A Ghost Story

Many of you know I used to be an opera singer. Today, I'm bringing you an author who used to be a ballerina--Erin Kellison. She's a fellow Leisure Lady who offered to stand in for me here while I'm indisposed. (I should be coming home from the hospital today, so I'll be sure to pop on and let you know I'm ok!) Please give Erin a great Blog Tourista welcome! And now, my blog is yours, Erin.
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First of all, a big thank you to Emily Bryan for sharing her blog with me while she is away. My hugs and best wishes go with her. As for readers of her blog, I’ve got two books, Shadow Bound and Shadow Fall, ready to give away to a blog commenter.


I love ghost stories. And I hate them. They scare me, and worse, my imagination has a tendency to play with them long into the night, hours from the original telling, until the structure and the content of the story has shifted just enough to dig at my deepest fears. Those nights, I sleep with the light on.

My head has been working on one particular ghost story for years: The ballet, Giselle. A long time ago, way back when, I used to be pretty serious about ballet. I wasn’t crazy about modern choreography; I wanted story ballets. Actually, I just wanted the stories. But of all the ballets, Giselle entranced me the most.

Giselle is a tragic love story in the first act; an eerie ghost story in the second. Once upon a time, I got to be one of the wilis, the bitter spirits of broken hearted women who populate the woods in the ghostly second act of the ballet. They trap men wandering the woods at night and condemn them to dance to their deaths. It’s a nightmare in black and white; the deep, still forest and the insubstantial bright spirits waiting to torture passersby. Myrtha, the wili queen, will point at the next victim, you, then circle her hands over her head, will dance, then cross her wrists before her, until you are dead. You will dance until you are dead. Creepy, no? The victims beg the wilis for release, but one by one we would literally turn a cold, ghost-white shoulder.

The setting could easily be my Twilight, a between place of magic in my Shadow series. Twilight is about beauty, inspiration, and nightmare. In Shadow Fall, my heroine is Annabella, a ballerina making her debut in the lead role of Giselle. The story of the ballet plays a huge role in Shadow Fall, a dark fantasy, mixed with romance.

What are your favorite ghost stories?
Back cover blurb for Shadow Fall:

Sacrifice
Custo Santovari accepted pain, blood, even death, to save his best friend. But a man with all his sins just isn't cut out to be an angel.

MysteryOne moment he's fleeing Heaven; the next, he's waking up stark naked in Manhattan. In the middle of a war. Called there by a woman who's desperately afraid of the dark.

ShadowIt gathers around Annabella as she performs, filled with fantastic images of another world, bringing both a golden hero and a nightmare lover.

WolfHe pursues her relentlessly, twisting her desires even as she gives herself to the man she loves. Because each of us has a wild side, and Annabella is about to unleash the beast.

Buy links for Shadow Fall:

Amazon
B&N
Books a million

A bit about Erin:
Erin Kellison is the author of the Shadow Series, which includes Shadow Bound and Shadow Fall. Stories have always been a central part of Erin Kellison's life. She graduated summa cum laude with a degree in English Language and Literature, and went on for a masters in Cultural Anthropology, focusing on oral storytelling. She lives in Arizona with her two beautiful daughters and husband, and she will have a dog (breed undetermined) when her youngest turns five.

You can contact Erin though her website, http://www.erinkellison.com/, where you can also sign up to receive her newsletter, but also

Twitter: http://twitter.com/ekellison
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/erin.kellison

Buy links for Shadow Bound:
Amazon
B&N
Books a million

Emily here again. Thank you, Erin for being such a great guest host today.

Be sure to leave a comment or question for Erin for your chance to win one of her terrific books!