Hollywood After Dark: 3 Tales of Terror ~ An Excerpt

By Lisa Maliga copyright 2013

hollywood after dark 3 tales of terror lisa maligaThis October, why not consider looking at some different horror books? More psychological than bloody, these three novelettes contained within the pages of Hollywood After Dark: 3 Tales of Terror, all take place in a certain area of Los Angeles. They also contain some fairly ambitious main characters. Available in both eBook and paperback formats. 138 pages.

The motivation for An Author's Nightmare, a horror/chick lit tale, came about after reading some bragging posts on a forum about how successful a chick lit writer claimed she was. It gave me the idea for this dark story.

Here's an excerpt:

That day I heard a radio in the laundry room as the grungy new tenant who worked at a vintage clothing store, always brought along her radio when she did her laundry. I overheard a news reporter describe the untimely death of a literary legend on Mulholland Drive in a freak accident early that morning. “Mega Best Seller Harvey Boston, author of the successful Legionnaire Series, apparently lost control of his Ferrari when it spun out of control and tumbled down an embankment to the bottom of a ravine near Mulholland and Coldwater Canyon.”

Staring at the computer screen open to a new, untitled document, I sat there and gazed upon it, as though willing a new manuscript into existence. I said, “I’d do anything to sell a book manuscript—anything. I’d even sell my soul!” I remember laughing about that, as I didn’t believe in anything as silly as that as there was no god and there was no devil.

And that’s when I noticed the weather icon went crazy the numbers turned red and went from 87 to 88 to 89 and kept getting higher and higher until they stopped at 105. The temperature in the room increased and I was ready to take off my shirt I was so hot and clammy. And that’s when the name came to me: Carlotta’s Cakery: Book 1 Magical Cakes of Love! Yes, that was it, my new book title and I knew how to bake and why the hell hadn’t I thought of that before? Seconds later I had the first line of my book: “My name is Carlotta Sue Carter and I’m the owner of Carlotta’s Cakery. I bake the most awesome personal sized cakes in Brentwood, California, if not the United States!” And that was how it all began.

Paperback available at Amazon

All other purchase links: http://lisamaliga.wordpress.com/novels/hollywood-after-dark-3-tales-of-terror/