Let the Tour Begin!!

Virtual Book Tour begins TODAY!!! 

Oct 24th thru the 31st.

Promotion on multiple blogs, websites, Facebook pages, Instagram, Twitter, etc. 

Help spread the word!

Available on Amazon - digital eBook and Paperback

Thank you to Bewitching Book Tours

LaZoom Haunted Comedy Bus Tour...say what?

Asheville North Carolina – LaZoom Haunted Comedy Bus Tour

“Hey babe, for our vacation to Asheville NC next month I booked us a one hour thing called the LaZoom Haunted Comedy bus tour...that should be fun right?”  My wife said smiling enthusiastically.

I stopped sipping my hot coffee and looked up at her from my cup with a completely bewildered look on my face and replied with a certain snarky snapping tone, “Ah what?”

I thought for a moment she had completely lost her mind and then with my playful yet annoyed attitude I asked, “What the Hell are you talking about?”

I thought; “Haunted” and “Comedy” cannot go together, they don’t mix…or do they?

I can tell you folks that “haunted” and “comedy” can in fact mix and give you quite an enjoyable time…at least for us that it did.

We ventured down to Asheville NC in late August of 2018. We had never been there before and decided on a whim to go (actually we saw a tourism commercial on television about the town and both said, “Hey that looks kind of cool, let’s go there).

On a warm Saturday night we arrived at the LaZoom headquarters on 76 Biltmore Ave. The building was funky and the interior was even funkier (is that a real word?). We sat on a comfy couch and had a beer while we waited. The tour bus sat outside and the staff was getting it ready to go. Honestly, I had no idea what to expect. I had been on ghost tours before, but never one that incorporated comedy of any kind and a giant purple painted bus with huge lips on the front.

Once the bus rolled down the street we were greeted by a 300 year old voodoo priest named BoneZee as our tour guide. He was quite a delightful character…a real fire cracker. He regaled us with true haunted stories as we went from one block to another along with his side-kick who helped bring the stories to life; the nun at the church, the bootlegging tunnels during prohibition, the fella that jumped off a building during the Great Depression and so on. He even pulled out his…guitar…and sang a hauntingly rendition of “You give love a bad name” with slight change of wording of course.

The tour was filled with not only a great deal of humor, but real history and real ghost stories as well. We got to see parts of Asheville that we most likely would not have seen on our own. Same is true for the stories of the haunted parts of Asheville. So, it is true, haunted and comedy can indeed mix and you can have a lot of fun doing it. I highly recommend if you are ever in Asheville NC, you definitely book the LaZoom Haunted Comedy Tour. Just look at all the positive reviews on Google, Facebook and Trip Adviser and you’ll know what I mean.

They're HERE!!!!

They’re HERE!!! Ahhhhhhh!!!!

Ladies, Gentleman, ghosts, ghouls and the walking dead…I am extremely happy and so proud to say that Wicked Harvest: Michigan Monsters & Macabre – Series One has been PUBLISHED! And ready for purchase! YEAH!!!!

It is available on Amazon.com as an eBook and Paperback versions.  Please make sure to share the information with family and friends. Give them something awesome to read for the Fall and Halloween season.

Don’t forget to check out the websites at WickedHarvestMI.com and my new author website at JerrodSmelker.com

SO CLOSE!!!

All 10 stories of Wicked Harvest: Michigan Monsters &

Macabre – Series One have been edited as well as the book intro and back of the book info. The cover is finally done as you can see and I personally think it looks awesome!

About one month to get everything put together and published in both digital eBook and paperback formats. I am confident that my October 1^st date to be published will happen. 

It will be available on Amazon.com once published so look for it in October! And please make sure to share with family and friends. Give them something great to read for the Fall and Halloween season.

Don’t forget to check out the websites at WickedHarvestMI.com, LastLeafPublishing.com and my new author website at JerrodSmelker.com

It’s coming together!

Five of the 10 stories of Wicked Harvest: Michigan Monsters & Macabre have been edited…yes I finally found an editor and she is awesome! She is working on editing the other four and soon to edit the last and final story that I just finished called “Class is Dismissed…or is it?” Oooooooo!

So, just about two months left to get everything edited, proof-read, cover designed, back page info, dedications, preface, etc. etc.  Lots to be done in a short amount of time. But, I am confident that my October 1^st date to be published will happen.  

Also, got some cool looking business cards made up…or book info cards or book announcement cards or whatever you’d like to call them. They look awesome and can’t wait to get them out into the public. If you would like some to hand out, post on a bulletin board, etc. please let me know and I will ship you some ASAP. I would appreciate any assistance and promotion I can get.

Don’t forget to check out the website at www.WickedHarvestMI.com as well as my other site www.LastLeafPublishing.com

It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown

Everyone loves nostalgia…or at least, I think they do. I believe most people have certain items, books, movies, shows, magazines, places, and even people that make them nostalgic from time to time. I feel that way quite a bit…and the older I get, the more it happens.

I’ll admit that I long for the days of my childhood when life was simpler, easier with less responsibility and more fun. Growing up in the 70’s and 80’s was a great time. Sure we didn’t have all the cool gadgets we have today, but you know what, that was okay. I miss those days…more often than not. I try not to live or dwell on the past, especially not the regrets. However, I do like to relive certain elements of my youth and that is especially true around fall and Halloween.

So, where am I going with this? Well, growing up there were lots of traditions in my house that my mother thankfully kept going throughout the years. One such tradition was watching the beloved 1966 “Peanuts” television special “It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown”.  When October rolled around each year I would scour through the weekly TV guide (remember those?) trying to find when that marvelous show was going to come on. I just had to watch it each year. It wasn’t the Halloween season without it.

I had to see Snoopy, the World War I flying ace, take on the Red Baron for air supremacy. I had to see Charlie Brown get skunked by that mean’ol Lucy trying to kick the football time and time again. And I had to see if the Great Pumpkin would rise from the pumpkin patch to bring gifts to all the good girls and boys. One of my favorite scenes was Lucy bobbing for apples and coming up with an apple and Snoopy attached to it. “Baugh! My lips touched dog lips! Agh! Poison dog lips!

Love this photo...it will be my phone
wallpaper all fall season

Agh!” HA!!

I always felt bad for Charlie Brown during Trick-or-Treating though; I mean, why were all those mean adults giving him a rock instead of candy? Poor Charlie Brown.

Writing this though I can’t help but feel somewhat saddened by the fact that some traditions may come to an end at some point. I know that I will certainly watch “It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown” until the day I die, but sadly my kids are not interested in it much these days. Granted they are teenagers and have more on their minds than some old cartoon. I guess because I love it so much, I want them to love it. Perhaps someday when grand-kids come along, I can watch it with them. Perhaps it skips a generation and will live on with another. One can only hope.   

“It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown” is charming, lovable, fun, and will get you in the Halloween spirit. If you have never seen it before, I highly recommend you do. Sure it’s over 50 years old, sure it’s cheesy, sure it’s a cartoon, but it’s a classic. Give it a shot. You can bet I’ll be watching this fall.

Thank you to the late great Charles Schultz for bringing a wonderful cartoon, story and characters into my young life and into my adulthood.

True Ghost Story

Friend’s House – Part 1

“The story you are about to hear (read) is true.” I love that line, but seriously, this is a true story that happened to me when I was about 16 years old.

I was staying the night at a friend’s house located in town. His parents were out of town and he and I had the whole place to ourselves. Now, he told me in the past that he thought his house was haunted, but as a 16 year old kid, I basically blew it off. At that time in my life, I didn’t really have any ghostly experiences up until that day. It’s not that I didn’t believe him, but as a 16 year old…I had other things on my mind…like…girls.

Anyway, it was the weekend and I stayed Saturday night. He set me up in his parent’s bedroom to sleep. They had a waterbed…yeah, this was around 1987, so his parents had one of those giant wavy waterbeds. I slept just fine Saturday night with no incidents. That is, until Sunday morning.

Sunday morning came and the sun was already up. I opened my eyes and stretched out my arms. I laid there for a few minutes to collect my thoughts and wondered what I was going to eat for breakfast. As I did, I felt the waterbed move. I didn’t think much of it until the water in the mattress began to move again. At first I thought that perhaps my friend’s cat had jumped up on the bed to greet me a good morning. I lifted my head off of the pillow, looked around my top covers, but found no cat. I laid my head back down and shrugged my shoulders. And then the bed moved again.

I lifted my head off of the pillow again and looked around. There was no cat and no one around. By this time my memory flashed back to when my friend told me his house was possibly haunted. A wave of fear rushed over my entire body and I started to tense up.

As I reached to pull the blanket off of my body I looked down towards my feet. There, on the side of the waterbed I saw the imprint of a person sit down on the mattress. I saw a portion of the mattress sink down about five inches in the perfect shape of someone’s behind. The imprint caused the water in the mattress to move. I could feel the wave go underneath me.

“JEFF!!!!” I screamed as loud as I could for my friend. “JEFF!!” again and again. I was so freaked out. I wanted to jump out of the bed, but didn’t. I wanted to toss the blanket over my head, but I didn’t. I just sat there yelling for my friend to come into the room.

As I heard Jeff’s staggered footsteps enter the room, the imprint vanished. As if the someone or something got up off of the bed right as Jeff entered the room. I was shocked and in disbelief. I was stammering trying to tell my friend what I had just experienced. I was flailing my hands, sweating, breathing heavy and talking extremely fast. My friend just stood there in front of me nodding his head.

I finished telling him what had happened. He just stood there with a blank expression on his face with arms crossed in front of him. “Yup, that happens. You want breakfast?”

👻