Spirits of the West – Blog Tour – Don’t Eat the Pickled Eggs!

I love a good anthology, and when an anthology is about ghosts, the West, and the supernatural, AND has a story in it titled ‘Don’t Eat the Pickled Eggs’…you know I’m going to be grabbing a copy! Please enjoy with me, Kaye Lynne Booth’s blog tour and introduction of her anthology, Spirits of the West.

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Do you believe in ghosts? I think there is something inside every one of us that makes us want to believe, but not all of us do. That’s what makes a good ghost story so attractive. I mean, who doesn’t enjoy a good ghost story? I know I do.

I also believe that every story carries a grain of truth. We bury many real-life experiences and dreams in the subconscious, but often, they are not content to stay there, so we allow them to poke their heads up and see the light of day through our stories. Encounters with the spirit world often fall into this category, because we’re afraid that to talk about them out in the open will label us as crazy. Often, we begin to doubt our own senses and what we know to be true, and soon the memory is buried and we seldom think about it, let alone talk about it.

I believe in ghosts. I’ve had numerous encounters with the spirits in my life. Too many for me to doubt the existence of ghosts and spirits. And every paranormal story I’ve ever written has that little grain of truth from a true-life encounter embedded within it. Spirit encounters make great story fodder, often resulting in a story that makes you think long after you’ve set the book down. The story that I wrote for the Spirits of the West western paranormal anthology, “Don’t Eat the Pickled Eggs”, is no exception, although the encounter described was not my own.

When I heard my friend’s tale of how her boss came to her one night before anyone knew he had passed, I knew this tale would eventually find its way into one of my stories. She recognized the fact that it could have been a dream, but still claimed no doubt that it had really happened. She and her boss had always had feelings for one another, but he was married, so those feelings had been denied for many years. Her story was so powerful that it gave me chills and goosebumps, just hearing her tell it, perhaps because of the sexual nature of the encounter. It was so intimate, so personal that even if it had been a dream, I knew that she believed it.

I sat on the idea, letting it simmer in the story cooking pot of my mind, like the ingredients in a good stew, for several years until the time came when I was trying to come up with a western paranormal story for the Spirits of the West anthology. I took the idea of un-acknowledged love and a final good-bye and placed it in a western setting, and I truly hope I was able to capture the same feeling that I got when listening to her tell it. The very nature of this idea creates a mystery, resulting in a western paranormal murder mystery, creating what might be a totally new genre. The addition of the colorful character of Stinkweed was added as a means of revealing the truth of what actually happened to Hiram. It’s a story that I enjoyed writing, and one that I hope folks will enjoy reading. You can get your copy of Spirits of the West here.

Kaye Lynne Booth is a freelance writer, editor, and novelist. She writes poetry, short fiction, and children’s books, as well as literary and gardening articles. She holds dual MFA in Creative Writing – Genre Fiction and Screenwriting, and will soon be earning an M.A. in Publishing.

Her first novel, Delilah, was published by Dusty Saddles Publishing in 2016. In 2019, she founded WordCrafter Quality Writing & Author Services and WordCrafter Press and now publishes her own books and anthologies, as well as the work of others. She also promotes herself and other authors through WordCrafter Book Blog Tours and her authors’ blog, Writing to be Read.

WordCrafter Quality Writing & Author Services

WordCrafter Press

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Amazon Author Page

Goodreads Author Page

 BookBub Author Page

41 thoughts on “Spirits of the West – Blog Tour – Don’t Eat the Pickled Eggs!”

  1. This is such an interesting post. I have never had an encounter with a ghost, but I am not closed-minded to the idea. I have always loved ghost stories and live in a house that is purported to be haunted. The spirits of the members of the criminal gang who died in this house have never given me any trouble or revealed themselves to me. Thanks for hosting Kaye, Jessica, and for your support of Spirits of the West book tour. I think the two shorts stories in this book are among my best.

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    1. I don’t ‘think’ I’ve ever had an encounter with a ghost, but there was this mangy black cat that used to hang around the house I grew up in… problem was, we didn’t have a cat! You’d see him out of the corner of your eye, and when you’d look, he’d be gone. I swear he was a ghost. Oooo! Shades of ‘Nethergate’!!!

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      1. How funny to think that all of the encounters I have had throughout my life, and neither of you, Jessica nor Robbie, have ever had one. It doesn’t seem fair. I can often identify who it is visiting me, and I’ve had visits from my son, our dogs, and my mother and grandmother, among the various anonymous spirits that have said ‘hello’ on occasion. When I know it to be a loved one, it is comforting, even if it gives me goose bumps.

        Jessica thank you for hosting for the “Spirits of the West” book blog tour, and for your kind words about me and my story. It’s a wonderful anthology, filled with western paranormal stories that leave the reader thinking long after the story has ended. And Robbie’s two stories “The Thirstyland Journey” and “The Ghost in the Mound” truly are some of her best writing.

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    2. Pickled eggs were often available in saloons of the old west, and they play a big role in this story. But I wouldn’t eat them either, Teri. We share in the appreciation of a good ghostly tale. I hope you’ll give the stories in Spirits of the West a try.

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  7. This does sound like an excellent anthology. I love the combination of ghosts with the Old West. I’m a fan of both, although I would NEVER want to meet a ghost in person. Love the title of the story, too!

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    2. Encounters with spirits can be scary, but I think encounters with harmful spirits are rare. I’m not psychic or anything, but I have had ‘visits’; but even unidentified spirits I’ve encountered have seemed pretty benign, just letting me know they are present.

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    2. Thanks for visiting us here, Diana. 🙂 It would be great for this genre to gain more attention. I’d love it. But for that to happen, I think it would first have to grow in popularity for writers. It was difficult to get entries for last year’s contest, because of the western paranormal theme, and I barely received enough to create a book. Not many western authors, and of those, even fewer that write in the paranormal sub-genre. I was hoping to raise interest in the genre with the theme requirement, but….

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    2. Really? Okay, maybe on salads. I hadn’t considered salads. My mom used to pickle stuff. Not eggs, but veggies. It’s a lot of work. Kudos to your brother.

      Thanks for the comment. You’ve offered me food for thought. (Bad pun).

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  12. Pingback: #SpiritsoftheWest #Blogtour – Day 5: The Ghost in the Mound and a review – Robbie's inspiration
  13. Pingback: Review of the Spirits of the West Western Paranormal Anthology by Patty L. Fletcher: Blog Tour Day 7 | Pattys World

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