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| The Ritual - new cover |
FREE PDF of The Ritual Vol 1 can be found HERE.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/220586489/The-Ritual-Part-I
or on
WATTPAD
http://www.wattpad.com/47698742-the-ritual-vol-i
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Pulled from the shelves
The review above- which can be seen on Amazon - is from Mary Quallo, a voracious reader from the Mid West of America. She reads books like some people eat cornflakes. It's one of the best reviews I have ever had.
I really thought that this review would get the book started but nothing happened with it and in October last year, I pulled it from the bookshelves.
The reasons are explained here.
The Ritual Discussed - Plus Deleted Extract
But that review nagged at me.
I knew that the novel was too good to be shelved. I have shelved three books so far, and I may restructure another, but this one was just too interesting to forget forever.
Here is the original link. The one where I discuss The Ritual in context of the blockbuster horror novels of the seventies (Wheatley, King, Straub, Sharman and Herbert RIP). Also Hammer films, particularly The Devil Rides Out.
The Ritual - Extra
Resurrection
So, I broke the novel up into six parts, each approximately 20k words. I rewrote some of it, added a bit, took a bit away, and reedited it.
The Ritual is now a series.
Walpurgisnacht
The night the witches dance, one of the most significant nights in the Occult calendar.
The night The Ritual took place in the book in 2011. April 30th.
(Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...ghosties and ghoulies)
For those of you who cannot be bothered to read the links (I know, I know, its a busy world nowadays), here's a 100 word summary of The Ritual.
A beautiful mother and her reluctant, outlandish, relentlessly angry emo daughter from Dayton, Ohio, arrive in Wheatley Fields, a prosperous English Minster town. They have come to help a family member in a serious crisis.
Unbeknown to the two of them, they are being followed by acolytes of a mysterious pre-colonial Church who believe one of the women to be the reincarnation of their long dead spiritual leader. The Church take up residence in the town and set about creating the occult preconditions for the resurrection of their leader in a centuries old Ritual. And those preconditions are hellish.
One of the women is destined for the altar. A sacrificial altar.
And there seems to be nothing that either can do about it.
Well, that's about 100 words.
Like all of my work, it contains large portions of satire, liberally salted with social commentary. For those of you who have read Carla, or The Night Porter, you will recognise the hotel and some of the places mentioned there.
I also happen to think that I wrote a thriller (with some gory and naughty bits) rather than a horror novel. That's my take on it.
E-book only.
The Ritual is e-book only, only the second time this has happened.
I may reconsider this depending on sales and demand. Call it an experiment.
FREEBIE
Tonight, I am PDFing The Ritual Vol 1 (known as The Daughter of Satan).
It will be given away FREE. If anyone wants to add it to their blog, let me know.
I am uploading it to Scribd.
I am also uploading it to Wattpad.
If you know of anywhere else I can put it, let me know.
I am uploading it to Kindle too, but, as you all know, I will probably have to charge for that, so it will be the lowest I can get away with and I won't enrol that in KDP. It will be permanently free.
Well. Here goes...
The covers in this blog post are at a draft stage and may be different when published, (but not that different.)