F. P. Dorchak

Speculative Fiction (New Weird) Author

Spooky

The Assumption Cemetery

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The Assumption Cemetery, October 2013
The Assumption Cemetery, October 2013

Yesterday I posted about Silver Cliff Cemetery. Today, I’m posting about the sister cemetery up a little farther on that little dirt road, called The Assumption Cemetery. It’s a Catholic cemetery (and I’ve read Silver Cliff was a Protestant cemetery) and isn’t as old as Silver Cliff.  Most of the graves in Silver Cliff were 1800s, while in Assumption, there were many more contemporary graves.

Curiously, my wife and I noted a preponderance of “Franks” buried here.

That reminded me of the time my dad and I were staring down at my grandfather’s gravestone during my grandfather’s service, over 21 years ago. My grandfather was the “Sr.” of the “Jr.” and the “III” of us, but his gravestone did not have “Sr” on it. After the service I turned to my dad and remarked how that was our name on the gravestone. We both chuckled at how unreal it was attending our “own” funeral!

Anyway, since this was later in the day, I loved the long shadows that developed at Assumption; it reminded me of the Vincent Price film, House of the Long Shadows, I’d just watched the other night. It definitely added an extra bit of atmosphere to the place. And there are a couple shots I have that really turned out great, one a small tilted wooden cross and another of a wooden cross propped up by bricks that lent a particularly eerie (human?) shadow….

Note, I’ve attached links to my other cemetery posts, below. Take a tour!

So, without further ado, here is The Assumption Cemetery:

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Silver Cliff Cemetery

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Silver Cliff Cemetery, Silver Cliff, Colorado
Silver Cliff Cemetery, Silver Cliff, Colorado

Yesterday, my wife and I visited the Silver Cliff Cemetery, at Silver Cliff, Colorado. It’s a stone’s throw east from Westcliffe, Colorado. We picked this cemetery because of the drive…and that it’s supposedly haunted. It’s listed as the “most haunted” (scroll to the bottom to read about it) Colorado cemetery. Of course, you need darkness and a moonless night to see the supposed blue and white lights, but we went during the day…also to go on a drive on such a beautiful, crisp October day that it was. We saw no glowing lights that are said to hover above the graves, and are also written up in National Geographic (August 1969, Volume 136, No. 2). I did a quick search for the NatGeo magazine, but didn’t find any entry into one, just outlets looking to sell it to me, and now, to search NatGeo’s archives, you need an account. Not creating one.

Our visit was interesting…once entering Silver Cliff, you take a left on an unmarked street (should have been labeled “Mill Street”) just before the only pizza joint in town (on the left), drive down a short stretch of Mill Street blacktop, then onto a dirt road, which takes you out into the open Colorado plains. Lots of sun and wind. Open space. This, as well as another cemetery we also visited just up the dirt road from it, The Assumption Cemetery (will post tomorrow), both repose before the beautiful Sangre de Cristo mountains. Basically, they’re not your typical, Night of the Living Dead layout, but, this is Colorado. They both had some beautiful and interesting gravestones, and, as always, these places always fascinate me about the lives lived and lost. Who were they—really? How’d they die? How’d they live?

What are they doing now?

Here are some links to read about Silver Cliff:

Top Colorado Cemeteries to visit

Silver Cliff Town

Silver Cliff Lore 1 (lights)

Silver Cliff Lore 2

Silver Cliff Lore 3 (lights)

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The Uninvited—Now In Paperback!

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The Uninvited - Paperback (© F. P. Dorchak and Duvall Design)
The Uninvited – Paperback (© F. P. Dorchak and Duvall Design)

“The images invaded my thoughts when I wasn’t reading the book.”

CDurandette (The Uninvited reader)

Just in time for Hallowe’en, The Uninvited is now available as a 6 x 9 trade paperback!

Right this moment (October 26th), it’s just available through CreateSpace’s link, but keep checking for the Amazon link update. Though the page counts differ between the e-book and paperback (327 for e-book, 282 for paperback), nothing is lost. Same story, just different formatting

Karen Duvall, of Duvall Design, designed this cover. I will be interviewing her next month. Thanks for the bang-up job, Karen! My interior formatter was Pam Headrick, of A Thirsty Mind. I plan on interviewing her in no short order, too. Pam is quite patient and ever so thorough—thanks, Pam!

Recent events have forced me to reconsider my earlier timeline of releasing some other work, this year, so I no longer plan on releasing anything new in the remainder of 2013. Further releases of pending novels will now be sometime next year.

So, if you’re looking for another creepy read, please do check out the paperback version of The Uninvited! I’ve written with you in mind….

Praise for The Uninvited:

“This book was quite an unexpected pleasure. I began by following a journalist into a gruesome crime scene in Florida and in a short time I found myself thinking about this novel when I was shopping, having coffee or doing chores. The characters are interesting and well developed through the book to the very end. The development of the storyline was unanticipated so I hate to tell you too much about it here in the review, but I highly recommend this novel as a good way to spend your time.”

CDurandette (an Uninvited reader)

“I get the chills… a most impressive work.”

Rob Butts, Seth Material Facilitator/Author, The Seth Material, The Early Sessions, The Personal Sessions

“At some point in our lives we contemplate, among numerous things, the demise of past souls and the inexplicable ‘natural’ comfort (or immediate aversion) we feel with some upon first meeting. F. P. Dorchak’s The Uninvited presents the possibilities through an ominous tale that explores and may provide reason for such sensitivities, while explaining the evil borne (and perpetrated) by society’s sinister few.”

Jan C.J. Jones, CoExecutive Producer – Researcher/Writer, Forest Rose Productions, LLC

“The Uninvited is a dynamic, intense novel. F. P. Dorchak weaves his story adeptly, with skill and precision. He easily intertwines the worlds of reincarnation and quantum physics to create a powerful, suspenseful experience for the reader.”

Sydney Heflin, Ed. D. Former Research Chair, International Association for Regression Research and Therapies.

“If psychological and even physical characteristics can follow us from lifetime to lifetime, can revenge and retribution be far behind? In his chilling novel, The Uninvited, author F. P. Dorchak explores the dark side reincarnation. It’s a good read. Hard to put down.”

Dr. Robert T. James, author of Passport to Past Lives. The Evidence.

“I found I could not stop reading… I became totally fascinated by the depth of Dorchak’s exploration into the many influences beneath the hostilities performed. I was especially delighted with his reference to the modern pioneer in metaphysics and philosophy, Jane Roberts—right there beside the famous psychic Edgar Cayce. Today’s police and lawyers need this novel!”

Madelon Rose Logue, Editor/Publisher The Black Sheep

(© F. P. Dorchak and Lon Kirschner)
(© F. P. Dorchak and Lon Kirschner)
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The Woman in Black

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My wife and I watched this 2012 film last night and, though there were some odd incongruities I can’t mention because they give elements of the plot away, it was overall pretty cool! What I really loved about the film was the atmosphere and some of the really cool visuals. The story is a period piece about a lawyer (Daniel Radcliffe, of Harry Potter fame) who has lost his wife and has to raise his child on his own (well, with a nanny), and is sent to a dead woman’s estate (the “Eel Marsh House,” at a cool setting involving tidal washes) to close it out. Of course, the supernatural ensues. This film is produced with several companies, one of which is Hammer Films. I love Hammer films! They have such richly created and stylish worlds to all their productions, and I was not at all disappointed this time around. It was neat to see “Hammer Films” up on a screen again!

Now, this is not like your current crop of flicks that go all gory and hack-and-slash crazy, and I loved that. It was a ghost story. It was psychological and carefully played out. About shadows and reflections and peripheral visions.

Creepy.

That would be the operative word!

Check out this site, and the last video, titled “Classic Ghost Story.” Then catch the film itself, at night, in a dark room….

During afternoon tea, there’s a shift in the air.
A bone-trembling chill that tells you she’s there.
There are those who believe the whole town is cursed.
But the house in the marsh is by far the worst.
What she wants is unknown, but she always comes back.
The specter of darkness, the Woman in Black.

From FirstCovers.com.

ERO—On Sale Now!

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ERO (© F. P. Dorchak and Lon Kirschner)
ERO (© F. P. Dorchak and Lon Kirschner)

Well, my team and I have done it—Lon Kirschner, Pam Headrick, Cherry Weiner, and all the other readers and people (see Acknowledgements/Author Note in the beginning of the book) who have read and commented and helped out in any way—ERO is finally available through Smashwords, Amazon, and soon, Nook (not yet processed; please, keep checking back)! Thanks, for everything, folks! I’m charging $5.99 for this book. It’s bigger and I have more money invested in it. I will shortly be working on getting the physical copy out there; it takes more coordination.

Wow, what a sprint. As with The Uninvited, it’s so weird to actually, finally see this out there after so many years (seven). I have in my writing log that I started plotting for the novel on March 6, 2006, and started actually writing the manuscript itself “in earnest” on March 9th, around 4 p.m. (Mountain Time). I’d called the working title of the manuscript Brilliant Eyes. You’ll see that tile in the story. I also note in the log, that a few days later—March 11th—my wife and I took a trip to Roswell, NM. Yeah, that Roswell. That was an interesting trip. Met and talked with some very interesting people, including an “Earth Station Roswell” guy who took us into his back room to spend a serious amount of time talking with us about his plans for a huge Roswell conference center using advanced/state-of-the-art technology in creating this center…basically, making it like a huge UFO mothership for the conference center itself. It was so cool. Incredibly cool. And we thanked him for the honor of his taking the time he did talking with us. He and I had to have been talking about an hour or more. Anyway, I’d kept tabs on him for a couple years, but last heard he’d been fighting not only water rights issues, but his fellow locals, for him pulling the “UFO business” out of downtown Roswell, and to the “front” of Roswell. I’ll have to check up on all this, now, that I’m reminding myself of it. Maybe interview him for my blog.

This also reminds me of the woman behind That Crazy Lady Down The Road, Judy Messoline (I have a signed copy of her book; will now have to give her the same, since I’d been talking up my book with her for years), and her UFO Watchtower. We’d gone down to see her many times over the years, and would just hang out and B.S. with her at her place, in the 90+ degree heat…watching the summer thunderheads roll in and out, talking about UFO sightings and, once, even getting some violin lessons from another lady also hanging out with Judy. This lady also went on to play some violin music. That was sooo cool, the four of us and Judy’s dogs, out in the middle of nowhere, violin music gracing the airwaves! After visiting her the first time, my wife and I then went around the area asking residents whether or not they’d seen anything weird, and, boy, did we hear some stuff. One was told us from a person who told us their grandmother used to sit on their front porch and watch UFOs rise out of Blanca Mountain (the prominent peak down there). Their grandmother’s time was the late 1800s.

Well. Here it is. My opus. My space opera. My signature work, as I’ll call it, because that’s how I look at this one. Of all I’ve written, and those who have read all of my work (including my ex-agent), this is the one everyone loves the most. This is my “Big Book.” It’s got it all: intrigue, love, conspiracies, UFOs, aliens, thinky stuff, scary stuff, funny stuff. Parts of my life. My DNA.

Thoughts for our future.

And I give it all to you.

I hope you enjoy it. Thank you for stopping by, and I thank you all in advance for taking a chance on it.

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ERO—The Research…and the Truth

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Grainy B&W image of supposed UFO, Passoria, Ne...
Grainy B&W image of supposed UFO, Passoria, New Jersey Edited version of Image:PurportedUFO NewJersey 1952 07 31.gif. By Bach01. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

ERO is about how one lieutenant’s life had changed after having become part of the UFO conspiracy machine.

It’s fiction.

I made it all up.

There are aspects of my real life embedded within the story…but not in any of the fantastical, conspiracy theory laden aspects. I have an active imagination, is all. I began the story with a single premise I can’t say, because it actually gives away the story, and added to it from a host of material. Most of the scenes just flowed into the writing as it happened, but, occasionally, I added material I’d read about and thought would make for some cool scenes. One of the continued scenes I added was from a book I found, called Above Black, by Dan Sherman. It blew me away, and I thought, huh, that’d be neat to include. So, I contacted the author and asked him if I could incorporate it into my novel. We did a short Q&A exchange, and he said I could. So, once I incorporated it, I’d sent him a copy of it to review. Never heard back from him one way or the other, but appreciated him letting me incorporate it. Thanks, Mr. Sherman, hope I did it justice and hope you are faring well.

Another instance of incorporation involved using the Communion books, by Whitley Strieber. Though I did not contact Mr. Strieber (or did and had no response, I can no longer remember), I borrowed certain aspects from his work. Those who have read his work will recognize where I have done so. Again, I’m not going to give away the scenes, but when I read Mr. Strieber’s work, again, I was blown away by what I read. If half of what I’d read was true, life truly is more fantastical than many of us realize. And, if you read other works, more frightening. If you are to believe some of this material (see bibliography, below), people have died talking about some of this stuff. And, if you believe some of this material, our lives are not our own, and never have been. That’s the problem with conspiratorial writing. Over the years I have read tons of books on UFOs and extraterrestrials, especially as a kid. As an adult, I scaled back quite a bit…until I wrote ERO. To be honest, some of this material scared me. One book in particular put me into a particular “funk” after having read it (and, it’s the only book I’ve read that actually had a disclaimer up front, almost trying to keep you from reading it!). Other books appalled me. Others, amused.

Are our lives our own?

Is there another, shadow government out there quietly running the world?

Is the Truth obfuscated for dark, nefarious purposes?

Do UFOs and extraterrestrials exist?

These kinds of questions plagued me the more I read about conspiracy theories as I wrote ERO, and tugged and tore at my belief systems. Eventually, I’ve made peace with it. Whatever is going on out there is and has been going on out there with or without my direct knowledge of it and will continue t do so. Do I believe in everything I’ve read? No, I don’t. And it doesn’t matter, because it really has little impact on my life on a daily basis.

You know, short of ETs coming “out.”

We all live our lives as we do, trying to get by, doing the right thing (most of us). All have our belief systems. And what if these conspiracy theories are just another alternate reality that intersects with all our individual realities, in that, it’s not really real…just an alternate present/past/future we touch on when we “go there.” That life is really all sunshine and rainbows and ice cream…but when we start talking “dark,” then this other reality “Venn diagrams” its way into our reality, our consciousness? And, if that is the case, then we can just as easily not allow it into our consciousness by not believing in it.

I know, a bunch of hooey, to most. But, it’s the perfect “conspiracy machine.” This whole world obfuscates everything. And it doesn’t cost those who may be control a dime.

Isn’t that perfect?

Because, those who may be running things…the secret societies, the shadow governments…get what they need. Confusion. What is real, and what is imagined?

If people really had died in talking about any of this stuff, how did others survive while talking about it? To help put your minds at ease, from what I’d read, those who had theoretically died from “talking” had actually, theoretically taken part in the dark, hidden worlds of UFO/extraterrestrial operations (or had actually “known something”)…had been pledged to eternal silence…then spoke out once they “left” the organization. Now, if anyone is any kind of familiar with the science fiction world, you well know, once you enter any kind of weird Secret Society, you never, really leave. At least that’s what we’re told from the like of the SyFy channel and similar ilk. Yet…one or two still claim to do it and survive, and reasons are given, usually they’re smaller players, or not big enough names making big enough splashes, with important enough wave-making…or because the do muddy the waters just enough to be of benefit to the whole obfuscation process.

Or, it could all be fake.

It’s a weird world out there, Horatio

So, all that said, I’m just a know-nothing guy who had a cool idea in his head for several years and finally wrote it down. I have zero experience with any kinds of UFOs (uh, as far as I know…) nor any kind of experience in any kind of “dark operations.” This entire plot came solely from my imagination and into which I incorporated elements of publicly available material, to which I freely attribute my sources and acknowledgement of their efforts. I am grateful to everyone who wrote their books, and, in some cases, were brave enough to do so.

Don’t take anything for granted. Your life is yours…make the best of it and do not let anyone take away any of your rights to it. And, like a favorite television show used to say every week:

The Truth is Out There.

My ERO research material:

ABOVE BLACK, OneTeam Publishing, 1997, 2006, by Dan Sherman, ISBN 0-9660978-0-7

ALIEN AGENDA, HarperCollinsPublishers, 1997, by Jim Marrs, ISBN 0-06-109686-5

Body Of Secrets, Anchor Books, 2002, by James Bamford, ISBN 0-385-49908-6

BREAKTHROUGH, HarperCollinsPublishers, 1995, by Whitley Strieber, ISBN 0-06-017653-9

Communion, Beech Tree Books, 1987, by Whitley Strieber, ISBN 0-688-07086-8

CRASH AT CORONA, Paraview Special Editions, 2004, by Don Berliner and Stanton Friedman, ISBN 1-931044-89-9

DARK MISSION: THE SECRET HISTORY OF NASA, BY Richard C. Hoagland and Mike Bara, Feral House, ISBN 978-1-932595-26-0

Deep Black, Berkley Books, 1988, by William Burrows, ISBN 0-425-10879-1

Dreamland, Villard, 1998, by Phil Patton, ISBN 0-375-75385-0

Leap Of Faith, Harper Torch, 2002, by Gordon Cooper, ISBN 0-06-109877-9

Roswell: Inconvenient Facts and the Will To Believe, Prometheus Books, 2001, Carl T. Pflock, ISBN 1-57392-894-1

Rule by Secrecy, Perennial, 2001, by Jim Marrs, ISBN 978-0-06-093184-1

Sky Walking, Collins/Smithsonian Books, 2006, Tom Jones, ISBN 978-0-06-088436-9

That Crazy Lady Down The Road, Earth Star Publications, 2005, by Judy Messoline, ISBN 0-944851-14-2

THE DAY AFTER ROSWELL, Pocket Books, 1997, by Colonel Philip J. Corso (Ret.) and William J. Birnes, ISBN 0-671-01756-X

The Right Stuff, Bantam Books/Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, 1979/2001, Tom Wolfe, ISBN 0-553-38135-0

The Roswell Legacy, New Page Books, 2009, Jesse and Linda Marcel, Jr., ISBN 978-1-60163-026-1

The works of Seth, Jane Roberts, and Rob Butts

The Zeta Reticuli Incident (and Commentary), AstroMedia Corporation, 1976, Terence Dickinson

Top Secret, The Dictionary of Espionage and Intelligence, Citadel Press, 2005, by Bob Burton, ISBN 0-8065-2650-5

TOP SECRET/MAJIC, Marlowe & Company, 2005, by Stanton T. Friedman. MSc, ISBN 1-56924-342-5

TRANSFORMATION, Avon Books, 1988, by Whitley Strieber, ISBN 0-380-70535-4

UFOs AND THE NATIONAL SECURITY STATE, Hampton Roads Publishing Company, 2002, by Richard M. Dolan, ISBN 1-57174-317-0

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