FANTASY | SCIENCE FICTION | THRILLERS AND MYSTERIES | CHILDREN’S
My first novel was Flames over Frosthelm, a fantasy adventure mystery story, kind of Princess Bride meets CSI. Since then, I’ve released three more Inquisitors’ Guild stories, and I’ve written a pair of sci-fi adventure stories set in the far future, Daros and Kenai, and two mystery/thriller novels set in the present day, Got Trouble and What Grows From the Dead, and another brand-new humorous fantasy story with The Glorious and Epic Tale of Lady Isovar. I have a fantasy story in an anthology, another fantasy story published in a magazine, and I’ve also written a children’s book on endangered species published by Charlesbridge. Please sign up for the mailing list to keep abreast of new releases.
FANTASY
The Glorious and Epic Tale of Lady Isovar
Lady Isovar is a mighty and supremely confident knight errant who leaps into adventure with both feet and then tracks it all over the rug. Chevson, her long-suffering squire and companion, is a former student of stone magic who spends most of his time keeping his mistress from causing enthusiasm-related injury to innocent bystanders. A tragic turn of events has sent them far from home, where they roam the countryside righting wrongs, smiting miscreants, deposing despots, and taunting their foes, often with seriously questionable one-liners. This new life is more than enough for Izzy, but Chevson wants nothing more than to set right what he harmed long ago. Following clues to sites of ancient power, they might just achieve his aim. That is, if they aren’t murdered, dismembered, devoured, executed, roasted, or derailed by Izzy’s bravado first.
The Glorious and Epic Tale of Lady Isovar is a humorous epic fantasy story of adventure, friendship, heroic battles, and vile villains. Available at Amazon, and free for Kindle Unlimited members.
Content Warning: This book includes a lot of medieval-style violence and some gore (so long as it’s not a Fourthday).
Flames Over Frosthelm
Sometimes, a mystery has no easy solution. Marten Mingenstern and Boog Eggstrom are provisional inspectors, fresh out of Inquisitor’s Guild training and eager to prove themselves. Assigned a mundane task, tracking down stolen jewels, they instead uncover a mysterious cult set on destroying the city. People start to explode, they earn the enmity of a vicious noble, the Chief Inquisitor gets bought off and goes rogue, barbarians seize them, and they are sentenced to death. Twice. In a final, frantic race against prophecy, they stand alone against the power of an angry god. Available at Amazon, and free for Kindle Unlimited members. An audiobook narrated by the wonderful Simon de Deney is available on Audible.com, Apple Books/iTunes, and on Amazon.
The Outcast Crown
Boog Eggstrom is back, and he’s helping to train a new apprentice inspector, Zekra Kalem. Together, they investigate a mysterious phenomenon afflicting the city – a troubling manifestation, always accompanied by a buzzing sound, sometimes taking almost human form. As they search for clues, they come across a murder of someone who should probably already have been dead and find hints of treachery and intrigue from a far distant land. The city they love may be under a threat as dire as it has ever known, and they are thrust into the twisting machinations of an ancient, deadly mistake and a curse that afflicts an entire nation.
Available on Amazon for Kindle and in paperback. 100% free for Kindle Unlimited members.
The Woeling Lass
An assassin hunts Inspector Gueran Declais through the streets of Frosthelm, and she is not acting alone. Just as he learns that his family may have been attacked and slain, Gueran is struck down as well. Despite the odds, he lives. Barely. Whisked away from the city for his safety, he struggles to recover from his injuries, learn his family’s fate, and uncover the identity of those who want him dead. Far from Frosthelm, he becomes caught up in investigating another bloody attack, one that may or may not have been perpetrated by vengeful spirit of a woman wronged long ago, and one that threatens to expose him to his enemies. The locals are certain, though: the killer had to be the Woeling Lass, her hands cold as the grave and her feet aflame.
Back in Frosthelm, Urret Milton is an apprentice in some difficulty at the Guild. She receives a mysterious note for Gueran, a man everyone thinks is dead. Rapidly embroiled in the effort to unravel the reason for the killings and bring the assassins to justice, Urret struggles to shed her troubles and show that she has what it takes to be an inspector. But all this leads her into far more peril than she bargained for, for which she can’t possibly be ready. Her position at the Guild, the security of the city, and her life itself are all at stake.
Available on Amazon for Kindle and in paperback. 100% free for Kindle Unlimited members.
Traitors Unseen
Provisional Inspector Emerra Denault is working on a case with her mentor investigating some stolen money. Everything seems straightforward, but then she is accused of a crime she would never commit. On the run from both her enemies and her friends and not sure of which is which, Emerra must solve the mystery of her betrayal and uncover the plot that led to her misfortune. That plot, still in motion, is deep and deadly. It would give the city she loves over to relentless murderers bent on power. Emerra faces criminals, corruption, magic, villainous nobles, and rot within the Guild she serves. She must overcome them all to save Frosthelm and to stay alive.
This novella is available on Amazon for Kindle and in paperback, and it’s also available at lots of other retailers (e.g. Nook, Kobo, Smashwords).
If you’d like a free copy, you can get one in exchange for signing up for my newsletter. Click here to get your free copy of Traitors Unseen!
Talon’s Shadow
I’m really happy to share that I have my first story in an anthology. The book is From The Arcane: Relics of Legend and Lore, with fourteen fantasy stories all related to magical objects and artifacts by authors active in the Indie Fantasy Addicts Facebook group. My story, Talon’s Shadow, is about Penelope, an apprentice in a magic shop. The shop sells gear to those brave enough to challenge the dragon Ankaregis, who lives on a nearby mountaintop. The shop owner, though cruel, is teaching Pen a little about magic. You can get a copy of this book for only $0.99, which is seven cents a story. I hope you’ll consider giving it a read if it sounds like your kind of thing.
The anthology is available on Amazon in ebook and paperback.
SCIENCE FICTION
Daros
High above Daros, sixteen-year-old Brecca Vereen prepares to unload a cargo of trade goods aboard her father’s ship, the Envy’s Price. Nellen Vereen shows her a mysterious artifact bound for a contact below, one that will earn them a lot of credits, and one that they definitely won’t be declaring to customs.
Materializing out of nowhere, alien invaders fire upon all ships, destroy the jump gate, and knock out communications. The Envy’s Price is crippled, and as her father tries to guide it down from orbit, Brecca rescues the illicit artifact and jettisons in a life pod to an uncertain fate below.
On the flagship of the invading fleet, Navigator Frim tries to persist within the cruel autocracy of the Zeelin Hegemony, under constant threat of death, but wishing for something better. And then she notices a whisper of radiation above Daros – the trail of a cloaked Vonar ship. What are they doing in the midst of all this? And will the captain kill her just for revealing this disagreeable news?
Available on Amazon for Kindle and in paperback. 100% free for Kindle Unlimited members. Also available as an audiobook from Audible, Amazon, and Apple Books, narrated by the tremendously talented Jennifer Pratt.
Kenai
A planet steeped in mystery…
Jess Amiko is long past her days as a space marine, with all the glory of that time tarnished beyond repair by what came after. Trying to rebuild from the ashes, she’s taken a job as a security guard on Kenai, a lonely world far from the Council systems. It’s supposed to be easy duty – quiet and peaceful, on a docile world with no real threats, watching over an archeological dig at a site built by a race long vanished.
Betrayed and attacked by forces unknown, and finding that nothing on Kenai makes sense, Jess is plunged into a desperate fight for survival that leads her deep into the mysteries of Kenai’s past, and deep into the hardship and paradox the planet imposes on all who call it home.
Content warnings: Mild language, gun violence
THRILLERS AND MYSTERIES
Got Trouble
Trouble can find you anywhere
When your day starts at 11 pm, it’s a long way to sunrise. Glynnis Cary is stuck working as a night manager at the Gas-O-Mart. Her husband Keith’s idea of romance is buying her grocery store flowers, usually only when he comes home drunk. Her son is in trouble at school, skipping out with his girlfriend, and keeping secrets. Big secrets, ones that may turn out to be both lucrative and felonious. Keith’s bumbling unexpectedly makes Glynnis the target of multiple murderous enemies and a lot of bullets. Way more bullets than is reasonable. On the run with a new friend, one whose life she’s just inadvertently destroyed, Glynnis has to rely on her gut, her grit, and her ability to spin big lies to find a way to survive.
Got Trouble is a new novel of suspense, thrills, humor, and one woman’s attempt to just have something go right. For once. For crying out loud.
Content warnings: Coarse language, some gun violence
What Grows From the Dead
Morris Drummond is not at his best. Well, he hasn’t been at his best for a while now. But having just suffered two crushing losses, he’s almost at rock bottom, which for him means driving ride-share in his mom’s beat up Chevy, drowning his sorrows in tacos and spray cheese, and avoiding anything related to ambition, self-care, or laundry.
Morris is about to learn that he didn’t even know what rock bottom looked like, and it’s all thanks to his mom. A secret she left behind comes to light, and that brings down a lot of unwanted attention on Morris, the kind that looks likely to send him either to prison or to the hereafter. Blood and treachery from long ago rise to the surface, and Morris has only his lawyer Annie, who’s an old high school friend, and a few unexpected allies to call on as he tries to figure out what his mom was up to and why so many people want him out of the picture.
A humorous mystery with elements of suspense and thrillers, What Grows From the Dead is set in present-day small-town North Carolina, not far from the mysterious Uwharrie Forest.
Content warnings: Coarse language throughout; some gun violence (not graphic).
CHILDREN’S
Can We Save Them? Endangered Species of North America
The environment is constantly changing. People are building roads, houses, bridges, and cities. This development has damaged the natural habits of many native organisms. In this important book readers are introduced to a variety of these endangered species.
Engaging text and stunning illustrations highlight the plight of these animals and plants and suggest ways to help restore their natural environments. From the beautiful cui-ui to the Puerto Rican parrot, readers will begin to understand how each living species contributes to our planet and how we can strive to save each of them.