book details

Book: A Heartland Horror Story by Edward M. Clark

categories: Book, Youth, Demon, Ghost, Farm, Grave, Horror Fiction

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Edward M. Clark

about this book: This book is what I consider more of a light horror tale. There is no death but plenty of occult, ghost and of course the main monster. The book was written with youth readers in mind having a simple plot and storyline. While the story lacks killing and traditional horror story traditions it is a rather fun book to read as it follows a family's children and their adventure on a haunted farm. They discover a lot of mysteries and unlock a monster by accident. There are many suspenseful moments in the book. Some that may even have the adults jumping out of their seats.

There were two inspirations for this book. The first was my experiences of living on a farm with wild and crazy things always happening. The other was my daughter. Her imagination along with many ideas helped along the way. I really wanted a horror book that was age appropriate for many to read and enjoy.

This book only took around 6 months to write. The process was somewhat quick as just some of the facts were embellished. The other reason it went so quickly was that I would get piles of sticky notes with ideas of what to add.

The title of the book ironically has been mistaken for An American Horror Story. This is unfortunate since I had had the short story written for the last 20 years along with the title. I could have just changed the name but it goes well with the storyline, and it just seems to fit very well.

The cover I had revised several times. I wanted something scary but nothing that a kid would pick up and then put it back down after being frightened.

The hardest part of writing this book was keeping the content interesting. Most youth readers seem to love it while some adult readers seem to shy away. The reasons given was that the story didn't start off dark enough or was not nearly grouse enough. Even with only have a majority of youth readers liking the base story I still believe it is a very well written horror book.

I think this book does tell a very well written story once you get past the buildup. It blends very well with a scary tale to a bonding experience for the siblings as they are forced to work together.