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Number of pages: 193 Word Count: 36,600
Cover Artist: BookDesign
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Welcome to the Wicked Harvest: Michigan Monsters and Macabre spooky short stories books.
Inside you will read 10 chilling haunts of encounters with terrifying creatures, cursed fountains, the undead, an abandoned asylum and other creepy and frightening things.
All stories take place in and around Michigan cities and towns and transpire during the delightful season of fall and the greatest holiday of Halloween.
These startling tales are fictional stories of course…or are they?
Hello everyone, my name is
Jerrod S. Smelker, I am the author of the recently published book
Wicked Harvest: Michigan Monsters & Macabre, Series One. The book
is a collection of 10 short stories about Michigan towns dealing with
hauntings, creatures, ghosts, monsters, mysteries and the macabre.
All stories transpire around the best season of Fall and the holiday
of Halloween...and they are, of course, fictional…or are they??
Fall has always been my
favorite season and Halloween has always been my favorite holiday. I
have enjoyed celebrating Halloween since I was a toddler. I love and
appreciate the folklore behind it, the traditions, the fun, movies,
creatures and costumes…and of course, the candy! I’ve always
admired and respected the classic tales of Dracula, Frankenstein and
the myths and legends told by friends and family…especially real
life ghost stories.
Now,
I’ll be honest, I was never a big fan of horror books or movies
when I was younger or even as a young adult. As I said, I like the
classic tales and the stories, but the whole blood and guts gory
psycho killer thing was never my bag. It wasn’t until my mid 40’s
when I started watching the movies and reading the books. I’ve
always enjoyed the family oriented movies and shows like Hocus Pocus,
It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown, Young Frankenstein, and Hotel
Transylvania, but now I also like the more horror scare-fest one’s
like Trick’r’Treat, Tales of Halloween, Jeepers Creepers, and so
on.
When I started writing, I
never envisioned myself as a horror or scary story writer, and then I
decided to write one the fall of 2017. Stone Hollow (originally
titled "Welcome to the neighborhood") was my first spooky
story and it was the catalyst to creating these Wicked Harvest books.
When I think about the story I feel good about how I used my
neighborhood and town as part of the story. That part was also the
catalyst with using Michigan towns and cities for every story
setting. I love Michigan and loved the idea of mentioning the towns
in my writing.
I remember talking about
spooky stories with my wife and daughter that fall and my daughter
said something like, “Well Dad, why don’t you just write one.”
It wasn’t too long after that conversation I was on our porch one
night and I could hear the train go through in back of the
subdivision and within a few seconds the story just ‘popped’ into
my head. I grabbed a notepad and began writing as fast as I could.
The next day I was on my laptop and within an hour I had the entire
story done.
Once I finished Stone
Hollow I got hooked and couldn’t stop writing spooky stories. Ideas
came into my head at times faster than I could write them down.
Within a week I had about 20 story ideas and thought I could submit a
few to other book anthologies and then put the others into my own
book. I had to go through each one and narrow it down from there.
My
hope is that others read them and enjoy them as much as I do.
Jerrod S. Smelker
About the Author:
Jerrod S. Smelker is the owner/operator/writer for Last Leaf Publishing, Our Michigan Travels and Wicked Harvest MI. Author of “Vigilant in Today’s World” series of crime prevention books, “Wicked Harvest: Michigan Monsters & Macabre” series of spooky short stories and books and numerous other short stories. He is a proud member of the Great Lakes Association of Horror Writers. He grew up in Ionia, a quaint small town smack dab in the middle of Michigan between Grand Rapids and the state’s capital, Lansing. He enjoys history, writing, reading, fine cigars and pipes, craft beers and hard ciders, coffee, and Michigan road trips. He currently lives in Grand Blanc Michigan with his wife, kids and cats.