol, Duke of Winchester, she's seen the world and avoided her family's clutches.
But now she must return to that elegantly-decayed, antebellum house on the historic Battery in Charleston, South Carolina, where the "moonlight and magnolias" atmosphere hides some deadly family secrets. Returning for the wake of her aged relative, Henrietta, who hasn't left her South of Broad showplace for decades, Annabella walks into the chilly embrace of her Cousin Beatrix and the woman's much-too-attractive new assistant, Armand, whose words of encouragement and warning keep arriving inexplicably in her mind.
In just a few hours, the house reclaims her. She finds herself waking up in her deceased relative's bed and clothes, Henrietta's ring on an unremovable chain around her neck. And, even as she begins to realize that magic is real and her friends and Armand hope to save her with it, it's starting to look as though the terrifying mansion and its demonic secrets may never let her leave.
Katherine Gilbert, author of the quirky urban fantasies Protecting the Dead and Unearthly Remains, shows a more serious side in this chilling Southern Gothic tale (but not without a bit of quirk!). On a Gilbert wackiness scale of 1-to-10 sarcastic talking cats*, this one is about a 3.
*Warning: Not all stories contain talking cats. Wackiness may take other forms.
Get it Here -> https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07W5XRJ87/?fbclid=IwAR1Oe5O5eSLtZ-Exu5K7DC3fgml0jd3wiEYoSXfJGMb9rt6EdOzPzUZgkkU
As excited as I am that Buried is so amazing, I also cannot forget that before Buried I wrote an ALMOST as good book called Belladonna that is being released on the 15th September! Please feel free to go pre-order and enjoy this spooky tale about Mermaids with a taste for blood.
Meeting Eleanor changes Patrick Knowle's life as he knows it.
His only passion has been the ocean right up until meeting the enchanting heiress to a fortune almost as big as his own. Life simply couldn’t get better until Patrick starts seeing the pale woman in the water.
Mysteriously, people in their coastal town start to drown in the most bizarre ways.
After being attacked himself, Patrick goes on a quest to unearth the mermaids' secret, and ultimately face the consequences of his own ignorant actions.
For Kindle get it here ->https://amzn.to/2OITuAw
For other stores get it here -> https://books2read.com/u/4ExxME
This months writing advice:
Every now and then I'd like to include some writing advice for those fans of mine that are starting out as authors or at least considering it.
This months advice is to start this journey with patience. You cannot build a fan base overnight, in fact that so rarely happens. It takes a lot of dedication and patience and work harder than you have ever known. In fact, I can honestly say that the first two years of being an author I was lucky I had any sales at all considering the amount of work I put in then versus the amount of work I put it now.
But the trick is to persevere. Even when you really don't want to and everything is telling you to quit, push through because it gets so much better.
With that being said I'm going to say ado for now! I have lots of prep to do for the launch, for a book that's being released in November and of course for Comic-Con!
For those of you who are interested I am closing off with an excerpt from Buried followed by some awesome giveaways you must look out for this month!
Always lock your doors!
Sian B. Claven
EXCERPT FROM BURIED CHAPTER 9
1892
Wallace Jackson had just inherited a mansion back in his family’s hometown and he was curious about it, specifically about its morbid history. There was a rumor circulating that the Jackson Mansion was cursed and that in each generation a Jackson family member was doomed to be a killer.
Wallace didn’t hold with such nonsense. He was a firm believer in science and fact, and there was no such thing as curses. Still, he travelled to the mansion and was delighted when he discovered it was built underground. He found a bedroom and made it his own, directing the servants on where to pack his goods before he went to explore the mansion. It would make an excellent place to conduct his experiments.
He lived at the mansion alone, preferring to be left in peace to work, while his family remained in Jackson where his children went to school. His wife had not been saddened by his departure; he was rarely home anyway and she knew how important his work was.
He turned one of the rooms into a laboratory of sorts and spent countless days working there. His meals were served there, his tea was served there, and eventually he moved his bed in there so that he wouldn’t waste any of his time at all. It was a dream come true for Wallace Jackson, and one he intended to continue to live until his last breath.
There was, however, a nagging feeling. Something in the pit of his stomach that made him question whether or not the mansion was complete. A little voice kept gnawing at him, telling him he had to expand the mansion, grow its reach.
So he called contractors in, told them what he wanted and set them to work. It would fall into his daily ritual. Eat, Work, Eat, Work, check on the progress of the building, Eat, Work and rest. Every day was the same as the one before and would be the same as the one that ensued.
Unfortunately, though, the construction quickly burned through his savings and he had to find alternative ways to make money. He knew there was a need for women to have abortions safely and without judgment and without the law interfering. He mentioned it to his servants and they brought forth the first girl desperate to have an abortion. She paid the price for it and Wallace executed the abortion skillfully, putting the tiny baby body into a jar. It was little more than a head, but he wanted to study it anyway, so these abortions would not be a complete waste.
There was an endless supply of women who needed his help and many came from the bigger cities under the guise that they were on a Christian retreat, or on holiday with friends, just to enlist his services. His plan worked perfectly; he was able to support his family in Jackson, his renovations of the mansion and his scientific studies. Senators brought mistresses, mayors brought daughters, and everyone in between came from miles around to use his abortion services.
Soon he had a fair collection of babies in jars that lined his laboratory and it got him to thinking about them. He wanted to dissect and study them.
He started with the earlier and smaller ones he preserved. He cut them open, examined what had developed and what had not, and made notes on each one.
It wasn’t long before he heard the voices of his ancestors talking to him, guiding him, telling him how to renovate the mansion and what to use the dead babies for.
Soon he experimented with attaching different body parts to the aborted babies to try and bring them back to life. He tried attaching them to each other and pulsating them with electricity. He tried attaching them to various animal bodies. Soon he began to order foreign creatures from out of the country to experiment on. He brought in various kinds of cats, dogs, exotic birds, and then started to bring creatures of varying kinds.
THIS MONTHS AWESOME GIVEAWAYS AND SALES
Please note that some of these are only available later on in the month. Bookmark them so you don't miss them!
Please click on the image to view!
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