I’m a great lover of 80s horror, so when a friend of mine, C.T. Phipps, shot me through an advance copy of his latest novel Psycho Killers in Love I was delighted to give it a read (you can check out my review here). The story pays homage to some of the great slasher flicks of the era, particularly Friday the 13th, Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street, Child’s Play and Candyman. But it got me thinking about some of my lesser known favourites from the decade, so I put together a list of eight eighties gems lovers of those same films will enjoy!

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The following is a standalone story but operates as a prequel to characters and events seen in Kill Switch and Kill Switch: Serial Escalation, available on Amazon in eBook and paperback form.

“Run, rabbit, run rabbit! Run! Run! Run!”

Sweat drips into eye. Hot. Baking in the cave like an oven. Fire crackles orange and fills it with smoke. Man across the fire. Singing.

“Run, rabbit! Run, rabbit, run, run! Run!”

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“We have some countries that are very near collapse… Let’s see if we can prevent that by doing the right thing now. We really can’t wait til 2020.”

Sick of talking about Trump, we gave ourselves a week off to travel south of the border and talk about issues plaguing Central and South America. Record numbers at the US-Mexico Border and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrado. The latest on the Venezuelan Crisis and sanctions on Cuba, Brazil’s rightward turn under Jair Bolsonaro and fears for the Amazon, Argentina’s money troubles, Bolivia, and recovery for Puerto Rico.

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The seven of them had gotten three rooms for the night. Oliver and Hunter were sharing one room and the three girls were in another, with the Australians sharing the third. Mia had the keys for their room. It occurred to her she couldn’t remember the last time she’d gotten actual keys and not a plastic card in a hotel. She tried to smile at the thought but instead shuddered at the memory of when the hotel worker had handed her the key and there had been a wet, malarial warmth to his skin. Continue reading →

The following is a standalone story but operates as a prequel to characters and events seen in Kill Switch: Serial Escalation, available on Amazon in eBook and paperback form.

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Titama liked the time after Neo Francisco’s frequent rain showers. Neon gleamed off wet asphalt. Grime was washed off of buildings, trash hosed off sidewalks and into gutters, down drains, making everything look clean. Standing under a red and yellow awning, she avoided the last of the drizzle. Continue reading →

I bought this paperback from a secondhand bookstore that also sells knives, swords, and synthetic cannabis. Actually it’s more of a knives, swords, and synthetic cannabis store that also sells books as the books part is new. Inside books are piled all over the shelves and floors in complete disarray except for a few authors, Clive Cussler, Stephen King, Matthew Reilly, who have their own dedicated sections. The Vang: The Military Form by Christopher Rowley was $1 from a stolen shopping cart parked in front of the store. Continue reading →

The following is an excerpt from the Prologue of ‘Kill Switch: Serial Escalation’, you can find the full novel on Amazon in eBook and paperback form.

The roar of the crowd filled the cavernous space. It drowned out the grunts of effort from the two competitors and the wet snarls below them. Camera drones circled, capturing every drop of sweat, every strained muscle, and every line of effort on the two men’s faces. Two raised platforms were suspended high above the arena, just barely within striking distance of one another. The round arena floor was dotted with outcroppings of upwardly jagged fake rocks. Baying and snarling, a pack of genetically altered attack dogs circled the raised supports of the two platforms in anticipation of their dinner. The crowd was pushed in tight around the arena cage. The rusty iron stench of blood, sweat and animal stink filled the room.

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The following is a standalone story but operates as a prequel to characters and events seen in Kill Switch, available on Amazon in eBook and paperback form.

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“We’ve got a heat signature in the master bedroom, upper floor, right corner,” the command truck said. “Could be Dawson.”

“Is it Dawson, or is it just a heat signature?” SWAT captain Charlemagne Lewis asked.

“Sorry, heat signature is all we’ve got. Walls are too thick for a better read than that and the windows are shielded.”

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They didn’t come to us from the stars with city-destroying lasers or waves of mechanised infantry and walking tanks, or even false promises of peace hiding villainous agendas. They didn’t need to. When the first of their vast machines descended on the Earth there was nothing we could do to stop it. Continue reading →

The following is an excerpt from Chapter Eight of the zombie novel ‘Wave of Mutilation’, you can find the full novel on Amazon in eBook and paperback form.

Early the next morning, the second day since the rise of the undead, the airspace over Manhattan was abuzz with activity. Military, law enforcement and civilian aircraft were suspended in the air or darting like flies over the corpse of the great city. Pilots did what they could to help but there was so much chaos to try and contain, and nowhere truly safe to take survivors. A small NYPD helicopter sprinted over the Upper East Side, above 5th Avenue as it ran alongside Central Park. On board were six people, rookie officer Maxine Schreiber, two other uniformed cops, the pilot and co-pilot and a SWAT sharpshooter. Maxine knelt by one of the open cockpit doors while the sharpshooter, a swarthy man named Reynolds, was ready for action at the other side with his huge SIG Sauer sniper rifle. Below, 5th Avenue and the numbered streets branching off it teemed with violence and swarming masses of the living dead. Even worse than the streets were the hundreds of people taking refuge on rooftops throughout the Upper East Side. They waved their arms, jumped up and down or used makeshift signs, anything to try and flag down the passing police helicopter. These people were hanging on by a thread, but there was no one available to save all of them by this point. Maxine’s chopper was tasked with rescuing some doctor VIPs from further uptown instead. Continue reading →