Brian Moreland Talks Behind the Scenes of Writing The Girl from the Blood Coven

Author of the surreal, supernatural, and scary, Brian Moreland probably doesn’t need much introduction at Hook of a Book anymore. He’s become one of my favorite authors, people, and friends. He’s a class act and a superb writer that stands apart in a sea of writers in today’s market. I don’t just feature him here or review him, no, instead I truly believe he’s one of the best you’ll read or learn from. To the readers, don’t miss his stories and to other authors, take your cue from his expertise. You won’t be sorry either way.

So without further discussion, check out Brian’s guest article about how he came to write The Girl from the Blood Coven and get some tidbits of trivia into both the short story, and the novella it leads off, The Witching House.

Moments on Writing The Girl from the Blood Coven
by Brian Moreland, Author

I’ve always loved writing short stories. I wrote a bunch of them in college when I was first learning how to write horror fiction. I’ve since graduated to writing longer forms of storytelling, like novels and novellas, and I’ve been lucky enough to publish a few of them. After I wrote my most recent novella, The Witching House, I decided there was a lot of history about the coven that I thought would be fun to explore in a short story, so I wrote The Girl from the Blood Coven, which is set in 1972 on the night the coven was massacred. It’s written from the point of view of a small town Texas sheriff who investigates the murder scene at the Old Blevins House after a young witch, Abigail Blackwood, enters a roadhouse tavern covered in blood.

I actually wrote the short story after I finished editing the novella. I was staying at a cabin in the East Texas woods just miles from where the story takes place. I was so inspired during that time that I wrote The Girl from the Blood Coven in two days back in February 2013. I designed the cover art myself the very next day. I noticed that my publisher, Samhain Horror, had released a few free short stories that lead into novels and novellas of other authors, so I told them about my short story and how I’d like it to be a prelude to The Witching House. They agreed to release The Girl from the Blood Coven as a free ebook in July 2013, one month prior to my novella.

With my two witch stories, my style of storytelling is very different from my historical horror novels. I grew up loving horror films from the late Sixties and early Seventies, like I Spit on Your Grave, Let’s Scare Jessica to Death, Squirm, Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things and of course the scariest of them all, Texas Chainsaw Massacre. There’s something about those washed out, grainy movies that make them scarier than movies made today. Those movies, along with the real case of the Charles Manson Family, inspired me to create my hippy cult of witches who had been living on a commune in East Texas in the late Sixties-early Seventies and were massacred.

Another bit of trivia: I came up with the Blevins name from a street sign I used to pass years ago while driving along Interstate 35 from Dallas to Austin. The sign read Old Blevins Road. Its bridge crosses over I-35 just south of Waco, which ironically is near where the Branch Davidian cult massacre happened. Old Blevins always sounded like a creepy name to me and seemed to fit the clan and the name of their house.

After vampires and zombies have dominated books and movies for the past decade, witches seem to be making a comeback this year. With The Girl from the Blood Coven and The Witching House, my aim is bring something fresh and different to the witch genre. The stories are meant to be good scary fun and I hope you enjoy them.

The Girl from the Blood Coven, Synopsis~

The Girl from the Blood Coven is a short story prelude to The Witching House. It’s the year 1972. Sheriff Travis Keagan is enjoying a beer at the local roadhouse, when a blood-soaked girl enters the bar. Terrified and trembling, Abigail Blackwood claims her entire family was massacred at the hippy commune in the woods. Sheriff Keagan knows that Abigail’s “family” is a coven of witches that inhabit the Blevins house. They’ve been rumored to be practicing blood sacrifices and black magic. When the sheriff and his deputies investigate the alleged murders, they discover what happened at the Blevins house is more horrific than they ever imagined.

Download The Girl from the Blood Coven at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Samhain Horror.

The Witching House, Synopsis~

Some houses should be left alone.

In 1972, twenty-five people were brutally murdered in one of the bloodiest massacres in Texas history. The
mystery of who committed the killings remains unsolved.

Forty years later, Sarah Donovan is dating an exciting man, Dean Stratton. Sarah’s scared of just about everything—heights, tight places, the dark—but today she must confront all her fears, as she joins Dean and another couple on an exploring adventure. The old abandoned Blevins House, the scene of the gruesome massacre, is rumored to be haunted.

The two couples are about to discover the mysterious house has been waiting all these years, craving fresh prey. And down in the cellar they will encounter a monstrous creature that hungers for more than just human flesh.

Pre-order (or order after Aug. 6) The Witching House at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Samhain Horror.

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More Articles, Facebook Launch Party~

I hope you enjoyed learning about how these two great witch stories got their start.  You can see my previous post about The Girl from the Blood Coven and download it free by clicking HERE! Also, you can see Brian’s recent article on my site about creating his characters by clicking HERE. Stay tuned for my own review of The Witching House, which is such a unique horror-filled yarn of spellbound witches and the battle between good and bad magic, and pre-order now for Aug. 6 release!

Join Brian, Kristopher Rufty, and I on Aug. 6 for a Facebook party for the launch of Brian’s The Girl from the Blood Coven and The Witching House, as well as Rufty’s Oak Hallow novel. We’ll be answering questions and having fun at www.facebook.com/HookofaBook! Watch for more details.

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Author Brian Moreland, Biography~

Brian Moreland writes novels and short stories of horror and supernatural suspense. His books include Dead of Winter, Shadows in the Mist, The Girl from the Blood Coven, The Witching House, and The Devil’s Woods (coming December 2013). The Vagrants comes out May 2014. Brian lives in Dallas, Texas where he is joyfully writing his next horror novel.

You can join his mailing list or learn more at http://www.brianmoreland.com/

Twitter: @BrianMoreland

Like Brian’s Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/HorrorAuthorBrianMoreland

Brian’s Dark Lucidity blog: http://www.brianmoreland.blogspot.com