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Deep Cold
DEEP COLD is a collection of nine tales by master storyteller Steven J. Conifer, winner of two awards in the 2012 West Virginia Writers Competition.In "Room 133," two young lovers elope in the dead of night, the girl pregnant and both of them virtually penniless. They must flee their strict and controlling parents, start a new life for themselves, but aren't sure where to run to.In "Italian Lobster," a man waiting on his date at a small-town southern diner gets a big surprise from the waitstaff and other patrons - and things quickly spiral out of control.In "Cat in the Moonlight," a man's close friend shows up on his doorstep in the wee hours of the morning, apparently injured. But the friend has a dark secret, and when he reveals the true source of the blood on his clothes, the protagonist suddenly realizes he may be in mortal danger.In "The Fortuitous Death of Dr. Alfred W. Preston," a wealthy, 19th-century logician is unjustly accused of murdering his wife. En route to the county jail, he escapes on foot, only to be bitten a short while later by a venomous snake. When he later comes to in what feels like a coffin, he realizes he was mistaken for dead, and now must find a way not only to escape his premature tomb, but to elude the authorities until he can clear his name and bring the true culprits to justice.Ranging from the macabre to the bizarre, the mournful to the poignant, all of the nine tales gathered in DEEP COLD bear the indelible mark of Conifer's unique storytelling abilities.
360 pages, Paperback
Published February 18, 2013
About the author
Steven J. Conifer
16 books3 followersGreetings, fellow readers (and scriveners)!
BASIC BIO & AUTHOR C.V.
Originally from southern West Virginia, I am an attorney by trade and also the self-published author of more than a dozen books, with a combined sales total of over 5,000 copies since January 2013. In 2012, I was awarded two monetary prizes in the annual West Virginia Writers, Inc. competition, 2nd place (out of 96 entries by authors from around the country) in the "Short Story" category and 4th place (out of 46 entries) in the "Genre: Horror/Sci-Fi/Fantasy" category; the winning tales, both collected in PITCH BLACK (2011), were "The Flat" and "Process of Elimination," respectively. In 1997, as a junior in high school, I was asked for a roughly 200-word vignette by a newspaper with a circulation of approximately 250,000 and over 25,000 daily subscribers. The result was the publication in that paper (the Charleston DAILY MAIL, now sadly defunct) of "When God Must Be Sleeping," a short-short which also appears in PITCH BLACK.
IMPORTANT NOTE: For various reasons, to date I have published all but two of my books under a pseudonym, Michael Prescott, and a few of my books ONLY under that pen name. That is why my author page on Amazon, the link to which is supplied above, is for Michael Prescott; I thought it better to link to a page with ALL of my books on it (save the two mentioned earlier) rather than merely most. The two exceptions are a very short (about 30 pp.) compilation of poetry called DECADES, and my fourth and most recent short-story collection, CALL ME ANYTIME. Those can be found at amazon.com (and perhaps BN.com as well).
MORE (FAR MORE EXTRANEOUS) INFO. ABOUT ME + BOOKS/AUTHORS I [INSERT HEART ICON HERE]
My hobbies include tennis, skiing, chess, watching good films, exploring philosophical and metaphysical topics (I was a philosophy major in college), and, of course, reading avidly. I'm also a huge fan of poker, in particular Texas Hold 'Em, and have played regularly for about six years now, once winning a >$1,000 pot. (I won't tell you the size of the biggest pot I lost. :-)
By way of some (largely random) biographical data, I now live on the West Coast and still drive the same car (a 2006 Toyota Corolla) I bought when I was twenty-nine years old. (My book sales, I'm proud to report, have more or less paid for it! So, for that and more importantly your faithful readership itself, thank you to all my loyal fans.) I'm just shy of 6'2" and of narrow frame, bearing a somewhat eerie resemblance to Bill Wilson (a good friend of mine), only with much darker features.
My favorite authors include Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., Breece D'J Pancake, Stephen King, John Irving, Raymond Carver, Raymond Chandler, John Cheever, Augusten Burroughs, David Foster Wallace, Michael Chabon, Dave Eggers, Pearl S. Buck, J.K. Rowling, Kathryn Stockett, and Denise Giardinia. My writing HEROES, on the other hand, include most of the usual suspects: Hemingway, Fitzgerald (perhaps my favorite of all time), Faulkner, Steinbeck, Graham Greene, Edgar Allan Poe, Stephen Crane, Ralph Ellison, Aldous Huxley, Kerouac, Mailer, Updike, and Philip Roth.
My five favorite novels of all time, in descending order of awesomeness, are as follows:
1. ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST (Kesey)
2. THE GREAT GATSBY (Fitzgerald)
3. THE CATCHER IN THE RYE (Salinger)
4. CAT'S CRADLE (Vonnegut)
5. A FAREWELL TO ARMS (Hemingway)
Two honorable mentions (both collections of short stories):
6. THE COLLECTED STORIES OF BREECE D'J PANCAKE (brilliant WV writer who took his own life, tragically, in 1979 at age 27, and is buried about eight miles from my childhood home)
7. WILL YOU PLEASE BE QUIET, PLEASE? (Raymond Carver)
I write in many different genres, including psychological suspense, horror, humor, and mysteries, but my bread and butter tends to be mainstream literary fiction. Among my most popular works are OUT OF IOWA, and DEEP COLD (eight stories and one novella).
BASIC BIO & AUTHOR C.V.
Originally from southern West Virginia, I am an attorney by trade and also the self-published author of more than a dozen books, with a combined sales total of over 5,000 copies since January 2013. In 2012, I was awarded two monetary prizes in the annual West Virginia Writers, Inc. competition, 2nd place (out of 96 entries by authors from around the country) in the "Short Story" category and 4th place (out of 46 entries) in the "Genre: Horror/Sci-Fi/Fantasy" category; the winning tales, both collected in PITCH BLACK (2011), were "The Flat" and "Process of Elimination," respectively. In 1997, as a junior in high school, I was asked for a roughly 200-word vignette by a newspaper with a circulation of approximately 250,000 and over 25,000 daily subscribers. The result was the publication in that paper (the Charleston DAILY MAIL, now sadly defunct) of "When God Must Be Sleeping," a short-short which also appears in PITCH BLACK.
IMPORTANT NOTE: For various reasons, to date I have published all but two of my books under a pseudonym, Michael Prescott, and a few of my books ONLY under that pen name. That is why my author page on Amazon, the link to which is supplied above, is for Michael Prescott; I thought it better to link to a page with ALL of my books on it (save the two mentioned earlier) rather than merely most. The two exceptions are a very short (about 30 pp.) compilation of poetry called DECADES, and my fourth and most recent short-story collection, CALL ME ANYTIME. Those can be found at amazon.com (and perhaps BN.com as well).
MORE (FAR MORE EXTRANEOUS) INFO. ABOUT ME + BOOKS/AUTHORS I [INSERT HEART ICON HERE]
My hobbies include tennis, skiing, chess, watching good films, exploring philosophical and metaphysical topics (I was a philosophy major in college), and, of course, reading avidly. I'm also a huge fan of poker, in particular Texas Hold 'Em, and have played regularly for about six years now, once winning a >$1,000 pot. (I won't tell you the size of the biggest pot I lost. :-)
By way of some (largely random) biographical data, I now live on the West Coast and still drive the same car (a 2006 Toyota Corolla) I bought when I was twenty-nine years old. (My book sales, I'm proud to report, have more or less paid for it! So, for that and more importantly your faithful readership itself, thank you to all my loyal fans.) I'm just shy of 6'2" and of narrow frame, bearing a somewhat eerie resemblance to Bill Wilson (a good friend of mine), only with much darker features.
My favorite authors include Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., Breece D'J Pancake, Stephen King, John Irving, Raymond Carver, Raymond Chandler, John Cheever, Augusten Burroughs, David Foster Wallace, Michael Chabon, Dave Eggers, Pearl S. Buck, J.K. Rowling, Kathryn Stockett, and Denise Giardinia. My writing HEROES, on the other hand, include most of the usual suspects: Hemingway, Fitzgerald (perhaps my favorite of all time), Faulkner, Steinbeck, Graham Greene, Edgar Allan Poe, Stephen Crane, Ralph Ellison, Aldous Huxley, Kerouac, Mailer, Updike, and Philip Roth.
My five favorite novels of all time, in descending order of awesomeness, are as follows:
1. ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST (Kesey)
2. THE GREAT GATSBY (Fitzgerald)
3. THE CATCHER IN THE RYE (Salinger)
4. CAT'S CRADLE (Vonnegut)
5. A FAREWELL TO ARMS (Hemingway)
Two honorable mentions (both collections of short stories):
6. THE COLLECTED STORIES OF BREECE D'J PANCAKE (brilliant WV writer who took his own life, tragically, in 1979 at age 27, and is buried about eight miles from my childhood home)
7. WILL YOU PLEASE BE QUIET, PLEASE? (Raymond Carver)
I write in many different genres, including psychological suspense, horror, humor, and mysteries, but my bread and butter tends to be mainstream literary fiction. Among my most popular works are OUT OF IOWA, and DEEP COLD (eight stories and one novella).
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