In 1967, in Tampa, Florida, Richard John and Frankie (named after FDR) Mae Moscatello received their only son, Richard Anthony, somewhat to the chagrin of his older sister, Deborah Lynn. The father was a landlord and businessman, the mother a real estate agent and homemaker, although in later years, they retired insomuch as any hardworking people can, and devoted their time to antiques and collectibles.

Ricky’s early years were spent typically, with perhaps a bit more time than most spent playing on an Atari. In 1977, little Ricky got his blue box Dungeons and Dragons set and began what has been a lifelong love affair of games and gaming. Axis and Allies, Divine Right, Titan, and many other boardgames filled his youth, and in the late ‘80s, computers, and computer games came to his attention.

Empire, Bard’s Tale, Populous, the games grew as he did, and soon Rick found himself going to gaming conventions. The realities of life sank in however: one cannot make a living playing games. His income at this time was mostly working for father, cutting down trees, digging up sewers, scraping blood off rental home walls, and learning most thoroughly to avoid real work whenever possible.

Thus, although he was an indifferent student (not even graduating in the top 10% of his class), Rick knew he would need to go to college to get a cleaner job, although he did spend a20few years in heavy metal, country, and 50’s music bands. Once he heard of a subject called “game theory”, even though it was in the much dreaded field of mathematics, his major was chosen.

A quick trip to Gen Con during his college years found him winning the Warhammer Fantasy Role Play Gamemaster award, more prized, perhaps, than an award he won but a few years later for research into game theory (second place went a student from some place called ‘MIT’).

College graduation found him with a degree in mathematics, and a misguided desire to get a taste of reality. Thus, Rick became a stockbroker, riding the ups and downs of the market, traveling to and from New York, and learning much. Alas, a year of such reality was all he could take, and so he took his profits and invested in graduate school, starting at the University of South Florida. He spent a few years there, teaching classes in auditoriums, before getting a fellowship at Tulane, in New Orleans.

At Tulane, it was more mathematics, but the best times were playing Dungeons and Dragons with friends, and playing a nifty new card game, Magic: The Gathering (1997 Louisiana State Champion, by the way, and 4th place the year after).

After teaching as a visiting professor there, Rick moved on to Southeastern Louisiana University, seeing and experiencing horrors best left unwritten.

Great fortune came to him and he was offered a position at River Parishes Community College, a tiny, but growing, institution some miles east of the closest approximation to civilization, Baton Rouge. While he was lucky enough to move out of New Orleans but months before Katrina devastated it, cancer reached out and clawed at him, causing much of two years to be a blur of unpleasantness.

In between the gaming, mathematics and life, Rick wrote extensively for gaming magazines, such as Dragon, Simcoarum Systems Bimonthly, General, TopDeck, InQuest, Scrye, Computer Games magazine, Tuff Stuff Collect!, Wizard, and quite a few others, and still writes regularly for Knights of the Dinner Table magazine, a hysterical comic fanzine that touches the fun parts of all aspects of gaming.

Rick still lives in Louisiana, doggedly improving his indifferent classical piano skills, nigh futilely training to pass his 4th degree black belt exam, and running his full D&D campaigns, in between much, much gaming, mostly on his Alienware computer, and on his custom designed computer desk, large enough to allow him to run tabletop miniatures games on it while the darn computer boots up.

He also has taken to writing fiction novels, such as The Rise of Deadhand, a book that tries to take a closer look at the villain, making the bad guy more than just the insubstantial godlike being that is so common to the genre, with goals more comprehensible than the standard “destroy the world” spiel that folks like Sauron, the Dark One, and Lord Foul tend to pursue.

Another novel, In the Game, addresses how heroes living in the demented fantasy worlds of MMOs, view their lot, as well as a few other things, and perhaps it will be published soon.

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The Rise of Deadhand by Rick Moscatello is a magical tale of mages, goblins, zombies and animated skeletons surrounds the transformation of a young boy into an angry, vengeful necromancer, against a backdrop of the machinations of Empirical and noble families, as well as the activities of ancient spirits and sub-human races.

These characters combine with the development of his powers to unleash events in an Empire, where the power of magic is failing, that may shake the foundations of the Empire itself. This rollercoaster of a story from the keyboard of Rick Moscatello captures the reader’s imagination and leads them through a world vastly different from the one we live in.

Vamplit Publishing announces that from the 11/11/09 Nicole Hadaway has donated her debut novel to Operation Ebook Drop available from ebookundead.com free to service personnel serving overseas.   The project is the brainchild of Ed Patterson whose  meeting with a U.S. serving soldier in the coalition forces prompted him to offer his ebooks for free.  From this grew the Operation Kindle Ebook Drop which has now been adopted by Smashwords authors.  Vamplit Publishing was contacted earlier this week by their bestselling author Nicole Hadaway about joining this programme and was excited to be able to offer our support.  Nicole told us

“I have always had the utmost respect and awe for those men and women in the military, especially after reading about the countless tales of bravery and sacrifice as part of the research I did for my novel, Release, which is set during World War II.  When I heard about Operation E-Book Drop, I immediately wanted to be a part of it as I feel it’s a great way for me, as an author, to give something back to those who serve their country.”

On Armistice Day Vamplit Publishing are pleased to be able to do our bit to help in this inspirational cause and Nicole Hadaway has our admiration for being our first author to sign up to Operation Ebook Drop we hope that others will now follow suit.

From the Imagination and Graphic Artistry of K.A. M’Lady & P.M. Dittman.

Marissa Farrar’s debut novel with Vamplit Publishing is a vampire romance with a depth of feeling that investigate the dark world of spousal abuse and the drastic lengths one woman is forced to take just to be happy. Alone is a beautifully crafted novel in which the supernatural world mirrors our own with startling results. Alone by Marissa Farrar is now published as an ebook available from ebookundead.comprice £3.99 and will be available in multiple formats.

Born in the East End of London where he currently resides with his fiancee, Jevron Mc Crory’s sincere love of the vampire is somewhat humbling. As affecting as they are unique in a rapidly expanding field, Jevron’s blood drenched tales are short, sharp shocks that somehow still manage to retain a bitter sweet romanticism. ‘Swan Song’ is Jevron’s emotional debut novel with Vamplit Publishing. It unflinchingly portrays an altogether too real scenario of loneliness and despair that, with the inclusion of a vampire lover as damaged as her male counterpart, builds to a heart rending climax.

Swan Song by Jevron Mc Crory is available exclusively from ebookundead.compriced £2.99

Katrina Collins isn’t like other musicians. She doesn’t grant interviews. She doesn’t pander to the press. No one has ever seen her outside of her musical arena. Her manner is brief, her beauty startling and her effect upon an audience mesmerising.

Lewis Morrison isn’t like other music journalists. He despises music. He loathes musicians. No one can stand to be in his company for more than a few moments. Katrina and Lewis are both damaged.

In the seedy underbelly of Camden, a unique North London habitat, they will find each other and their discovery will bring hope, redemption, pain, pleasure and death. This is Swan Song and it is unlike any other vampire story you have ever read.

Available exclusively from ebookundead.com priced £2.99

Seventy years after the invasion of Poland and the beginning of World War II, Nicole Hadaway has written a novel that tells of the struggles of war from the point of view of the vampire world.  In her novel Release, Nicole Hadaway creates the story of Ben, a member of the Polish Resistance, working in occupied Poland to rescue Jewish children from the death camps.  When his path crosses that of a vampire, werewolf and demon, Ben takes a chance to change to course of the war, but at a price.

Release is Nicole Hadaway’s first novel and is beautifully written, describing a time in the world when the evil that humans do far outweighed any supernatural horror imaginable.  In a masterful and vivid story, Release intermingles true events with the ever popular vampire novel.  Release gives a fresh perspective on one of the most troubled times in recent history, at the same time creating a believable, interesting and fresh take on the vampire novel. Nicole Hadaway’s debut novel Release is published by Vamplit Publishing and will be available from Mobipocket and ebookundead.com as an ebook later this week.

Nicole Hadaway used to work as a lawyer, but now she only writes about such things as bloodsuckers and deals with the devil. Having lived in such varied places as Pennsylvania, Louisiana, Washington, D.C. and even Monaco, she currently makes her home with her family in Texas.

Nicole’s amazing debut novel Release is published by Vamplit Publishing and available from ebookundead.com September 1st 2009.  Visit Nicole’s blog nicole-hadaway.blogspot.com and findout more about Nicole’s writing and inspiration.

We publish, primarily in ebook format for the same reasons we use hostpapa.co.uk as our web hosts, we are both committed to being green businesses.  Everything about Vamplit Publishing is set up to be as energy efficient as possible.  We all work in virtual offices avoiding the need to travel to a workplace and individually reduce the need to use any form of transport in order to earn a living.  As individuals at Vamplit Publishing we are committed to reducing our carbon footprint and we believe that epublishing is the natural choice for our beliefs.  Most households now have computers and most people now have mobile phones and other ways of downloading our ebooks, so by buying ebooks each customer is becoming a part of a green publishing revolution.  The production of ebooks is friendlier to the environment, and their distribution removes the need for transportation and therefore further reducing this companies, its customers carbon footprint and also the authors by choosing to publish in the way.

As the digital age moves forward ebooks will become as accessible as the paperback novel and just as popular.  Already recognised bestselling authors, such as Stephen King are now publishing their novels as ebooks and established publishing houses now make their back catalogues available as ebooks.  Ebooks offer the author and reader a chance to connect in a more immediate way.  Authors can submit their manuscripts digitally to publishers, who can edit online and publish.  Readers can now browse the thousands of ebooks out there and download to read immediately without having to pay for postage or wait for delivery.

The most advantagous thing for many people who read regularly, is that ebooks are easily stored on your computer or digital reader, instead of having piles of paperbacks covering every surface in you home.  No more trips to the paper bank with heavy carrier bags full of paperbacks covered in dust.  For any avid, older reader the ability to change font size makes choosing ebooks the sensible option, as large print books are often only available in hard back at three times the price and limited in availability.  I recently tried to get a copy of a Zane Grey novel for my father in large print, the price was extortionate.  I paid such a large sum because it was a gift, but I can understand why many older people only read books that are given to them or in their local library.  As an older generation, who are becoming more internet aware, find their way to ebooks a whole new world and market will open up.

As the demand increases for ebook reader the price is coming down drastically.  The BeBook reader allows books to be downloaded from any site and is not tied to just one bookshop.  The price is a very realistic £199 and it is as versatile as the more expensive models available on the market at the moment.  Whether you choose to buy a palm held device or just download and read from your laptop or computer, ebooks make sense.  Ebooks can be made accessible to the blind, or those who wish to read whilst away from home;  just imagine being able to take your whole library with you on planes, train or automobiles.

Vamplit Publishing is committed saving energy whilst promoting the work of new authors and showing the world a new, more planet friendly, world of horror.  If you submit your manuscript to us you know it will be read not left to languish in the editorial slush pile.  We also have a site vamplitpublishing.ning.com for new authors to meet and share their work with other writers.  We are totally committed to helping authors fulfill their dreams whilst insuring our standards remain high.

Beyond The Grave is a collection of the best short stories entered in our competitions, posted on our websites or submitted to us be here at vamplitpublishing.com. This is the first edition of what we hope will be a quarterly release edition.

Release date to be announced.

“I am a drinker of human blood and an eater of human flesh, a monster dressed in the skin of a man.” So states Charles, the main character of the novel, after being infected with a virus transmitted by an insect vector.

The Pumpkin Seed opens in India near the Nepal border in the late 17th century. A commissioned officer of the East India Company is seeking a profitable new trade route into China. Indian bandits of the Thuggie clan attempt to stop this further invasion by the British and release a plague of insects, which carry a unique virus. This organism not only infects humans, it transforms the chemical and physical nature of the host’s body. Longevity, resilience and the need to feed on human blood and flesh make the host an efficient killing machine, especially in regard to the human race. The novel follows the characters through 17th and 18th century England and India, culminating in present day Austin, Texas.

Set in the orphanages of London and in the vile trade of body snatching, a list of characters, who are as despicable as their deeds, search for the truth and a cure for their malady. The Pumpkin Seed takes us through the vices of greed, hate, love and despair and creates a modern novel that puts colonialism in the spotlight and asks difficult questions about this generation’s guilt for the crimes of its ancestors.