A Concept Born on Crimespace

[Jude Hardin]

Remember this thread? Here's what I've come up with.

Welcome to Pewee Valley, Tennessee, population 642. Three retired carnival workers--a clown, a fortuneteller, and a magician--friends since childhood, are celebrating Thanksgiving at different locations when a sinister presence buried long ago deceptively claws its way to their conscious minds. It seems the men have been anointed from the fountain of youth, but their newfound vigor comes with a hefty price tag: human lives. Relentlessly prodded by the insatiable entities that have taken up residence in their brains, they will stop at nothing to get “the fuel.”

Derek Wall, the lone constable on patrol, just wants to finish his shift and drink himself to sleep in front of the TV. He looks forward to a call from his daughter, but otherwise the holiday means nothing to him. Responding to a 9-1-1 for a domestic dispute, he walks into a double murder scene and then is kidnapped by the suspect--a young woman named Jo who is determined to prove that her octogenarian grandfather was responsible for the carnage.

Isolated by last night’s ice storm and a twenty-car pileup on the interstate leading to town, Derek and Jo team-up to track the rogue grandpa. As the body count rises, though, it becomes apparent that there is more than one killer and that an unseen force is controlling them.

[I. J. Parker]

Supernatural? Paranormal?

[Jude Hardin]

We're never really sure whether the "sinister presence" is supernatural or extraterrestrial, I.J.

[Jon Loomis]

Maybe it's both. Ghost aliens! Vampires from Mars!

[Jude Hardin]

Ghost aliens. Hmm...

[Dana King]

This has Christopher Moore written all over it.

[Jude Hardin]

I've never read him, Dana. I'll have to check him out!

[Dana King]

Try THE STUPIDEST ANGEL. It's a howl. I've heard good things about his other stuff, too.

[Jude Hardin]

I went to his website and read a few paragraphs. Seems like a vulgar Dave Barry writing horror parody. I like it!

[minervaK]

I'm in.

MK
www.minervakoenig.com

[Jude Hardin]

Thanks Minerva. It's a fun little book, I think.

[Jon Loomis]

You lost me at "sinister presence," but I'm obviously not the audience for this kind of thing. The ice-storm AND twenty-car pileup is a good touch--it always helps if people are cut off from civilization in these scenarios. Let's say the telephone lines are down, too--and the lone cell-phone tower along the interstate is so covered in ice that it's only functioning intermittently. Let's say mad turkey disease, or whatever we're calling it, is caused by a fast-acting prion with collective "hive" intelligence (Borg-seed, as it were), seeded in turkeys by aliens with a sense of humor bent on the destruction of humankind.

[Jude Hardin]

Some good ideas there, Jon. You should write your own book!