Before there was Manic-Expression.com, there was Manic Expression: A Collection. This three volume collection of short stories was published in 2008, before I had ever written a single blog or thought about running a website. The books didn’t do well. The publisher turned out to be incompetent when it came to advertising and marketing (the one television interview I did to promote the books was one I booked myself). Couple that with them charging upwards of $40 per book and you’ve got a recipe for disaster. Fortunately for me, I held on to the copyright for the book.
Now, nearly seven years after the books publication, I’m pleased to announce that it’ll be getting a new life as an e-book, available here in our Manic Expression store. All three volumes have been collected into one and sold for the much more reasonable price of $4.99. The book features a new cover by Taylor Wyatt, character designs, and two news stories – adaptations of the Podcast Plays Vows and Another Time.
Not only are all three volumes of Manic Expression collected into one book, but the now 36 stories have been re-arranged into six categories. To give you some idea of what you’d be buying, I’ll be posting these plot summary blogs of each section. This is Book II of the new collection, entitled Ghosts.
Nothing
This short story follows a boy named Timothy through his childhood and into adulthood as he struggles with depression, blaming it all on a phantom he once saw.
Unbound
This horror story follows a successful comic book creator named Victor Silverberg who finds himself hunted by the same SS officer his grandmother escaped from during World War II. This masked, undead monster will not stop until he has butchered the descendants of a concentration camp revolt.
Requiem
Michelle Crews is a drug addled writer living a hedonistic lifestyle. She strikes up a sexual relationship with bestselling horror writer Patrick Barron, and finds for the first time a kindred spirit. However, menacing dreams and the mystery of Patrick’s missing old flames threaten to break the two apart.
Spoiled Meat
Wayne, a greedy executive forced into marrying his bosses pregnant daughter, murders his new bride while the two are camping in the California wilderness. When his stomach starts rumbling he stumbles upon an inventive way of disposing of the body.
Jupiter Sacrifice
Before he became a shape shifting murderer in Lapdog Destiny, Charlie Edwards was a confused teenager locked in a mental hospital after a failed suicide attempt. When he is visited by an alien one night who speaks of prophecy, Charlie dares to hope that there just might be a meaning to his life after all.
Days’ End
In this sequel to Bloodshot, set five years later, Will and Megan are on the verge of making all their dreams come true. But when tragedy strikes their family those old familiar phantoms from their past come back, this time with far more sinister goals in mind.
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