H is for haunted. I am a huge fan of haunted houses, the Halloween kind and the real kind. I’ve been a haunted house actress and I’ve been an actual ghost hunter for decades, long before TAPS and company. It’s only natural that some of my stories feature hauntings.

I had a short story, Haunted in Dreamspinner’s anthology, Two Tickets to Paradise where the set of lovers are ghost hunters on a working vacation in Victoria, British Columbia. They spent the story chasing down the same ghosts I had when I was there. I admit it, I ghost tour almost any place I go.

It’s heavily the theme of my latest WIP novel, These Haunted Hills, set in the Hocking Hills near where I live. Joshua is an ecologist teaching in the area (probably at the university I do but I don’t think I’m ever going to mention it. Could just as easily be OU). He is an uber geek who ghost hunts and has a ghost website. I.e. he’s pretty much a combination of me and my friends. In fact, his web site IS one of steampunk buddy’s, Haunted Hocking. You can check out a ton of haunted sites and see his books there too.

The potential love interest in this novel is Brendan, sort of a J.K. Rowling type (i.e. wealthy author), who has lost his son. He’s giving up YA writing and wants to write a ghost story channeling Stephen King and Joe Hill. He is also looking for a psychic to contact his son.

Together they’re going to explore the haunted hills, including a hotel I based sort of on Holmes’s Chicago ‘murder house.’ But ghosts aren’t the only thing haunting this novel. Brendan is very obviously haunted by his son’s early death at the hands of cancer. He hasn’t been living, merely existing, for the last three years. His wife, while remaining his close friend, has divorced him and moved on. Brendan, who identifies as bisexual, finds himself coming alive again in the hills with Josh at his side.

So far in the Rainbow Snippets community on FB (scroll back in my blog to find posts), it’s being well received which is great. It’s my camp nano, also great. What’s not great, no time to write and no ability to concentrate. Here’s hoping something kicks free soon.

Haunted Hocking: Ash Cave