I am a glutton for punishment. Not only am I tossing aside Tribal for the time being, but I have an idea for a World War One horror novel that’s starting to get under my skin like a blood starved chigger. My first problem was which side the protagonist would fight on? The second problem was where? I did a little market research and found out to my surprise – there are few horror novels that take place during World War One. This really surprised me. I figured that World War One would be a popular idea.

Also — the perfect cover photo is public domain.

Think about it – the beginning what would be called total war. The filth. The disease. The tactics of the 18^th century running pell-mell into the mechanization of the 20^th century. The idea of attrition as a strategy. So many horrors in fact, and then we throw on top of that the supernatural elements. Zombies wandering the no-man’s lands, foam from a chemical attack drying on their chins. A centuries old vampire – caught up in the fervor of the war in the early days and looking for easy conquests – gets cut down by these new-fangled machine guns and is more wounded by the horrors around him. Why aren’t their more novels from this era?

This stirred my resolve to write this book, but I wanted to make my mark – so I did more market research. There are a lot of fictional books (relatively speaking) about the Western Front, but nothing about the Ottoman front. Now I had a place, and working backwards I had the nationality of my protagonist – he’s German. I wanted to take it to the Western Front, but the idea – a real, live flesh-eating ghoul in the trenches – didn’t really work because there were so painfully few Ottoman soldiers in the West. They were mostly pilots and “carry the flag” types. So, I picked the Ottoman front, which turned out to be a good choice for me.

The book started writing itself. So, I am going into research mode when I have some free time (HA! HA-HA!). As it turned out there is also not a lot of non-fiction about the war front. One book is $133 – and it happens to be the best-looking source. A Hundred and Thirty-Three Dollars! Are you kidding me? Am I going to pay it? If you don’t know the answer to that, then I’m afraid we can’t be friends.

So, that’s where I am at. Planning another novel, on top of outlining one and working on another one while promising to finish another one. Such is my crazy life. Well – that’s all for now, I should get to work on something. Ta-ta for now.