Claudine Marcin presents a compelling narrative in her psychological horror novel, "The House on Woody Creek Lane," where a young couple's dream of a peaceful life in a fixer-upper transforms into an ordeal of terror. The story centers around Jimmy, who possesses the unique ability to perceive spirits, yet finds himself confronted by a malevolent presence haunting their new abode. Marcin's work is distinguished by its incorporation of personal experiences, as she intertwines fragments of her own life into the fabric of the narrative, thus enhancing its authenticity and emotional depth. The episode features a dynamic discussion with host Rich Bennett, who engages Marcin in an exploration of her writing process and the inspirations behind her chilling tale. Furthermore, we are treated to a riveting reading of an excerpt that encapsulates the essence of suspense and fear that permeates the novel, inviting listeners to delve deeper into the story. In this compelling episode, Rich Bennett engages in an insightful conversation with Claudine Marcin, the author of 'The House on Woody Creek Lane'. The dialogue begins with an acknowledgment of the Book Fair at Bel Air, celebrating the union of authors and readers. Claudine introduces her novel, a psychological horror story that follows a couple's aspirations to create a loving home, which is soon disrupted by an ominous presence. The conversation highlights the interplay of ambition and fear, illustrating how dreams can devolve into nightmares. Claudine's narrative touches upon universal themes such as anxiety, the unknown, and the complexities of familial love, making the book relatable to a broad audience. As Claudine elaborates on her protagonist, Jimmy, listeners gain insight into the personal experiences that inform his character. She shares how her own encounters with spirits and familial dynamics have shaped the narrative, creating a rich backdrop for the unfolding horror. This personal connection not only enhances the authenticity of the story but also invites readers to reflect on their own experiences with fear and the supernatural. Claudine’s passion for storytelling is evident as she discusses the emotional depth she seeks to convey, aiming to resonate with fans of horror literature, especially those drawn to the works of Stephen King. The episode reaches a thrilling climax with Claudine reading an excerpt from her book, wherein Jimmy encounters a haunting presence within his new home. The vivid imagery and tension in the reading exemplify Claudine's skill in captivating her audience. Rich's facilitation of the reading and subsequent discussion amplifies the suspense, engaging listeners and leaving them eager to explore the depths of Claudine's narrative. Through this episode, listeners are not only introduced to a gripping tale of horror but also invited to ponder the intricacies of fear, memory, and the human experience.

Takeaways:

• The Author Pitch podcast showcases writers from around the globe presenting compelling pitches for their literary works.
• Listeners are encouraged to consider the Book Fair at Bel Air as a valuable community event celebrating literature.
• The psychological horror novel 'The House on Woody Creek Lane' features a protagonist named Jimmy, who experiences unsettling supernatural phenomena.
• Claudine Marcin emphasizes the personal connection she has with her characters, drawing from her own life experiences to enrich the narrative.
• The podcast episode highlights the importance of reader engagement and the emotional investment that authors place in their storytelling process.
• Claudine Marcin's upcoming projects include a romance novel inspired by her own experiences in the realm of online dating.

Links referenced in this episode:

• bookfairatbelair.org
• claudinemarcine.com

Companies mentioned in this episode:

• Book Fair at Bel Air
• Amazon.com
• Barnes And Noble

Before we begin today's pitch, I want to thank the Book Fair at Bel Air for sponsoring this episode. Every year, this free community event brings Together more than 100 authors and readers of all ages to celebrate the magic of books.

There are stories to discover, activities for kids, and plenty of chances to meet the writers who inspire us. To learn more or join their email list, visit book fairellaire.org what if discovering your next great read only took a few minutes?

Welcome to the Author Pitch, the short form podcast where writers from around the world deliver a powerful pitch for their book and read a standout excerpt in their own voice. I'm Rich Bennett. This is the Author Pitch and your next great read starts here.

Welcome to the Author Pitch, where writers from around the world deliver a powerful pitch for their book and read a short excerpt in their own voice. I'm your host, Rich Bennett, and today's guest is Claudine Marcin, author of the book the House on Woody Creek Lane.

And if you've listened to my other podcast, you've heard Claudine before, watch it. How you doing, Claudine?

I'm good. How are you, Rich?

I, I, I, I'm doing good so far.

You're already red in the face.

I know. And thank God you're reading from this book and, and not your new one yet. That's gonna take some time for me to get ready for that one. God.

All right, so let's start with your pitch. Go ahead and give listeners a tight, high impact overview. What the book is, who it's for, why it matters, and what makes it unique.

This book is about a young couple that buys a fixer upper in the woods. They dream of filling the house with kids and making memories. But the house on Woody Creek Lane is where dreams become your worst nightmare.

So this is a psychological horror novel, paranormal. It's for anybody that loves Stephen King. This is good for teenagers and all the way up.

There's no sex in this book, so you don't have to worry about that with your kids. But if they like Stephen King, they'll love this. It's about Jimmy. Jimmy's the main character.

Jimmy can see spirits as they cross over, but they never interact with him. But when he gets to this house, he senses a different presence in this house and it wants something from him.

Will he figure it out before it's too late?

What makes it unique besides the fact that you wrote it?

What I think makes it unique is that I put a lot of myself in this book. So really, Jimmy is sort of A version of me. Jimmy's background is my background in a way.

There's stories about his childhood that mirror my childhood family trips, that mirror a family trip that I went on. The ghosts that he has seen. It mirrors sightings that I have seen in my own life, you know, So I put a lot of this stuff in there.

I just twisted it around, you know, to fit the. The kind of book that I wanted this to be. And like, his.

His sister in the book is sort of based on my sister in a way, you know, so there's a lot of me in this book, which I really love.

I remember we talked about that on the other podcast, and I think we even started talking about each other's different experiences, which is why I know when people read this, especially if they're into that type of book horror, they're going to love it. They're going to love it.

I hope so. It's done really well. I love pitching it to people. I was just at an event yesterday, and a girl walked into my tent. She had both of my horror novels.

She had read one, but she hadn't read this one yet. So she'd read the Owl Witch. This one was still sitting on her nightstand to be read.

So it's exciting to have people come in that have read the book that really liked it. That just energizes me to write more.

Oh, yeah.

She was looking for another horror novel from me, and I'm like, I don't have one yet.

So those of you listening, get ready for this, because now we're going to have Claudine actually read an excerpt from it that she chose.

And if I know how Claudine is, she chose the perfect excerpt that once you hear it, you're gonna be hooked and you're gonna wanna buy the book to find out what happened or what's about to happen.

I hope so. So I'll just preface it by saying this is into the book a little bit.

So Jimmy and his fiance, they have moved into the house where everything takes place. And this is Jimmy's experiences in the house that his fiance knows nothing about.

Jimmy.

The breathy voice stirred him from sleep. He opened his eyes and whispered, what? Silence answered. In the quiet, he could hear Ronnie breathing beside him. Effortless slumber.

He lifted his head from the pillow and blinked his eyes, bringing the red LED numbers on the bedside clock into focus. It was 2:20am and he was inexplicably awake. He dropped his head and laid there, wondering if he'd been dreaming.

But then he realized they weren't alone. There was something else in the bedroom with them. A presence. He didn't see it at first.

It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the low light filtered through the curtains. And then, bit by bit, a shadowy figure came into view.

A hunched over shape with unnatural protuberances on its arched back was kneeling beside the bed with its head lowered as if in prayer.

He stared at it for what seemed like minutes as his brain tried to make sense of the featureless profile, like one of those black card silhouette portraits that were popular before the invention of photography. Am I dreaming? 2:21Am Forced by stinging dryness, Jimmy blinked his eyes. Two quick blinks, to be exact, but the shadow remained.

It was a shade, he was sure of that now, but he'd never seen one like this. It couldn't stay hidden just out of reach of the light, so that he couldn't quite see it. Nothing you see can harm you.

His mother's words did litter to calm his racing heart as he struggled to bring the shade into into the light. If only he knew how she died before she could teach him what his gift really was. Or how to use it. If she even knew herself.

As it lifted his head, Jimmy could make out the sharp points at the end of its nose and chin. Then it rolled its shoulders forward as it turned and crouched on all fours, ready to pounce.

It leaned toward him, its two amber eyes glowing in the murky darkness. I see you. It hissed, breathing out a stench of rot and decay. Jimmy refused to turn away. His mouth was dry, his tongue like dehydrated meat.

His breaths were shallow and quick. He swallowed the fear trapped in his throat and kept his eyes fixed on the figure as it leaned closer.

Then the light shimmered over its black hide as its lips peeled back over jagged teeth. I see you, James Mason. Jimmy sat straight up and reached for the bedside lamp, squinting at shards of light stabbed at his eyes.

He struggled to remain focused on the shade, but it was gone, back into the shadows. What's wrong? Rani asked, rolling onto her back with her arms shielding her eyes.

He flipped the covers back, swung his legs over the edge of the bed, and propped himself up with one hand on his knee. He shivered as the cool air touched his sweaty skin and wiped his hand across his forehead and hair. That was no ordinary shade. It wasn't human.

Wasn't ever human. It couldn't have been. It's Jimmy. Huh? Was all he managed to say as he stood from the bed. Are you okay? I just had A nightmare. Everything's fine.

What was it about? He was standing where it had been. On the very spot where it hissed his name. That had never happened before either.

Maybe it was a dream, but that was just wishful thinking. He looked at the clock. 2:23Am he scanned the room, but again, there was no trace of it anywhere. Everything was as it should be.

Jimmy, do you want to talk about it? No, I'm. I'm just. I'm gonna run some water over my face. Turn out the light first. She yawned, rolling over onto her left side. Okay.

He leaned over and pinched his fingers around the switch on the lamp. But before cutting off the light, he noticed the bedroom door was ajar. Didn't I close the door last night?

It had been a habit of his since he was a kid. On bring your parents to work day, one of his classmates brought his father, a volunteer fireman.

Jimmy was fascinated by the man's uniform and the equipment he used. The man took the opportunity to teach them about fire safety and tell them that they, too, could be firemen or women someday.

He couldn't remember that man's name or. Or the name of his classmate, but he never forgot what that fireman said.

Closing the bedroom door at night could substantially improve the chance of surviving a house fire. Jimmy had always been terrified of a house fire, and ever since then, he always closed his bedroom door before going to sleep.

It was possible that the stress of moving, lack of sleep, and a full day of football caused him to forget to close the door, but he wasn't sure. Then something moved in the dark hallway just outside their room, and he stood up a little straighter, fingers still gripped around the light switch.

Jimmy, please. I'm trying to go back to sleep. Sorry, babe. Click. Darkness. He shuffled through the room, hands outstretched, until he found the doorway.

He closed the door behind himself and searched the shadows for movement. All clear. Ambient light from the street showed him the way to the bathroom. Once inside, he closed the door and turned out the light.

His reflection in the medicine cabinet mirror was pale. His hairline was damp with sweat. His hands shook as he reached for the faucet.

He leaned over the sink and splashed cold water on the back of his neck, then on his face once, then again. Eyes closed, he turned off the stream and felt for the hand towel.

He held the soft terry cloth on his face, drying the water away before daring to have another look. James Mason Hobart was officially terrified.

He rehung the damp towel and then relieved himself in the commode, meeting new shades in the Middle of the night tended to overact one's bladder, or so it would seem. He had never actually happened to him before. He flushed the water down, closed the lid, and washed his hands.

He reached for the door handle and then took one more glimpse of himself in the mirror. It occurred to him to stay in the bathroom until sunrise. But how would that look?

He sucked in a deep breath and slowly exhaled through the through his puckered lips, letting his cheeks puff out as the air escaped. Then he switched off the light and opened the door. Damn it. He gasped, nearly tripping over coal lurking outside the door.

Then he felt the cat's soft tail wrap around his calf, followed by a head bump. The gentle purr followed him as he walked away, reverberating in the dark, empty hallway like a motor through still water.

Perhaps, under different circumstances, Jimmy would have found it soothing. Maybe he even would have picked Cole up, held him to his chest and relished the vibration.

Perhaps, he thought as he closed the bedroom door and returned to bed. But not right now. Not on this night.

That actually sent chills up my spine. That did. That was good.

Thank you.

I mean, and I could picture everything cool, which makes. Well, as you know, that's what an author's supposed to do.

I tried to paint a picture.

You did. You did. Scared the hell out of me.

Good.

All right. So why'd you choose that particular excerpt?

I really like that scene. It's the one that I have marked for anybody that comes by my table if they want to try the book out.

It doesn't give too much away, but it gives them a feeling of what the book's going to be like. One thing I will say is these nighttime encounters happen to Jimmy quite a bit in the book. Same time, but they escalate.

Oh, so this shade is what he calls them. He learned this from his mother. These are the ones that he can see, and they're not good.

Right.

So the light is what helps him see people as they're passing over, see the spirits as they pass over. They call it the light, and that's what helps them see them. But these shades are different.

Shades are not good, and he's never encountered one like this. So it's trying to get his attention. It wants something from him. He doesn't know what.

And when it's not getting what it wants, it tries a little harder.

And correct me if I'm wrong, just so the listeners know, a lot of this stuff has happened to you, right?

Well, not like this. So that scene is based on a Ghost that I saw.

Right.

I didn't see that. I saw a man praying. It was clearly a man.

But you have seen stuff, is my point.

Which to me, I never saw anything like that.

But being the author, you've experienced it.

Yeah. And so I took what I saw and I made it terrifying.

Now, is that what sparked the book for you? Right.

I mean, this. It happened to me 30 years ago.

Right.

But when I started writing this book, I took those experiences that I had and I just made them frightening.

Yeah.

I mean, it was scary seeing a ghost.

Oh, yeah.

But I didn't see anything like that. Evil beast.

I don't wanna see anything like that.

No. No. But it escalates. And he's never told his fiance about his gift. She has no idea that he can see spirits as they cross over.

And so he doesn't tell her about this either. Oh, wow. So, yeah. So now Jimmy has these things going on in this house, and it's freaking him out. As the book goes on, he's getting worse and worse.

She doesn't know what's going on with him, and he doesn't know how to tell her. And so I try to give the reader that.

What?

The feeling of what Jimmy is experiencing. Insomnia, anxiety. All these things are going on with Jimmy, and I want the reader to feel it.

Wow. Okay, now with. Because you're getting the horror. You have some suspense in there. And with your fiance, is there a little romance?

Not when I say romance, I don't.

Mean, like, they're in love, you know, but there.

There's kissing, you know, I mean, how can I refer.

There's no sex. There's no sex in the book, though. I mean, not that.

Not that type of romance. Get your mind out of the gutter, Claudine.

I mean, in other words, like with a husband and wife, how when one's facing the other one, they don't know how to tell them, but once they do, because sometimes it could lead to them separating or building that bond stronger. Or do we have to read further to find out?

Well, you're gonna have to read further to find out. Does he tell her? Does he not tell her? I don't know.

Trying to get a shortcut. She won't give it to me, which is good. I love that.

That's right. I gave you the book so you can read it.

All right? Now, here's. Here's the scary question. And I ask everybody on. Everybody comes on this question, but for some reason, I am very scared to ask you this.

What's next for you as an author.

Oh, I love this question.

I don't.

And I know because you don't like the question because you know the answer. So I am trying to work on a muddy romance novel. So this is based on online dating, which I'm currently navigating myself.

And I just need the motivation to write it. So I'm like 15,000 words in, and I need to get myself going. I want to finish it this year.

Okay. Because last time you were on, which was what, six months ago? On the other podcast, it seemed. I mean, like, you were gung ho.

You were getting into this.

I know. I just. I haven't really been motivated to write.

I think I've just been, you know, pulled in different directions and not wanting to sit down to write. So November is National Novel Writing Month, and I started out on day one really good, and then I flopped after that. So it's just.

It's not writer's block. It's just not.

You're not feeling it.

I'm not motivated to sit down and write. So I've been actually trying to get some friends together just to get together and write. And that's it. Not critique, not critique. Just write.

And you're holding each other accountable to that. So there's a few of us that are talking about how can we get together and do that?

And we're also starting to toss around the idea of a writer's retreat. So we were just. Yeah. Cause I had an event yesterday in Delaware.

Irmgard Brown and myself drove up together, and we were spitballing this in the car, so. And then we talked to author Tim Baldwin. He was doing the event with us.

And we all really like this idea of just trying to figure out how we can get together for now. Maybe like a long weekend.

Yeah.

And then maybe do it again and extend it. And we wanna just, like, see some ideas and throw it out there and get people together.

And, like, if we make it a thing, a real thing, then we can have guests come in or whatever. But we wanna make it something real where it's for writers getting together.

If it's a retreat like that, maybe we would critique each other, read stuff to each other, but mainly just so we can get together and write.

That's a great idea.

I need to be held accountable.

Yeah. All right, so something very important. Where can people purchase the House on Woody Creek Lane and follow you?

So you can follow me on Facebook and Instagram, and then the book is available on Amazon.com as well as Barnes And Noble. I'm not in the stores, unfortunately. Although I did excitingly find my very first book, the Glory Box.

Pineapple in Winter was in a Barnes and Noble in. Where was I? I can't even remember where it was. I posted it online. I found it was in the store.

Somebody must have ordered it and then they didn't pick it up. So it ended up on the shelf. That's all I can figure. Just the one book. And I went out there and signed it. So that was pretty cool.

That is cool.

Chevy Chase. But anyway, yeah, I was pretty excited about that. But yeah, so. And then you have a website, too? I have a website.

Claudinemarson.com and then I will be at the Towson Spring Fest this weekend, which is two days, Saturday and Sunday. And then coming up in the middle of May is the Chesapeake Regional something something artists and authors.

And that's gonna be at Hartford Community College. So that is, I think, the 15th.

Aren't you going to be at the Bel Air Book Fair as well?

But that's in August.

August, yeah.

Yeah. So the Chesapeake Regional one is.

I'll be on the author panel on May 15 and then in the Susquehanna hall at Harvard Community College on the 16th and 17th. So those are my upcoming events. But yes, I will be at the book fair in August.

I thought you had another website. And Mad Tales.

Well, Mad. Mad Tales. M M A D T A L E S at Gmail is my email address.

Okay. Not a website.

Yeah.

Okay.

There is a. There is a website that's connected to my website where you can purchase directly from me. So if you go on my website, copy exactly. And I can mail it.

Okay. And those. Those of you listening, you know what? I'm going to say two things.

Number one, you can also follow her on Amazon, so when she releases her new book, you'll get notified right away. And once you purchase her book, make sure and read it. Leave a full review, not just on Amazon, but leave it wherever you can leave a review.

Goodreads.com Goodreads. It's great.

Yeah. Well, what about Walmart? Can people leave reviews there on your book? Wherever you can leave reviews, just leave reviews. Just leave them everywhere.

Makes sense.

Yes.

All right. Oh, I forgot to ask you one other thing. Is this going to be an audio version? Are you hoping to.

I am working on audio, yes. It has not been released yet, but I am working on it.

Okay.

Perfect for all of them.

Okay, good. Thanks for listening to the author pitch. I'm Rich Bennett and until next time, keep turning pages and discovering new voices.