HAPPY HALLOWEEN! And a most joyful #CoffinHop to you all!

First things first… I will announce the winner of Mondays comic-book creeper pack contest… tomorrow…

I will also announce the winner of the Super Secret Mega Awesome Monster pack (and it’s contents)… tomorrow. All I’m gonna say is that it will go to one random commenter who has also liked my FB page. So get commenting/liking. Also, I’ll award TWO more prizes of the DEATH BY DRIVE-IN Collectors EP!

Because today is for the childrens. The childrens in all of us. Go check out the special All Hallows Eve content around the #CoffinHop, including devilish ol’ ME, rambling on R.L. Treadway‘s site, and waxing maniacal about MMA mutants and The Cleve’ on Bloody Bookish!

Then enjoy this years Ariescope Halloween short, which has become a tradition here on AxelHowerton.com. I should warn you, these are not for the squeamish, nor the easily offended.

And while you’re at it, check out our favorite video of all fackin’ time, kid. All youse gotta do is watch that shit.

Fackin’.

Okay, okay. I know I said Friday for the last contest, but new shit has come to light, man.

First, I’m running the #CoffinHop , man. I gotta keep an eye on everybody else.

Then, I had a good time rambling on for R.L. Treadway about “Why Horror Isn’t Scary Anymore” which you can check out on her site tomorrow.

THEN… best part of the story… dream come true… I got an email from The Dudley Lama himself, asking if I could whip something up for possible inclusion in the upcoming LEBOWSKI 101 book, kind of a treatise on all things Lebowski. Being a devout Brother Shamus, as well as a long-standing member (and licensed priest) of the Church of the Latter Day Dude, I was left about as brainlessly overwhelmed as if I’d just downed a half dozen Caucasians. (Check out the pic there of me and The Miz and #1 son for Halloween 2008. I’m the Dude in the Dudely raiment.) Suffice it to say, I am now hard-at-work trying to research my article on the ties between Detective Fiction through the ages, and His Dudeness, Jeffrey “The Dude” Lebowski. Praise Be to CCR.

In any case here are the winners of the first contest, as drawn by #2 son as he sang the “Daddy Ate My French Fries” tune from Adventure Time, in his skivvies, with a mouthful of pumpkin-cinnamon cookies:
KYM AMARAL & HEATHER POWERS

Congratulations, kids. You have each won an e-book copy of the COFFIN HOP: DEATH BY DRIVE-IN Collectors EP. I’ll be contacting you bb email to find out what file type you’d dig.

Now for today’s contest. It’s COMIC BOOK DAY!!! and I’ve got a pantload of awesome books for the winner. One copy each of Nicolas Caesar‘s FILTHY CAKE and THE PIT AND THE COMPENDIUM, one copy of ROBOT LINCOLN & ZOMBIE JACKSON, one RL&ZJ poster, and a handful of other titles TBD. I will also include a chapbook copy of my mini-anthology LIVING DEAD AT ZIGFREIDT & ROY.  All you have to do is LIKE my FB page, just over there to the right… Then comment and tell me you clicked it. Here’s a comic Red Tash made for me the other day.

 And here’s why:

Now get to Hoppin’!

Ahhhh, COFFIN HOP. That time of year when the leaves turn color, the wind grows cold, the nights get longer and I get very little sleep while the dead walk the Earth and the ghosts of All Hallow’s Eve do their little fandango. Over the next week, more than 100 of the best indie writers and artists out there will strive to entertain, enlighten, enrich and enliven your season with their words, their creativity and their hard work. There will be much fun to be had. There will be tricks, and treats, and surely an abundance of prizes.  Each and every one of those 100+ creators will be offering at least one contest over the course of the week. In most cases, multiple contests and prizes.  It’s a magical time of year, when we all – whether we realize it or not – celebrate the mysteries of death and mortality and wonder at the primordial possibilities that lie at the very core of our human consciousness.

Click on the happy goat-boy to go to the COFFIN HOP site and visit those hundred prevaricators of the unknown and read on for the first of my COFFIN HOP contests…

I’ll be having a few giveaways over the week, including a comic-book spooker pack, e-book copies of the official COFFIN  HOP: DEATH BY DRIVE-IN Collector’s EP (featuring four stories from the forthcoming Coffin Hop horror anthology DEATH BY DRIVE-IN), possibly an e-book of a brand new story, MOVIE DAY, and my Grand Prize package, which includes an autographed homemade “chapbook” of my own mini-collection LIVING DEAD AT ZIGFREIDT & ROY (available in e-book formats on Smashwords and Amazon), a whack of cool Halloweenie swag and an 8X10 art print of the cover photo of the DEATH BY DRIVE-IN cover, by the amazingly talented Liz Howerton Photography. So be sure to visit back over the week and stay tuned for all of that.

To kick things off, let’s give out TWO of those DEATH BY DRIVE-IN ebooks to a random commenter (chosen by hat-draw by my kids on Friday). Friday night I’ll announce the winners and unveil the next contest!

Leave me a comment, tell me who else you’ve visited in the next couple of days, and two of you will be reading some of the best horror fic in town, from Jessica McHugh’s surreal frightmare THE BRAIN TRAIN and Red Tash’s Pinterest lovin’ tale of skinchangers, to Amy K. Marshall’s disturbing story of the Alaskan undead and C.W. LaSart’s masterpiece of medical mayhem PLAYING DOCTOR. You also get the first part of a cliffhanger episode of the incroyible comic ROBOT LINCOLN & ZOMBIE JACKSON. You can only get this ebook through official COFFIN HOP contests. So get Hoppin’!

There’s a fresh new review of Living Dead at Zigfreidt & Roy over at Jason Darrick’s place My Crumbling Abode…

You can pick up LD@ZR for a buck on Amazon, or get it for free at Smashwords. Here’s how!

And don’t forget to check in on Edin Road Radio today at 6:30 Eastern/3:30 PST to hear my glorious reading and interviewee skillz!