Morbid Curiosity

Title: Morbid Curiosity
Published by: Leisure Books
Release Date: November 4, 2010
Pages: 372
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Synopsis

It seemed like the answer to Haley’s prayers. The most popular girl in her high school promised Haley that her life would change forever if only she performed certain dark rituals. And if Haley can convince her twin sister to participate, their power will double. Together they will be able to summon mystical entities that will do their bidding, some more powerful than they ever dreamed possible.

But these are uncontrollable forces, forces that can kill—forces that demand to be . . . fed.

Backstory

At its core, Morbid Curiosity is about a set of sixteen-year-old twin girls whose lives are turned upside down after their father dies and their mother is committed to a hospital after she attempts suicide. Without parents, the girls are eventually shipped off to Mississippi to live with grandparents they hardly know, and it’s there they decide to take control of their lives by way of Chaos Magic. The one thing they don’t count on conjuring up, though, is their own death sentence.

The inspiration for this story came while I was doing research on shamans for another book. I found a link on a website marked ‘sigils’, and curiosity sent me clicking away. The information I discovered on sigils and Chaos Magic blew me away. The intense measures that many practitioners (most of them teens) use to ‘charge’ and ‘feed’ their sigils is nothing short of horrifying. Some claim to have gone so far as committing murder. I couldn’t NOT do a story on that.

Praise

He had been forced into closets before, but never by a witch. At least he thought she was a witch . . .

“Deborah LeBlanc’s MORBID CURIOSITY treats this plot like few others in horror and saves a well-worn concept from cliché by creating memorable characters and plot twists aplenty. Leblanc isn’t afraid to go for the throat in this tale of two sisters.”
Dark Scribe Magazine

“LeBlanc paints a very vivid picture that keeps the reader entranced with its terrible beauty.”
The Horror Channel

Excerpt

He had been forced into closets before, but never by a witch. At least he thought she was a witch . . .

Ten-year-old Caster Morbadelli clamped his teeth over his bottom lip and inched his way to the closet door on his knees. In the utter darkness, time and space seemed to go on forever. He stretched out a hand, willing his fingers past his fear to the wooden door that separated him from his father, whom he prayed had not left him behind. The scent of mildew, dirty underwear, and old blood swam in and out of his nostrils and roiled through his empty stomach. A tear trickled past the right side of his nose to his mouth, and Caster flicked his tongue over the droplet, capturing it. He needed to pee.

He didn’t know how long he’d been in the closet, but it felt like an eternity. When he and his father had first arrived at Madame Toussant’s, the sun had been clotted over with storm clouds, which made it feel like late afternoon. But Caster knew better. It had been morning. One of those bad mornings when he woke on his own instead of to the sound of his stepmother’s deep scratchy voice, yelling for him to get out of bed and go fetch her cigarettes in the living room.

She was gone again. He knew it, felt it before he rolled out of bed and crept into the empty kitchen. Knowing the really bad part would come as soon his father woke and discovered she was gone, Caster quickly poured himself a bowl of stale cornflakes. It would probably be the only chance he’d have to eat today. As usual, there was no milk in the refrigerator, so he doused the cereal with tap water and was about to dig a spoon into the swill when he heard a crash from his father’s bedroom. So much for breakfast.

Within a matter of minutes, his father’s curses echoed through their small apartment, escalating in volume and vehemence as he hurriedly dressed, pausing only long enough to hurl a perfume bottle, her hairbrush, a can of shaving cream across the room. Caster knew the drill because they’d been through it so many times before. Once the throwing began, he had about five minutes to dress before his father dragged him outside. The rest of the day would be spent combing the streets of New Orleans, looking for her, something Caster couldn’t understand. If the woman didn’t want to be with them, why did his father keep begging her to come back? He’d never been brave enough to ask that question aloud.

Copyright 2007-2008 Deborah LeBlanc

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