Boothworld Industries Eyewitness Accounts

By Christopher Bloodworth

The following description is for the physical version of this book. It includes quite a bit more content than this version. The ebook only contains the short stories. For the interactive version that contains the Connect-the-Dots, Color-by-Numbers, and the official Boothworld Industries Death Override, search Boothworld Industries Initiation Kit.
This is not a book.

This is an interactive experience.

There are 10 horror short stories inside, sure, but that’s not the only thing lurking within these pages. Check out what this beta reader had to say:

“I thought I was buying a book of short stories. I didn’t realize that what I would read would have such depth of experience. Most of the stories were amazing, but I have to be honest. When dealing with anthologies that contain multiple authors, there are always a few clunkers and this book is no different. The puzzles, the death override (Do the confirmation. It’s pretty cool), the coupon (It works! And you get a surprise back too!) and the amount of thought put into this more than made up for any shortcomings one or two of the stories might have had. I feel as though the Bloodworth sat down and really thought about the type of experience he thought the reader would like to have while going through the book. Amazing.”
Ann P.
Beta reader

Ann is correct about the focus on reader experience. I wanted the reader to have something that they weren’t quite sure about. I wanted to hide things inside the pages. I wanted people to think of the Boothworld Industries Initiation Kit as less of a book and more of an interactive experience with a paranormal corporation called Boothworld Industries.

“Okay. First, I want to say that I’m a huge Bloodworth fan. I’ve followed him since he started writing creepypastas for reddit’s nosleep subreddit, back before it was filled with the stuff that’s in there now. His stories were among the few that focused more on characters and plot than just gore and scares. I don’t even like scary stories, but his writing pulled me in and kept me hooked. His stories made you fall in love with the characters he wrote. That sucked because you didn’t want anything bad to happen to them, which usually did. His stories also had an air of reality to them. Even though you knew what you were reading couldn’t be true, his words would make you question that very notion. Like I said, I’m a superfan.
I loved all of Bloodworth’s stories in this book. How could anyone not? He created Boothworld Industries and it shows. There were a few authors that gave him a run for his money though. Namely Ross Baxter and Stacie Savage. Now I don’t want to be mean, but there was also one story I just didn’t like at all. It seemed like very little thought had been put into it.
Oh well. I’ve yet to read a book that was 100% perfect, but this book, with all the extra goodies you find, comes closer than most.”
Bri K.
Beta reader

I really wanted the reader to walk away from this experience feeling as if they’d received something more than a book. I wanted to create lasting memories. That’s why so much time and effort was put into it. Sure, I could’ve just thrown the stories together, but it wouldn’t have been as powerful as I wanted it to be.

“Jesus, dude. I’ve never been more paranoid in my life. Every time my phone rings I say a little prayer that the number that appears won’t read 630-296-7536. Boothworld Industries is something else...”
Jon S.
Beta reader

I could tell you more, but now it’s time for you to discover Boothworld Industries for yourself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christopher Bloodworth
• Release date: Aug 3, 2015

Book preview

DID YOU CALL 630-296-7536?

Tell the world about your experience in a review.

Boothworld Industries

- Eyewitness Accounts -

Christopher Bloodworth

+

Amber Whelpley

Boothworld Industries

- Eyewitness Accounts -

Copyright © 2015 by Christopher Bloodworth

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval without permission in writing from the author.

Cover art by Christopher Bloodworth

Edited by Christopher Bloodworth + Amber Whelpley

Interior design by Christopher Bloodworth

www.iambloodworth.com

Have an experience with Boothworld Industries?

Tell the world in a review.

tumblr: iambloodworth.tumblr.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bloodworthhorror

Instagram: www.instagram.com/iambloodworth

Twitter: @iamBLOODWORTH

Destroy those who oppose.

- Overheard at Boothworld Industries

Table of Contents

WELCOME.

THE HARDEST JOB IN THE WORLD

CURTAINS

I DO

PERFECT SKIN

CLOSURE

HEART STRINGS

HUNTING THE HUNTER

CALENDARS

REPOSSESSIONS

THEY’RE SO GOOD TO ME

DID YOU CALL 630-296-7536?

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

OTHER BLOODWORTH TITLES

OTHER BLOODWORTH TITLES

HANDBOOK FOR A TEENAGE ANTICHRIST

WELCOME TO THE FAMILY

BEDTIME STORIES FOR THE DAMNED

DARKNESS BLOOMS

Want free stories, books, and private sale invites? Click here to learn more.

Your BOOTHWORLD INDUSTRIES uniform and accessories can be found in the corporate shop by clicking here.

WELCOME.

You are now in possession of the Boothworld Industries Eyewitness Accounts. If you have come into possession of this document by accident, please place your device on the ground and walk away from it. We are now tracking you.

If you were given this document by a proper Boothworld Industries agent, welcome to the program. Feel free to peruse this manual at your leisure.

Read this manual through from cover to cover. Contained within these pages you will find stories written about our company. Enjoy the fruits of our labor, and welcome to the club.

As always, the initial leak about our company can be found here:

www.iambloodworth.com/?p=416

THE HARDEST JOB IN THE WORLD

MICHAEL SEESE

I have the hardest job in the world. I run the Marketing Department of the AmerICAN Division of Boothworld Industries.

Don’t get me wrong. I have no complaints. I’ve had a great career, earning praise from the upper echelons of company management as well as accolades from my peers in the industry. All in all, I’ve had a remarkable run.

But lately, I feel as though I’ve lost my edge. My drive.

There’s an adage in advertising:

Sell The Company, And The Product Will Sell Itself.

I can no longer seem to muster the elusive it I need to sell Boothworld. So I guess it’s time for me to get out.

Still, I can’t deny that my decision comes with a heavy heart. I’ve given my life to this place.

The Boothworld AmerICAN Division began life as Home Cookin’, founded by John Babbage shortly after the onset of the Great Depression. If you didn’t live through those challenging times, you can’t fully understand the desperation that people felt. Though I did live through it, I was only a toddler, and have no real recollection of, and certainly no appreciation for, the gravity.

People were out of work. And they were hungry. The history books all show the black and white images of bread lines stretching along a city block. You can’t argue that they helped. But a man with a family to feed needed something more nutritious, something a little more rib-sticking.

Mr. Babbage—as he came to be called and forever known within the company—saw before him an opportunity to fill two needs. And Home Cookin’ was born. Mr. Babbage built the enterprise around a simple principle:

Better People Means A Better Product.

He always claimed, the old timers would say, that his great-great-grandfather, a mathematician of some renown (that would be Charles Babbage, the father of the computer), coined the phrase, albeit in an entirely different context. I always thought the story was apocryphal. Regardless, that motto served as the guiding principle of Home Cookin’ from day one. A true man of his word, Mr. Babbage did bring in only the best people. With unemployment hovering around 15 percent—on its way up to 25 percent—so many men were willing to give their right arm for a chance to work, and Mr. Babbage could afford to be choosy.

Within one month of opening the doors, AmerICAN, the first and only consumer product to come out of the Home Cookin’ kitchen, hit the shelves.

In order to ensure that AmerICAN would be an immediate success, Mr. Babbage hired two Madison Avenue types to market the company. He probably didn’t need to go to the trouble. AmerICAN practically sold itself. One tin could feed a family of four, with each serving packing 300 calories and 12 grams of protein. And, it didn’t cost an arm and leg.

Nonetheless, Mr. Babbage wanted to take no chances, which is why he tapped the folks at Lent & Green to come up with a catchy slogan. Building upon Mr. Babbage’s stated ideal, they came up with:

We Give You Our Best.

He loved it. And so did America. Within three months, AmerICAN was the top-selling consumer product in the U.S.A., displacing Coca-Cola from the number one spot. (Though one could say that Coca-Cola isn’t exactly a necessity, die-hard fans would argue otherwise.)

Profits took off, and Mr. Babbage expanded the company to keep up with demand. Within two years, our second factory was up and running. Both operations ran double shifts.

But it was during the war that our business absolutely skyrocketed. AmerICAN proved to be the ideal fuel for our troops. Back on the home front, we had people lining up outside our doors, offering to help keep the production lines moving.

Accurately gauging the public sentiment, Mr. Babbage re-branded the company as a pillar of patriotism. He charged his Marketing Department (by then, obviously, that function was handled in-house) with updating the corporate logo to include a stylized version of the flag. Soon, our slogan became:

As American As Our Fighting Men.

Though I never had the pleasure of sitting down at a poker table with Mr. Babbage, he certainly knew how to play his cards, metaphorically speaking at least. Even after our boys came home, that sense of service, of duty, carried Home Cookin’ through the decade.

With the advent of television, Home Cookin’ jumped into the world of corporate sponsorship. Anyone older than 60 would remember THE Family Dinner, brought to you by Home Cookin’.

Another story that the old timers often told was that Mr. Babbage always insisted he had created the character of Howdy Doody, to entertain his paperboy, Bobby Schmidt, later known to the world as Buffalo Bob Smith. I think that one’s a bit of an exaggeration as well.

No matter. Pretty soon, it seemed as though every mother in America began tuning into THE Family Dinner, and the next day exchanging AmerICAN recipes with her neighbors.

Sensing a trend, Mr. Babbage played up the housewife card. And before you could say June Cleaver, every Main Street and Mayberry was holding an AmerICAN bake-off. AmerICAN burgers, AmerICAN sausage, AmerICAN stew, AmerICAN casserole surprise. You name it, somebody concocted it.

The 1950s dawned. America entered the golden age of television, and the golden age of Home Cookin’. That’s when I came on board, fresh out of Princeton, brimming with energy and confidence, and looking to make my mark in the world. I jumped into the Home Cookin’ culture with both feet. My first day on the job, I put my nose to the grindstone, and never backed away.

With all modesty, I can lay claim to a number of the company’s most successful campaigns:

Goodness In A Tin.

Your Kind Of Dinner.

AmerICAN: Hipper Than You Think.

The latter, clearly, was an attempt to latch onto the burgeoning counter-culture of the 60s. To say everything changed then would have to be the understatement of... well, the decade. From our perspective, the seismic shift came in the form of two letters and a common noun: TV dinners. They burst onto the scene and quickly entrenched themselves into the fabric of America’s growing boob-tube society. Though AmerICAN made for easy main courses, the new model became an entire meal packaged in a shiny, disposable heat-and-serve container.

Sales began slipping, then dipping.

Mr. Babbage—as most of the company’s senior employees agreed—would have known what to do. He somehow would have explored the reaches of that magnificent brain of his and come up with a winning strategy. Unfortunately for Home Cookin’, the previous year our company’s guiding light had been forced aside when his baby was swallowed up, via hostile takeover, by Boothworld Industries.

I certainly don’t wish to demean the folks behind Boothworld. I’m sure they were all good people. But, they seemed to lack vision—the big-picture mentality which made Mr. Babbage a success—and instead maintained a singular focus: the bottom line. So rather than looking forward, trying to find the next wave of public infatuation and ride it high, Boothworld management looked back, to what had been successful. They hitched the company wagon to the U.S. military and their latest effort abroad. Unfortunately, the war in Asia proved much less popular than the Big One. Though I might be overstating a bit if I were to say that the brass at Boothworld sent us all on a suicide mission, they certainly failed to notice the landmines around us.

Quarter after quarter, our numbers kept trending down. And their best bean counters seemed incapable of coming up with anything that could reverse them.

Then came the 70s and its whole-grain alfalfa-sprout granola yogurt craze. The