Wednesday, September 07, 2011

How I Came to Write This Story: Lance Zarimba


Why I Wrote This Story…”Fangs and All”.

While I was living in Sioux Falls, SD, before moving to Minneapolis, MN, I was always looking for writing contests to enter to help get my name noticed and gain a new story for my resume. I found a cliché vampire story contest, and they wanted the writer to make the reader groan. I couldn’t do that, but…


I grew up pretending to nap on the couch as I watched Dark Shadows and all the wonderful Universal Studios black and white horror movies, Creature Feature and The Ghoul. So this was a genre perfect for me.


I took the requirements literarily and used as many clichés as I could come up with in writing the story. I brought it to my writer’s group and my friend Thea Miller Ryan read the story to the group. She ended up hyperventilating upon reading it. She was laughing too hard and reading so fast, she couldn’t catch her breath. She even had to use her inhaler. Sorry Thea. At least, I can take someone’s breath away with my writing. Needless to say, I didn’t win.



I met Anne Frasier several times at Once Upon A Crime and have loved her mysteries and supernatural thrillers, along with her Theresa Weir romances, especially Amazon Lily. So I was excited to be asked to contribute a story to her Halloween book. I sent her “Fangs and All” and asked if this is what she was looking for, and she said yes. Thank you, Anne.



I feel so honored to be included in this anthology with such great authors as Anne Frasier, Pat Dennis, Marilyn Victor, Michael Allan Mallory, David Housewright, Leandra Logan, and Shirley Damsgaard, all who I’ve read and followed their work. I look forward to reading the rest of this great list of stories and meeting so many new authors. Happy reading and I hope you don’t hyperventilate when you read my story.



Lance Zarimba is the author of Vacation Therapy, Oh No, Our Best Friend is a Zombie, and Oh No, Our Best Friend is a Vampire, along with many short stories.

1 comment:

Charles Gramlich said...

Dark Shadows still makes me groan, but in a good way.