Steve Ruthenbeck

Updates...

2012-02-23T09:41:00.001-08:00

Tattered Souls 2 has been nominated for a Stoker Award. Congratulations to the writers and publishers of the work. Be sure to check them out. My story is the last one in the book, I Was A Teenage Zombie Apocalypse. That's maybe my favorite title for one of my stories. I can't remember how I thought of it. Once in awhile I will think of a title and then write a story to go with it. In this case, I think it just popped in my head once the story was completed.

Live And Let Undead is now available for purchase. My story is titled Labor Relations. I wrote that story to order after seeing the requirements for the anthology, which requested tales about zombies getting assimilated into every day life. As for that title, again, just popped in my head once the story was done.

The Zombie Kong Anthology, which contains my story Lyceum, is available for purchase on Kindle. I also wrote that story to order after seeing the publisher request stories about a giant zombie ape. I named it Lyceum because that is what such events were called when a speaker visited my high school. The story was built on one of those experiences. The speaker was an expert at spinning basketballs on his fingers, toes and head. Little did he know that someday one of the students witnessing his talk would incorporate it into a story about a giant zombie ape...

So many zombie stories, and I don't even particularly like zombies. They are disgusting...

Finally, unfortunately, Attack of the 50-foot Book got cancelled by its original publisher. I think it got picked up by someone else, but I decided not to include my story in the new version.

Live And Let Undead Book Trailer

2011-08-30T07:01:00.000-07:00

Currently, the anthology is in layout/formatting. No release date yet, but I believe it will be relatively soon. In vague terms, my story concerns a janitor in a facility that makes use of zombies.

Tattered Souls 2 Goes On Sale

2011-08-05T06:20:00.000-07:00

Now available. Click image to order from Amazon. If you would like to read an excerpt of my story, I Was A Teenage Zombie Apocalypse, follow this link.

Exploring the fundamentals that make up both the horror and literary genres, Frank J. Hutton delves into the very core of humanity and fear. Within these eight disturbing tales, we explore what makes the human soul tick, and what makes that part of us digress. Tattered Souls 2 will move you to new places…some that will offer a fine trickle of hope, others, not so much.

A review here...

Attack Of The 50-Foot Cover

2011-06-30T10:38:00.000-07:00

Attack Of The 50-Foot Book has a cover. I like its over-the-top style. It seems like too many covers are abstract these days. Oh look, a shape, a shadow and a sans serif font. What's it about? That's not a problem here.

Anthologies of Interest, announces Professor Farnsworth...

2011-06-24T05:44:00.000-07:00

Two stories for anthologies are finalized. And Then There Were One will be published in Attack of the 50-foot Book from Library of the Living Dead Press. My understanding is the book will feature stories inspired by monster movies from the 1950s, such as The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms.

In addition, Labor Relations, will be published in Library of the Living Dead Press's Live and Let Undead anthology. Stories in that book are based on a world where zombies are integrated into everyday life.

I don't have the release dates for these anthologies yet.

Mavericks vs. Heat

2011-06-14T10:00:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure if you've heard, but the Dallas Mavericks defeated the Miami Heat. I can live with that. It's nice to see Dirk get a ring. As I watched the final game of the series, I had a feeling of deja vu. I knew I had seen this drama play out somewhere before. Then I remembered Dirk's little known role in the Antonia Banderas' movie, The 13th Warrior (back when he was shorter), which actually served as a symbolic prophecy for his eventual defeat of the Miami Heat, here having their team color represented by a tall red head...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sp1mzx5O4ao&feature=related

What Happens When Cobra Engineers Make A Lateral Move In Their Career?

2011-05-19T07:00:00.000-07:00

Now we know...

In other news — short stories, short stories, short stories, that's what I've been working on. I revised two for some upcoming anthologies to be announced at a later date. I'm also working on a couple of others for possible anthologies. I've been sticking with anthologies lately because I like the specific requests editors make for submissions. They don't want "horror," which can cover a broad range of subjective subjects. Rather, they want stuff like "giant rats attack sorority," or something to that effect.

Tattered Souls 2

2011-04-20T08:53:00.000-07:00

The cover for the Tattered Souls 2 anthology is out. The book will be available August 1. Cutting Block Press is hosting a pre-launch party at the World Horror Convention in Austin, Texas. The event will be held April 30. Location: convention party suite. Time: 10 p.m.

My story, I Was A Teenage Zombie Apocalypse, is part of the anthology. I came up with the idea by listening to people discuss post-apocalyptic worlds with what sounded like faint hopes they might happen. I don't think they actually wished the planet to take such turns. Rather, a common facination with surviving in a world full of stuff seems to exist. Like one could go to Fort Knox, make a chair of gold bars to sit in while playing video games and subsist entirely on looted candy bars.

I took the position that things regularly fail to go smoothly in the real world, so why would that dynamic be any different in a post-apocalyptic world?

I Am Legend

2011-04-17T15:40:00.000-07:00

When it comes to influential books, I Am Legend (1954) by Richard Matheson is high on my list. If people pointed out some of its flaws, I probably wouldn't argue with them, but some books transcend their pulp nature and strike an unexpected chord.

I first heard of I Am Legend in Stephen King's Danse Macabre — a short synopsis describing a world full of vampires and a main character so lonely he almost wants to join them. I then set the local librarian on the task of acquring Matheson books. In that regard, it was funner being a kid before the Internet. You didn't have every book and movie spoiled before you read or saw them, and there weren't message boards ripping such works apart or elevating them to Holy Grail status. You simply came across things, and sometimes it was a quest to obtain them.

The Shrinking Man was one book the librarian acquired. I remembered seeing the movie as a kid on a Sunday afternoon. (No cable then. I just happened to turn on the TV, and there it was out of the blue...) When I realized the guy who wrote I Am Legend wrote the story of The Incredible Shrinking Man, I was more intrigued. Unfortunately, the librarian had no luck finding it, however. I Am Legend seemed to be in a nether zone between printings at that time.

Eventually, I managed to locate a four-part comic book series by Eclipse and ordered it. Only issues 1-3 showed up. (For some reason, I couldn't get issue 4; it seems to me it wasn't published yet and had no date for publication.) I read the three issues and got caught up in the story's bleak feel, which wasn't so much generated by the situation, but by the character's mental state within the situation. Unable to find out how the story ended was frustrating to say the least.

A few months passed and one day I got an unexpected call. The librarian finally managed to track down a copy of I Am Legend. I quickly got dad to drive me to the library. All the way home I held the book, thinking the end of the story was right here in my hands. I had the edition with the cover posted above.

I didn't start I Am Legend in the car. I wanted to get home and jump into it where I wouldn't be distracted by so much as even walking from the car and into the house. Once home, I went to my room and had at it. I didn't even skip through what I had already read in the Eclipse comics (even though they used much of the original prose from the book). I started from the beginning and made myself wait for the new material. A couple hours later I finished the book... and started re-reading it right away. It was hard to return it to the library when its due date arrived. I Was Legend was simply something I wanted to collect.

Eventually, I ended up with my own copy of I Am Legend. Tor reprinted it in 1995. I had an abessed tooth that felt like a drill bit in my jaw when the bookstore called to tell me my order was in. I then drove an hour one way to get the book.

I wasn't the only one I Am Legend inspired. I've read it allegedly influenced George Romero's Night of the Living Dead, and one can see how that is possible, but I greatly prefer Matheson's vampires to Romero's zombies. Zombies are basically disgusting when you get right down to it. The vampires in Matheson's novel showed just enough intelligence to be dangerous and to make them more than walking appetites.

For me, the most striking part of I Am Legend is simply the main character locked away in his house while the vampires surround him each night and cry, "Come out, Neville!"

Matheson bridges the gap between monsters and internal fears with that simple setup. Yes, the monsters are outside, but loneliness is such a monster, as well, that the main character is browbeaten and driven to alcoholism by both, rather than mustering a heroic response.

At the end of the book the line between human and monster is bridged, as well, but it was pointed out to me that that line is blurred far earlier in the book. I never even noticed it on any of my previous read throughs, due to Matheson's subtle writing, until someone pointed it out.

The scene is Neville captures a female vampire to test some of his theories on (part of the plot of I Am Legend is Neville trying to figure out a scientific explanation for the vampires so he can develop a cure). As the last man on earth, celibacy is forced upon Neville. That, combined with the great psychological weight of missing his wife, causes Neville a great deal of struggle. In fact, when the vampires try to get him to come out of the house, the female vampires know of this weakness and try to entice him with sensuality. While testing the vampire, Neville is angered and disgusted by his attraction to the subject, so much so that it drives him into a physical rage. Neville then tosses the vampire out of his house, but it is not so simple upon closer examination of the writing. The passage states:

"Ten minutes later" Neville threw her out the door.

Ten minutes is a sizeable gap under the circumstances.

There Matheson illustrates how ambiguity can sometimes be better than telling the reader exactly what happened. Did Neville go off the deep end? Maybe he went to another room to cool off. Maybe he crumbled into a ball and wept. Or maybe something worse happened. Leaving that up to the reader doesn't hurt the rest of the story, and that's maybe the best use of ambiguity a writer can employ — enhancing the tale rather than making a reader wonder its point.

The end of I Am Legend is pretty cut and dry and actually my only disappointment with the book. I don't mind how it ended (I think it is a great ending). I just don't like the way Neville's character arc ended. Without spoiling it, I think it would have been better to let nature take its course, considering Neville's condition. Going by what had come before character-wise, I don't believe Neville would have hastened the process like he did.

To see other covers of I Am Legend, check out this website.

I'm On A Seafood Diet

2011-04-05T07:31:00.000-07:00

I see food, and I eat it. Ba-dump pss! Thank you. I'll be here all week, God-willing, of course. Try some kind of beef and be sure to tip the person taking your order and bringing your food, essentially waiting on you, would be another way to put it.

My short story Dawes was published in the Dead Bait anthology in 2009. It has received the first mention I've heard of it since then here.

I can't remember how I got the idea for Dawes. I recall writing it and submitting it to Clarkesworld. Nick Mamatas was the editor then, I believe. He rejected the story, and his reasons were fair. Then Dead Bait came along. I submitted Dawes, and they accepted it almost immediately. It just goes to show that because a story gets rejected one place doesn't mean it won't be a fit in some other market.

A sequel to Dead Bait is also now available, featuring authors like Steve Alten and Ramsey Campbell. It's the seafood that sees you as food...

RIP John Steakley

2011-04-01T07:26:00.000-07:00

I recently learned John Steakley passed away...

Steakley hasn't had a book published since 1990 — Vampire$ — so he hasn't been big in the public eye. Steakley's cult classic science fiction novel Armor was published in 1984. Both books feature characters who display an interesting combination of great strength and, perhaps, greater weaknesses, which somehow make them stronger. Vampire$ is about a group of modern-day vampire hunters who employ some interesting tactics in dealing with the monsters (crossbows, silver bullets and explosives, among other things). Armor is about a soldier fighting a mindless alien race on a desolate planet (and a rather lengthy side story that features a different character who faces a moral quandry after partnering with a shady mutineer). Felix, as the soldier is named, faces impossible odds but survives because he doesn't focus on odds. He just worries about the Ant (as the aliens are called) in front of him. He'll get to the next 10,000 after he takes care of that one...

Since Steakley wasn't a prolific author, he led a life that didn't lend itself to much news for fans. Hence, I would periodically Google him to see if he was up to anything new. This last time I Googled him, I discovered the news that he passed away.

Writers are often asked which authors influenced them. It's kind of a hard question for me. Enough have influenced me that it is hard to tell where one ends and another begins. Nevertheless, I think John Steakley ultimately wins by a nose for two reasons:

1. I discovered Vampire$ and Armor when I was stuck in a paranoia phase about writing. I had received enough rejections at that point that I began to seriously question the technical aspects of my work. Did I use too many gerunds? Did my dialogue have to be in iambic pentameter?

Then I came across Steakley. Steakley’s style broke a lot of technical rules (for example, Steakley wouldn't just write a run-on sentence; he would right ten run-on sentences in a row) and wasn’t without its warts, but it worked within the context of the stories he told. Discovering Steakley's works allowed me to stop being paranoid about technique and just tell the story (although I still recommend learning basic grammar rules to anyone who has aspirations of writing — also, it should be noted Steakley did have a B.A. in English). Beyond the nuts and bolts of Steakley's writing, I also enjoyed his take on emotional duress. He understood that stress is a common experience to everyone even if their stressors are not. I think that was the secret to his success. No one can relate to fighting vampires or aliens, but everyone can relate to having to deal with a problem, obstacle, danger that makes them feel like giving up, but they don't have that option.

2. When DogSS of War was first published, I was required to get author blurbs. Author blurbs are short reviews from well-known authors that go on book covers to help promote said books. The problem was I knew no well-known authors (or even unknown authors, for that matter). Shrugging, I sent out letters (and felt like an intrusive idiot in the process) to various authors I admired. I never heard back from any of them, and that's okay. They lead busy lives and probably get ten blurb requests a month.

But I did hear back from John Steakley...

He wrote:

Mr. Ruthenbeck's yarn begins with an aerial dogfight, malignant evil, stirring courage, tragic death and a belly laugh. In the first [chapter]... But don't worry, it picks up after that. You should find DogSS of War great fun.

Steakley could have e-mailed the blurb. Instead, he wrote it on a typewriter and physically mailed it to me. You can't get much more influential than that...

Revision History

2011-03-04T11:35:00.000-08:00

My first novel, Dogs of War, is now available on Kindle as DogSS of War.

What's the difference?

Not a lot... so if you read the first version, you don't have to run and buy the new version. You aren't missing out on new characters doing new things and being all-around awesome. Mostly, I went through the book, tightened it up in places and sometimes chose to be more subtle rather than in-your-face. The only change I made that qualifies as "new" concerns the backstory of one character. Even then, the changes aren't different in results, only in the process that led to those results. Ultimately, maturity motivated the edits. As time lent perspective, I realized it is better to involve the reader's imagination as much as possible on certain things, and I think the revision is a stronger story for it.

Click on the cover at left to go to the Amazon link.