DEMONS, GHOULS, AND BLURBS, OH MY!
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DEMONS, GHOULS, AND BLURBS, OH MY!
The Ghoulish Times | 07/29/23
Hello and welcome to the latest issue of The Ghoulish Times. My name is Max Booth III and this is my spooky newsletter. Lots of stuff to get into today, so let’s do it.
First, let’s tackle some upcoming bookstore events!
If you’re unaware, my wife and I operate an indie horror bookstore in the Greater San Antonio Area called Ghoulish Books (same name as our small press). Our address is 9330 Corporate Drive, Suite #702, Selma, TX 78154.
Here is what we have planned for the next month or so:
UPCOMING GHOULISH EVENTS
Saturday, July 29th (that’s today!!!): Saturday Night Spookies! Our horror movie screening returns, and this time we’ve decided to make the event absolutely free. Pre-show begins at 7:30pm, followed by showtime at 8:00pm. Event page here.
Every Thursday in August: Writing Club! Our writing club returns every Thursday night at the bookstore at 7pm. For the first hour or so, you can simply write in silence with everybody else, and if you’re workshopping anything specifically, after the first hour you’ll be given the chance to read it aloud for critique. Event page here.
Saturday, August 5th: The bookstore will still be open and operating as normal with Lori in charge, but I will be up in Austin all day doing various panels, readings, and signings for ArmadilloCon. More details here.
August 11-13: KillerCon! This is not a bookstore event, but a convention in Austin that will take place throughout the weekend. Ghoulish Books will have a vendor table and Lori and I will both be participating in various events. The bookstore will be closed on the 11th and 13th but open on Saturday the 12th. Learn more about KillerCon here.
Tuesday, August 15th: Free Horror Writing Workshop (7pm). Come to Ghoulish Books for a free horror writing class taught by Max Booth III (that’s me). Event page here.
August 19-20: Monsters & Aliens Expo. popup event at the Wonderland of the Americas shopping mall. We will have a vendor table at this event the entire weekend. The bookshop will remain open on Saturday. Event page here.
Friday, August 25h: Book Club Discussion. We will meetup to discuss the August bookclub pick: Victor LaValle’s The Changeling. Note: I have ordered several copies to restock at the bookstore. They have not arrived yet, but I’m hoping they get here soon. Otherwise, you can purchase copies through our affiliate Bookshop.org page or an audiobook through our affiliate Libro.fm page. Event page here.
Saturday, August 26th: We will do both a free horror movie screening and host a launch party for Lucas Mangum’s new wrestling horror novel. Stay tuned for more details in a future newsletter, but save the date!!!
Tuesday, August 29th: August’s episode of The Ghoulish Show, a live variety comedy show I host at Radio Coffee & Beer in Austin, TX. Show begins at 8pm! Please come and support it. Also, if you’re local and wish to READ SOMETHING during this event, please let me know sooner than later…
THE ONLY SAFE PLACE LEFT IS THE DARK
The next book to be published by Ghoulish will come out at the end of August, and we are stoked to share more about it. Are you ready for Warren Wagner’s The Only Safe Place Left is the Dark? You very well better start preparing yourself. Check out what Eric LaRocca had to say about it:
Pre-order The Only Safe Place Left is the Dark HERE. All paperback orders through the site will come with a signature sticker, too. Speaking of…
LET THE WOODS KEEP OUR BODIES
I must also mention another book coming out later this year from Ghoulish Books: E. M. Roy’s Let the Woods Keep Our Bodies. Why am I bringing this up? Because look at the picture she posted on Twitter last night:
What is she signing, you might wonder? Great question, we’ll tell you! She is signing a cartoonishly large mountain of signature stickers for Let the Woods Keep Our Bodies.
All pre-orders for this book through our webstore will receive one of these stickers (the same goes for all of the books we have available to pre-order, including Rainbow Filth and Saint Grit, too). Please don’t make all of her laborious signing go to waste! Pre-order LTWKOB here.
A HAUNTING IN TEXAS
Earlier this week, I was working at the bookstore when my wife, Lori, texted me asking what we should have for lunch. She was on her way back from running some errands, so she thought she’d just pick something up for both of us to eat at the shop while watching the day’s pirated copy of Jeopardy!. I responded to her question with a question of my own: what are you in the mood for? I then gave her four options, but neglected to utilize punctuation, so my next text came out verbatim: AMERICAN MEXICAN CHICKEN SANDWICH
We then shared a good laugh over fantasizing that my text had suggested a single item, the mythologized forbidden American Mexican chicken sandwich. What could that be, exactly? Oh, god, if only we could taste it!
Anyway, we decided on club sandwiches from a local diner. But, as Lori waited at an intersection, she happened to glance over at Bill Miller (a barbecue & fried chicken restaurant chain), and noticed their rotating sign advertising…well, why don’t you take a look for yourself?
In case you can’t read the sign, it says RANCH CHIPOTLE CHICKEN SAND[WICH]
Holy shit, I thought, am I a prophet? What in the name of Final Destination did we just stumble upon?
Then, after a moment of clapping myself on the back, I happened to notice something else in the photo. Something far more serious.
Do you see it?
Take a closer look.
Here, let me help you:
What…what is this…? What—
Oh holy fucking shit is that a demon?
GHOULISH PODCAST RETURNS
I’ve returned to podcast, much to everybody’s disappointment. A new episode of the GHOULISH podcast dropped earlier this week, featuring special guests Nadia Bulkin and Julia Rios for a conversation about haunted houses and their new Cursed Morsels anthology Why Didn’t You Just Leave.
The anthology, which also includes my short story “AITA for setting my dad’s trailer on fire?”, just reached their funding goal via Kickstarter this very morning. The campaign is still active for a couple days and I encourage everybody to go continue supporting it. It’s going to be a really fun book! View the kickstarter HERE and listen to the podcast episode HERE.
To help promote the book, I was also invited to contribute a guest post for Sarah Gailey’s excellent newsletter, which you can read HERE.
Additionally, I returned as a guest on my friend Miguel’s podcast My Horror Confessional, for a fun conversation about the British slasher Peeping Tom. Within 12 minutes of the podcast, I accidentally cut my thumb open with a pocketknife I was fucking around with, and instead of getting up to clean the wound I thought it would be funnier to just…bleed throughout the episode. I was correct. It was so much funnier to do this. You can watch the video version on his Patreon HERE or you can listen to the regular audio anywhere you get podcasts.
THE GHOULISH SHOW
June’s episode of The Ghoulish Show is now live on YouTube. Featuring Andrew Hilbert, John Baltisberger, Ryan C. Bradley, Michael Louis Dixon, Lori Michelle Booth, Miguel Myers (as Death), and myself. Check it out:
Okay, that’s it for now. You can support us on Patreon, browse the books in our webstore, and follow us on Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, TikTok, and Twitter (PMMP | Ghoulish Tales | Ghoulish podcast | Ghoulish Books | personal).
My new book, Abnormal Statistics, is out now through Apocalypse Party.
Or just click on our LINKTREE for all relevant links.
You can also join us on the Ghoulish Discord.
See you next time, ghouls.