Michael C. Laney is a Florida born independent writer of horror and erotica, and he has been writing and doing other creative things from a young age. He began making home made comic books and comic strips when he was in elementary school to entertain his parents and grandparents. Then in 1986, when he was in the sixth grade, he decided to write his first true short story. Using an old typewriter that was given to him by his grandmother he banged out his first short story “Bleeders”, a horror story that took its inspiration from the Roger Corman Monsterpiece Attack Of The Giant Leeches.
Throughout his junior high and high school years he was known for churning out cringe-worthy short stories such as “The Rocking Chair”, “The Dinner Guest” and “The Street” as well as co-writing a Doctor Who fan-fiction spoof “The Daleks And The Ex-Lax Pit” with his friend Jerry Dooley because writing stories was a lot more fun than shop class. Many of his classmates assured him that he was going to be a writer, and knowing it was his passion he began writing his first horror novel, Whispers Of Darkness, during his senior year.
After high school he tried his hand at writing erotica with his first BDSM erotic short story “Older Is Bedder”, which 19 years later became the first story he had posted online. His other early erotic stories were simple and somewhat experimental affairs such as “Trisexual” and “Ebony And Ivory”. The bulk of his early erotic stories were first read by his best friend Scott Smith and by Shain Brown who is now a budding author in the YA field.
In 1994 Michael moved to Missouri, where he wrote he considered to be his definitive draft of Whispers Of Darkness. For the next two years he shopped around for agents and publishers with no success. Rather than deal with the politics of the writing world he shifted his writing into “hobby” mode, feeling it would be better to enjoy his writing on his own than feeling it was a burden. Between 1994 and 1999 he wrote The Echoes Of Yesterday, a prequel to Whispers Of Darkness, as well as the bulk of its sequel The Reconstruction. He also wrote the horror novel The Creeper, the erotic novella A Day In The Life Of Abagail King, a partial novel titled The History Of Dead End Junction, and several short stories including “Nookie Between Neighbors”, “The Corruption Of Jillian Tamm”, “High Rollers”, “Ye Olde Shit House Rat”, “Chihuahua Psychology 101”, “Sex After Death” and “Fungi”.
In 2000 Michael returned to Florida after the end of his first marriage, where his writing went further onto the back burner for several years. Then in 2004 the writing bug bit harder than ever and he began working on a new horror novel Dweller In Darkness. His wife Betsy was not a big horror fan, so he decided to write something for her a well, an erotic BDSM novel The Sound Of her MASTER’S VOICE. In between chapters of the latter he wrote several erotic short stories including “Town Slut”, “Fuck Flowers, Fuck Candy…This Is A Gift You Can Really Use”, “Thank You, Ma’am And Sir”, “Halloweenie” and “Sound Of Bounce”.
Then in 2010 an idea occurred to Michael. Surely there were websites that accepted stories for posting online. A quick search revealed that there indeed were, and by the end of the week he had submitted “Older Is Bedder” and “Descent To Venus”. Finally having his works in print so a broader audience could read them sent Michael into a new flurry of creative activity. He began a new series about a hot wife who’s husband loves to observe her playing with other men without them knowing, Watching April. He also churned out several erotic works such as the short stories “What If I…Played The Switch For You?” and “My Halloween Decorating Distraction”, a few dozen poems including ‘Graveyard Sunrise’, ‘M BBW SBBW’ and ‘Woman With Plumage’. He also completed the novel that became Heather’s Journey: The Sound Of her MASTER’S VOICE and submitted it for an abridged, chapter by chapter, publication. He also updated his horror short story “Fungi” and submitted it for online publication in time for Halloween.
At the beginning of 2011 Michael learned that “Fungi” had been plagiarized and was being sold as part of a collection of similarly stolen stories available for e-Readers on Amazon and Lulu. Once he had fought to have the “author” and “her works” removed from circulation he became curious to know how easy was it to publish an e-Book. After a few hours of research he found that the political circle of publishers and agents did not control the digital domain, and that reformatting his works for publication was a simple matter. So after doing another edit and restoring certain scenes to Heather’s Journey: The Sound Of her MASTER’S VOICE Michael published it within a month on both Amazon and Lulu, realizing a near life long dream after less than a year of submitting his first story online.
To date Michael has additionally published his erotic short stories “Bunny Holes” and “St. Patrick’s Day Scrumpin’ ” on Amazon, and intends to add more short stories in the future. He is currently working on the next novel in the Heather’s Journey series, a Fungi oriented short story and novella collection, constructing a new beginning for what is now known as the Shadows Of The Night series, which Whispers Of Darkness will actually be the third book of, and a revised version of his erotic novella A Day In The Life Abagail King and his horror novel The Creeper.
Michael has two children from his first marriage. His youngest son, Quentin, lives with him, and his oldest son, Alex, attends school in Missouri. He met his wife, Betsy, on 9/11, a week ahead of when they had actually planned to meet, and they have been inseparable ever since.
Michael is a huge fan of Kiss, The Doors, Prince, Doctor Who, One Piece, Kamen Rider, WWE and classic B to Z Grade science fiction and horror movies, many of which he watched on Dr. Paul Bearer’s Creature Feature growing up. His works often contain oddball references to all his favorite things. He likes to write about average people who find themselves thrust into extraordinary circumstances. He also writes stories involving scenarios outside what is considered average and tasteful, writing stories of substance and grit instead of fluff, or stories appropriate for “all ages”. In his horror stories many of his characters have the horrors many people face in their every day lives tormenting them alongside the supernatural forces they run afoul of. Michael is a sexual abuse and rape survivor and draws on the horror of his own experiences as inspiration and as a coping tool.
Michael’s goal within the next two years is to have finished and published the first novel in the Shadows Of The Night series, Comes The Dark Storm. The series revolves around the lives of a group of high school friends living in the town of Ariana, Florida, who suddenly find their lives turned upside down by supernatural occurrences, as an inhuman creature, vampires and witches begin to take over the night. He is also working on setting most of his stories into a consistent universe. Time allowing there is much to come from Michael C. Laney, so keep lurking for more news.
Blog:
http://www.houseofmastervyle.blogspot.com
Amazon Author Page:
http://www.amazon.com/Michael-C.-Laney/e/B004QIVJTS/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_1
Twitter:
http://twitter.com/Master_Vyle
article by Michael C. Laney