Books by Eric Douglas

Thriller fiction and Non-fiction

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Advent Ghosts 2014 for the Winter Fire

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The first of my submissions to the 2014 Advent Ghosts collection comes from a true event in history. On Christmas Eve 1914, on a World War I battlefield, soldiers on both sides declared their own armistice and celebrated Christmas together before returning to the fight two days later.

Both of these stories were inspired by stories in the December 2014 issue of National Geographic Magazine.

The Advent Ghosts project is Loren Eaton’s I Saw Lightning Fall effort to keep the tradition of telling holiday ghost stories around Christmas and the Winter Solstice alive. Read more here. Read past year’s contributions here.

A glass of wine

The two men met in a field. They were wary at first, sitting on a burned out tank, but were finally able to relax.

“Merry Christmas, Henrik.”

“Merry Christmas, Dale. It is good to meet you.”

Dale brought out a bottle of wine taken from a French farmer.

“You probably killed my buddy.”

“And you probably killed my colonel. That is war.”

“At least I won’t have to worry about facing you when Christmas is over.”

“Why is that, Dale?”

“I poisoned the wine.”

“But we agreed we would stop fighting for Christmas.”

“I don’t celebrate Christmas. I’m an atheist.”

Parasite

“I recently read an article that said some parasites change the brains of their hosts when it’s time for the parasite to move on. The host does crazy things without even realizing it. Don’t you think that’s fascinating? The parasite doesn’t care about the original host, just its own survival.”

“Sort of creepy. But what does that have to do with us?”

“Oh, nothing I guess. It doesn’t matter. I just wanted to give you this gift…it is Christmas you know.”

“Wow, this is impressive. Thank you. But, wait, can you afford to give this?”

“I can’t afford not to.”.

Season brings out the ghost stories!

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This time of year people only have one thing on their minds. Everyone is wishing you seasons greetings and the radio stations all play scary ghost stories.

Wait, what?

Have you ever wondered why one of the classic Christmas stories is actually a ghost story? I’m talking, of course, about Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Dickens’ story is credited by some with saving Christmas. During the 17th Century Industrial Revolution in England, Oliver Cromwell, a Puritan, banned celebrating Christmas because the bible doesn’t explicitly tell Christians to celebrate Christmas. A Christmas Carol reminded people of many ancient traditions and sparked a renewed interest in the celebration. And fortunately, Cromwell’s reign in England only last five years.

Or what about the line in the Andy Williams song It’s The Most Wonderful Time of the Year that goes “There’ll be scary ghost stories and tales of the glories of Christmases long, long ago”?

An English tradition for hundreds of years was telling stories in front of the winter fire. They did this especially around the Winter Solstice which falls a few days before Christmas. I’ve said for years the winter solstice is my least favorite day of the year. It has the shortest amount of daylight and the longest night. Imagine what it was like for someone 500 years ago, wondering if this was the year the night finally won over the day and the days kept getting shorter and shorter until it was night 24 hours a day. No wonder they huddled around the fire for warmth and no wonder the only stories they could think to tell had ghosts in them.

Recently, a writer colleague started something, though, that has made me start liking the day a bit more. While Dickens might have saved Christmas with A Christmas Carol, the tradition of telling scary stories had just about died out, otherwise. Loren Eaton has the I Saw Lightning Fall website and for the last several years he has hosted a writing project for writers to write ghost stories and share them online. He calls it Advent Ghosts. The trick is that the stories are flash fiction… 100 words, no more, no less. Obviously, that is a writing challenge, but it is interesting just how much of a story you can tell with 100 words. It is just as important what you leave unsaid as what you say.

For the last couple years I’ve contributed to the project and I will have two more 100 word stories this year. They will all go online on Dec. 19 if you want to read some of them. You can find the link from my website.

Until then, don’t let winter creep you out…too much..

New dive adventure collection, special price

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Withrow Key coverJust in time for winter weather, I’ve released a special collection of Withrow Key dive adventure short stories on both Kindle and in softcover. And right now, you can get the Kindle version for half what it will be next week — $1.99

Get Tales from Withrow Key now!

The following is the introduction from the book, to explain everything.

Over the years, many of my readers have said my books read like a television show or a movie and that they can “see” my stories as they read them. That got me thinking about what it would be like to actually create a television show. And that was where Withrow Key came from.

I toyed with setting a story in the islands somewhere, but for logistics and quirk, it made more sense to go to the Florida Keys. The first story in this series, Going Down With the Ship, was originally published as a serial on ScubaRadio.com by my good friend Greg Holt. We had fun promoting the story each week on his syndicated radio show. A few of the later stories were originally published on ScubaDiving.com, the home of Scuba Diving Magazine, where I’ve been a regular contributor for several years.

The Withrow Key characters have evolved and changed over the years. The one constant has been Jackson Pauley, a New York City firefighter who left the city after 9/11 to find some peace. Instead, he found plenty of adventure, but wouldn’t have it any other way. In Queen Conch, I decided to write a crossover story and Mike Scott, the main character from my novels, came to visit.

Life under water cover webThe last story in this collection, Life Under the Sea, is also available as a standalone ebook, but it is brand new. It definitely won’t be the last story, however.

With these eight short stories, we have the scripts for the first episodes of a Withrow Key television series. Now I just have to find a producer…

 

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Halloween: Let me hear you SCREAM!

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IMG_1940
The swing ride at Lake Shawnee where a child died in an accident.

A week or so ago, I went to the Lake Shawnee Haunted Amusement Park just north of Princeton, West Virginia with my wife and stepdaughter. Lake Shawnee is a real abandoned amusement park where at least two children died in accidents and where the children of the first white settlers in Mercer County were scalped by Shawnee Indians. There is also an Indian burial mound nearby.

For October, the owners have set up the “Lake Shawnee Dark Carnival”. It is a quick tour of the facility combined with actors guiding you around and trying to creep you out. It was a fun evening, if not exactly what we expected. Afterwards, one of the staff told us that the rest of the year they offer tours where you can hang out and get a feel for the “supernatural” of the place. (If you’re interested in this, follow their Facebook page for more information.)

For various reasons, I’ve been to Mexico, Central and South America more than a dozen times over the last 10 years or so. Many of those cultures celebrate the Day of the Dead (Dia de Muertos). It’s actually a three day observance of Allhallowtide. That includes All Hallow’s Eve (Halloween) Hallowmas and All Soul’s Day. In general deceased children and infants are remembered on Nov. 1 and adults on Nov. 2. While they use skeletons dressed in clothing to represent that holiday, it doesn’t seem to be as much about the “things that go bump in the night” or that scare us. It is a time of remembrance and communicating with the dearly departed. They offer gifts of flowers and food.

That difference got me thinking about why some of us like to be scared. A couple different articles I read talked about the adrenaline rush that comes from it. Your heart beats faster, you feel stronger and more alive. Getting scared allows us to experience the forbidden without getting in trouble for doing it. If you’re reading a scary book, you know you can always close it. If you’re watching a scary movie, you know it will end.

I normally leave writing horror stuff to my colleagues, although for the last couple Halloweens I have written a ‘scary’ story to stretch my boundaries a little bit. Last year, I coerced some writer friends to contribute to a Halloween collection. Everyone wrote short stories and I posted links. We are doing it again this year.

And remember, it can’t be as scary as what you read about the upcoming election…

Here is what we did last year.

And here are the 2014 contributions (check back later for more stories):

Mark Slade

Elizabeth Gaucher

Virginia Moreland

Loren Eaton

Eric Douglas

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