Shane and I are excited to announce we’ve teamed up with Mark Matthews of Wicked Run Press to give away a few copies of Lullabies for Suffering! One lucky winner will receive a paperback AND digital copy of Lullabies for Suffering and five people will win a digital copy. For more details, check out the message from Mark below!

I’m thrilled to announce that Lullabies for Suffering: Tales of Addiction Horror, is now available in all formats: Paperback, Kindle, and Audiobook.

Check out the link here: Lullabies for Suffering on Amazon

There’s also a Limited Edition Signed Hardcover. 

Check it out here: Limited Edition Signed Hardcover from Thunderstorm

Lullabies for Suffering is the follow up to Garden of Fiends, but certainly not a sequel. Lullaby has expanded the topic and the content is more cosmic.

What I love is that after reading each tale you will think: “This is the kind of story only this author could write.” Each writer left a bit of their essence on the page. Kepnes went full Kepnes, Taff went full Taff, Mercedes full Mercedes, you get the picture… 

I could have left the table of contents and bylines blank and readers would have figured out which writer wrote which piece. 

In fact: Here’s the deal.

I’ve dropped the opening sentence/paragraph of each story below but taken off the title and author. First person who sends an email correctly matching up the author to the opening passage of their story will receive both a paperback and a kindle version for FREE.

The next five who identify correctly, will receive a voucher to download the kindle version FREE from Amazon. Got it? Great! Have at it. 

Just send an email to WickedRunPress@gmail.com and match the author names (or letter) with the Numbers on the passages below. 

Here’s the list of authors last names:

A: Kealan Patrick Burke 

B: Mercedes M Yardley 

C: Caroline Kepnes 

D: John FD Taff 

E: Gabino Iglesias 

F: Mark Matthews

And here are the opening passages from each story:

1.

Being a parent and being a junkie are almost the same thing. Both pull at you with an undeniable strength that makes you feel like you’re at the mercy of something infinitely more powerful than you could ever imagine.

2.

You are a virgin. You are eighteen years old and you’ve never done anything remotely criminal. Yes, you ate too many Devil Dogs, you played alone, and you got fat. But you lost five pounds before starting college. You’ve been there for your mother. You’re there for her right now, in line with her at TJ Maxx. She likes to shop every time she comes home from rehab. You say you believe it when she says, “this time it sticks.” You aren’t lying to her. You aren’t faking it. Every time feels like the time that it will stick and this time is no different.

3.

I met Calvin on the Singing Bridge outside Rosewood Park on the night of December 24th. I’d gone there to kill myself, and though he never admitted it, so had he. It was there in his eyes, the same flat look of grim resignation I’m sure I carried in mine. Everyone goes there to die. It’s become a cliché, but such things don’t matter when the end of your life is concerned.

4.

It was Saturday morning and Kelly was mowing the lawn. The grass smelled good and his shirt was stuck to his scrawny body in a sweaty, happy way. He was tired. Good-work tired.

5.

“You’re afraid to go, aren’t you?” 

I grabbed the car keys off the wall hook as if this was proof she was wrong, but she wasn’t. 

6.

The knife, it’s a zipper, right? It lets me open up and share the things that are inside me. Things that I’m too embarrassed or repressed to share.

Yeah, that’s what I believed at first.

It lets me feel things that I am too numbed to feel.

Stupid now, huh? 

Once again, Email WickedRunPress@gmail.com, and just match up the author with the number of the passage you think they wrote, and if you are right and one of the first six, then BAMN! Gift in your email address.