100 Ghost Street: The Return of Richard Speck
Director: N/A
Starring: Jim Shipley, Tony Lee Beson
Studio: The ASYLUM
ASIN: B007UTB5JO
Release Date: July 24, 2012
Running Time: 90 minutes
Rating: Unrated - Contains scenes of strong sexual content, disturbing violence, and horror

Late at night on July 13, 1966, Richard Speck entered the 2319 East 100th Street townhouse that was serving as a dormitory for student nurses and took eight women hostages. Over the course of several hours, Speck murdered six of the eight women by either stabbing or strangling them to death. The seventh victim was raped and then strangled. The eighth woman managed to escape by hiding under the bed. Speck must have lost count, as a ninth woman, who was visiting the other women, stayed hidden until the next morning when she yelled out the window for help.

The police found a smudged fingerprint that belonged to Speck at the crime scene. The police found Speck only after he attempted suicide at a hotel. Speck was tried, convicted, and sentenced to death on November 22, 1968. On November 21, 1972, a judge reversed the death sentence and re-sentenced him to 400 to 1,200 years in prison. Speck was later given the nickname "Birdman" because he kept a pair of sparrows in his cell. Speck died on December 5, 1991 from a heart attack.

2319 East 100th Street has become one of the most haunted places in Chicago. The ASYLUM Home Entertainment has recently released their newest horror movie to DVD and Blu-Ray titled 100 Ghost Street: The Return of Richard Speck that was filmed in a documentary style in the tradition of the Blair Witch Project.

A Matter of Matter
By: L. Ron Hubbard
Publisher: Galaxy Press
ISBN: 978-1592122394
Pub. Date: June 28, 2010
Running Time: Approx. 2 hours 30 minutes


Many famous writers got their start writing countless short stories that appeared in Pulp Magazines in the 1930s and 1940s. These magazines were made from pulpwood paper, which were the complete opposite of the higher-class magazines of the time period. Pulp magazines didn't need fancy designs as all they needed were amazing stories written by great authors. Times were tough back then with the depression, and readers were looking for cheap adventures to take their mind off their problems.

Galaxy Press was nice enough to send me five audiobooks last month from their Stories from the Golden Age collection. A Matter of Matter is my last audio from these five, containing four science fiction shorts - A Matter of Matter, The Conroy Diary, The Planet Makers and The Obsolete Weapon. The voice actors in these stories are Josh R. Thompson, Corey Burton, R.F. Daley, Jim Meskimen (He also was the director.), Tait Ruppert, and Michael Yurchak.

 

What inspired me to write about vampires and werewolves? 

Whether I am writing for Young Adult readers or Adult readers, I always seem to be writing about werewolves and vampires. Why? Well, the answer is: I’m not sure.

I know, and I’ve been told more than once, that this is a frustrating answer to readers and new writers. We always want to think that writers know exactly what they’re doing, know exactly why they do things.

This may be true of some writers—but for me a lot of things come to me because they come to me. I don’t know what inspired them but I’m glad they show up.

In the case of Subversive, and the entire Warrior series, I did have the desire to bring Vampires back to what they were when I was a young adult: scary. I loved the books that are out right now that have a vampire hero who is sweet and non-threatening but those were no the vampires I grew up with.

The Wicked Wives
By: Gus Pelaggatti
Publisher: Mill City Press, Inc.
ASIN: B005784LB4
Pub. Date: July 22, 2011
Pages: 304

The Wicked Wives is based on true events that took place in Philadelphia during the year 1938, in which seventeen women murdered their husbands. Giorgio DiSipio, an Italian lothario, gave each of the women a deadly substance to give to their husbands, which resulted in their deaths. The women were conned into believing that Giorgio loved them and that he would runaway with them once their husbands were dead.

One of these husbands was Reggie Stoner, who's death is first ruled as pneumonia, but later the cause of death is changed to arsenic poisoning, but was never ruled as a homicide until the First Assistant DA Tom Rossi discovered that Mrs. Stoner was to receive a hefty insurance check. Soon the Rossi learns of Mrs. Stoner's affair with DiSipio, and he places murder charges against her, but there is a twist. Her uncle happens to be the Deputy Mayor Bill Evans, who interferes with the investigation. Evans is corrupted and has ties all over the city, even in the police department. Now here is another twist, Mrs. Stoner was fooling around with her uncle in exchange for money.

In a blink of an eye, Grace becomes terrified as she notices that her five-year-old daughter, Mary, is not beside her. They had went into the mall to shop at a department store, to get a present for Grace's mother-in-law, when she went to pay for the gift that is when she noticed that Mary had disappeared. Just like any parent would do, she panicked and began shouting for Mary. The store manager and security become involve in the situation. After searching the entire store, there was no sign of Mary.

The mall's security guards could not find the little girl either, whom Grace says is special because she can heal the sickly and cheer up the depressed. The police are called in and Lieutenant Samuel Abraham of the Los Angeles police department. He interviews Grace and along with the other police officers, he searches the mall with no clue to where or what happened to Mary. Therefore, he calls the FBI into the picture.

Mary returns home with the police and FBI and her husband, John, arrives from work eagerly to assist them. The phones are tapped, but no kidnapper ever calls them.

A Hunter's Angel 
(The Hunter's Dagger Series)
Written by: Cera duBois
Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
ASIN: B008MZ5ONS
Pub Date: July 18, 2012
Pages: 212

Twenty-eight-year-old Grace Wallace has recently been elected as the new Police Chief of Clayton, Pennsylvania. Normally, the small town is peaceful, but lately there have been a string of unsolved murders. Prior to moving back to her hometown, Grace was a homicide detective in Philadelphia, where she helped track down a serial killer who drank human blood. The Clayton murders were similar to her old serial case as the victims' throats were slashed and drained of all their blood. Maybe a copycat killer?

The case is too big for the young Police Chief to handle, so the FBI are called in to help track down the killer. Of course the FBI agent assigned to lead the case is Grace's ex, Ian McHenry, in which she still has desires for. Ian wanted to be assigned to case as he has a connection to the killer. Ian is a vampire!