Upcoming release sample: INQUEST

Ye Olde Dragon Books

 Releasing March 1

 

“We need you to find them.”

“Two elderly Nisandrians in a galaxy with nearly four dozen Human-habitable worlds, three times as many orbital stations and platforms, and that’s just what belongs to the Alliance. Knowing Great-grandfather, he’ll decide the smart move is to hide on a planet unfriendly to the Alliance, because no one would expect him to go to a place that would gladly sell him out to Nisandros.”

“Well, not exactly …” Jeyn glanced at Ashrock. He nodded.

“You know where they went?”

“Not where, but to who. At least, we hope so.” She shrugged again. Yes, M’kar was getting irritated by that gesture. “Your brothers.”

“My brothers?”

“Ashar, Bannar—” Ashrock began.

“I know their names. Why would Great-grandfather and … No.” M’kar’s head hurt with the new load of possibilities and theories cramming into her brain. “Oh, yes, that will make them so much easier to find. Just look for a free-trader ship broadcasting Nisandrian registration, with several pirate-for-hire ships chasing them across the universe. Just how do you expect me to talk my captain into putting the Defender in the middle of that fight? We have families on board. Most of those children consider you their adopted grandparents.”

“Yes, and that reminds me, we want to have a festival, now that—”

“Po’pa!” Her fists ached slightly from the single, hard slam that made the bowls and serving platters and mugs bounce a good five centimeters.

“It isn’t that bad.” Jeyn reached to pat M’kar’s arm. “Your brothers are the logical choice, because they’ve been in constant contact with Aquid for years now. In fact, we found out they’ve been in contact since the day they fled Nisandros, going on missions for Etrusca.”

“How?” M’kar shook her head. “No, don’t tell me. I can guess. All three of them are just rebels and idiots enough to think Great-grandfather’s crazy notions are good ideas. I wondered how Etrusca managed to send pieces of the Gate off planet all these years. Now I know. It makes too much crazy, twisted sense.”

“If it’s any comfort, they also left because of the pressure to kill you,” Ashrock offered. “Most of our clan didn’t have any problem obeying the prophets who demanded your death, but your brothers did. They were tired of getting into battles with their cousins.” He chuckled. “Mostly because it got so boring, winning all the time.”

A strained bubble of laughter escaped M’kar. Maybe in a few days she would find some comfort in knowing that yes, her brothers did like her, enough to not want her dead. And yes, it was some comfort to know a thirst for adventure had sent them away from their homeworld. They hadn’t left because they didn’t want to be around their half-blood sister.

“All right. I’ll ask Genys what we can do. Treinna will have to pull a couple dozen strings to get people watching to catch the gossip. But that’s about all I can do without taking leave and hiring a courier ship and going hunting on my own.”

Ashrock accepted that just a little too easily. M’kar had the awful feeling there was still much he hadn’t told her.

All in all, she was glad to watch Le’anka and Anwesta vanish behind the Defender as the ship headed out on its next assignment. It was a blessedly boring one for a change, making a wide circle of stations, dropping off and picking up equipment and personnel and dealing with various technical problems that required the miracle-working skills of Jasper Lore and his Engineering department.

New release sample: BRIGHTEN YOUR CORNER

 

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

“Okay.” Cilla took a deep breath and put down the last page of the leasing agreement. “I think we’re ready.”

“I’m glad to welcome you to the Creekside Family.” Tracy picked up the pen with deep green ink that matched the letterhead for Creekside Shops, and the paint on the trim around the shop windows.

Fifteen minutes later, after leaving a generous tip, because after all, they had taken up a table at the café far longer than a normal breakfast hour, the three of them stepped out the door and walked two doors down, to the shop that was now officially the future home of Brighten Your Corner.

Tracy held her breath as she unlocked the front door, pushed it open, and leaned in. She sniffed cautiously. Winced. Turned back and handed Melba the keys. Three sets of five keys. For the front door, the back door, the utility box that served all the shops on that side of Creekview, and two for the gates on the concrete deck that ran behind the stores and extended out over the rocky drop down to Cadburn Creek. One set of keys for Melba, one for Cilla, and one set of spares, to be safely hidden somewhere at home, and hopefully not forgotten.

“These look new,” Melba said, turning the ring of keys over in her hands. They made a nice, solid jangle.

“They are.” Tracy stepped into the shop and spread her arms, welcoming them in. “Sorry about the smell. It’s actually better than it was. I don’t know what that man was doing in the back room …”

“We never did understand what he did here.” Cilla pulled out the tape measure from her tote bag and headed for the left-hand display window.

“I’m pretty sure he didn’t understand, either.” Tracy shook her head. “He definitely wasn’t dealing in collectibles, which is what he stated as his business when he signed the lease. I could have evicted him just on that detail alone. There were more deliveries to this place, at all hours, in all weather, than the entire street combined. A couple people complained about yelling screaming arguments, and the smells that seeped into the shops on either side weren’t …” She shrugged. “They just weren’t natural.”

“He wasn’t cooking meth or anything like that, was he?” Melba asked. Cilla muttered, “Meth” and sighed. Melba wrinkled up her nose at her, and they both chuckled.

“I almost wish he was.” Tracy shook her head. “He still owes me five months’ rent, and replacing the glass on the front door, twice, and the lock on the back door three times. I could legally charge him for replacing the locks on this shop and the back deck gates and copying keys for everyone.”

“It’s a crying shame,” Cilla said. “Ernie used to be such a nice guy, back in high school. What happened to him?”

“Besides going anti-establishment and running off to some commune and then advocating burning down the White House every time a new president got into office, no matter which party?” Melba shook her head. “Haven’t the foggiest.”

CELEBRATE! New release and get-it-before-it's-officially-out SALE!

 

WHITE ROSES, book 4 of the Tabor Heights series, is NOW available.

To celebrate the release, you can get the EBOOK and the AUDIOBOOK and save $$$ on the downloads.

How?

Go to Ye Olde Dragon Books and visit the storefront.

That easy.

Normally the ebook is $4.99 and the audiobook is $9.99, but you can save $2 on each if you buy THIS WEEKEND.

The sale price is only good THIS WEEKEND. That means come Monday morning, it's back to regular price.

PLUS!!!!!!

COMING MARCH 1:

INQUEST

AFV Defender series, Book 4.

You can get the ebook and audiobook NOW, before everyone else, by again, going to Ye Olde Dragon Books and visiting the storefront. Same price -- same savings. How can you miss out? Find out what the crew of the Defender is up to before everyone else AND save $$$.

By the way .... if you haven't heard, the Defender books are kinda-sorta based on stories and friends and personnas from when I belonged to the USS Defiance of Sacramento, a Star Trek club .... and in INQUEST, the Defender is sent on a mission with the most notorious ship in the Fleet. The Inquest has a reputation like a certain other notorious ship and rule-breaking captain .... not naming any names. But the rumors are that if you're sent on a mission with the Inquest, it's kind of like going to serve Vader .... your chances of survival are pretty slim .....

So, will the crew of the Defender survive this mission? Get the book and find out!!!

Don't leave yet!

There's MORE to the celebration -- and your savings.

THE BEASTLY BEAUTY, Book 2 of the Enchanted Castle Archives, is due out April 1 (nope, not joking!).

You can listen to chapters on the Ye Olde Dragon's Library storytelling podcast right now. We're up to Chapter 12 as of yesterday.

BUT, you can get the ebook at Ye Olde Dragon Books, going to the storefront, and .... here's that word again .... SAVE through this weekend. Regularly $4.99, but you can get it for $2.99.

So, celebrate the release of WHITE ROSES with me, and go get those savings!!!

New release sample: WHITE ROSES

RELEASE DAY!!!!

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

 

"Who's that?" Curt Mehdlang moved back from the table in the lunchroom at the Tabor Picayune, until his shoulders touched the top of the hatch window looking out over the river behind the building. It gave him the perfect angle to see through the gap in the curtain over the porthole window into Angela Coffelt's office.

A dark-haired young woman sat opposite Angela's desk while the editor looked through a sheaf of papers. As assistant editor for the twice-weekly newspaper, Curt would have known about any interviews. So what was she doing there?

"Hmm?" Max Randolph, one of the copyeditors, pulled her mug of hot water out of the microwave and stepped over next to Curt. "Oh. She's here for a job interview. I heard her tell Myrna she was a reporter at a newspaper out in Iowa somewhere."

"Job interview?" Curt shook his head. “When did we advertise?”

"We didn't." Max raked her fingers through her mop of dark hair and twisted her combs back into place to hold it out of her eyes. "I heard her say she just moved back to town. Takes a lot of guts, moving without a job to go to, in this economy."

"A lot of confidence," he muttered, still watching the composed, familiar-looking woman. "Not much going on to warrant new staff."

Something about her oval face, those big, dark eyes and the way she tipped her head to one side. He knew he should recognize her.

"Hmm?" He jerked, startled when Max touched his arm. "Sorry. A lot on my mind."

"I said, how can you say there's nothing going on, when the White Rose is still on the loose? That's kind of exciting. Sick, but exciting."

"You and Tony aren't going to use it for your next book, are you?"

"Spare me." Max rolled her eyes and ripped open two packets of raspberry hot chocolate mix for punctuation. "We write romances. Sickos preying on innocent girls, demanding love, sight unseen—that’s not romantic."

"Maybe we should check the personal ads at the PD and any other papers, to find someone who's been advertising for months and can't find his true love." Curt's stomach twisted and his mouth tasted like he had bitten into moldy bread. How could he make a joke about the White Rose Killer? Gretchen McKenzie was dead, and now Katrina Harper alternated between terror and frustration.

"I don't think someone like the White Rose would waste time and money on advertising. He's the kind of guy who sees what he wants and punishes anyone who won't give it to him."

Upcoming release sample: INQUEST

 

Ye Olde Dragon Books

 Releasing March 1

Later, M’kar realized she had been planning her days of laziness a little too loudly, and the universe heard.

Ashrock dropped the bomb over dinner.

“What do you mean, Etrusca and Great-grandfather are missing?” M’kar put down her mug of seooli tea, grateful he told her before she took a mouthful.

“They’ve vanished altogether from Le’anka,” Jeyn said, punctuated with a little shrug. “And no, they weren’t assassinated. We’ve been receiving messages from both sides of the growing battle, asking where they are, demanding we hand them over, and threatening all sorts of dire punishments.”

“Battle?” M’kar’s brain latched onto that word, among all the other bad ones.

“Someone tied Etrusca’s emergence from the surbda crater to the disappearance of the Ancestors’ voices,” Ashrock said, with a shrug that mirrored his wife’s. M’kar wondered how soon that little gesture would grow irritating. Her parents weren’t the kind of people to shrug and signal something was of little importance. Unless …

“What do you know? What haven’t you admitted to those indiferps and how could … Oh.” She sat back and wished they were eating indoors instead of in the pavilion by the firefish pond. She needed to shove back a chair and stomp away from the table and work off the shivers of apprehension as all sorts of images raced through her mind. It was hard to rise dramatically when she was sitting on a thick cushion on the tile pavement. “So Etrusca was right, and the Ancestors’ voices are actual voices, pulled in through the dimensional warping of the broken Gate. Once we moved most of the pieces off Nisandros, the dimensional warping stopped, and the voices stopped and …” A chuckle escaped her. “And all the lunatic prophets have no excuse to do crazy things.”

“Etrusca is uniting most of the worst of the clans by their hatred for her. Our clan is getting blamed for silencing the Ancestors and disrupting the totally idiotic traditions and structure of government. Your uncle Rokas sent you an enormous chest full of family treasures to thank you, by the way.” He snorted, grinning so half the tattoos on his face twisted or disappeared into folds in his skin. “All my brothers and cousins and uncles are delighted, preparing for war, strengthening the clan house defenses, answering honor challenges. You wouldn’t believe all the apologies I’ve been receiving on your behalf, expressing regret for trying to kill you when you were a child.”

“Nisandrians are insane.”

“Yes,” her mother said, “but life is never boring when you’re married to a Nisandrian.”

“I warned you, na’nooshki.” Ashrock reached across the table and intertwined his fingers with hers.

If her parents started making smoochie noises or even got up and started kissing, M’kar might throw herself into the pond. 

“So what’s the other boot you’re about to drop on me?” she asked, to head that off. It wasn’t that she didn’t enjoy evidence that her parents were still silly, sloppy in love, but she suspected that dropping sensation she got was something like envy.

New release sample: BRIGHTEN YOUR CORNER

 

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

“Investigator?” David blinked a few times. His mouth moved like he was going to say something else, but didn’t.

“Yes, you remember our friend Eden, from when Charlotte tried to move in with Cilla?” Melba said.

“Oh, yeah, right. I remember. You threw me off track. I’m talking about security for your house, keep someone from breaking in, or at least send for the cops if something happens, and you talk about that lunatic.” He chuckled, but the sound didn’t entirely convince Melba.

“Never to worry.” Cilla gestured at the back door. “Ted keeps an eye on things, and if he thinks the situation is dire enough we need a burglar alarm, he’ll help us with it. Not that we don’t appreciate your help, but he is a police officer, he lives here, and he knows how things are done.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said with a grin that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’m big city and you’re little township, with nothing in common.”

“I wouldn’t put it that way.” She chuckled. “Now, would you like to join us for dinner? I’ve got a lovely batch of chicken and potato wedges I put in the slow cooker this morning, and we’ve got the last of the corn on the cob from Dalrymple’s. Their corn is always so good.”

“Thanks, but …” David shrugged. “Got a business meeting on this side of town. Just thought I’d check on you before I headed over there. You didn’t get back to me, so I figured maybe you were out of the house all day, or out of town or …” Another shrug. “Glad you’re okay and on top of things.”

He turned like he would head down the winding path of paving stones through the middle of the garden, and out the back of the yard, then stopped after two steps and headed up the driveway to the street.

“Give our greetings to your folks,” Melba called. “How are they doing, by the way?”

“Fine, fine. You know how it is with them. Always running around.” David walked backward a dozen steps as they made their farewells. He turned left at the end of the driveway and in a few steps vanished behind the house next door.

“Huh, that doesn’t make sense.”

“What doesn’t?” Cilla was already on the back porch and fumbling with her key. “How about dinner outside tonight? It’s cooled down enough.”

“Fine.” Melba couldn’t recall seeing any cars parked on the street between Overview and their house, so where was David going? A sigh escaped her as she turned and headed down the path through the flowerbeds. She stopped halfway there, so she was partially hidden by the line of skinny evergreens that stood as a threadbare sort of barrier between their back yard and the parking lot of the apartment building behind them. Sure enough, she saw David jogging down the sidewalk and turning left into the parking lot to a car parked next to the driveway. 

He had come up through the back of the house, like he had done dozens of times before when he came over for picnics or brought his parents for a family get-together, whenever relatives dropped in from out of town. That explained why Heinrich went after him, coming through the trees like that. The old curmudgeon certainly wouldn’t have believed David when he claimed he was there on a legitimate visit, if he didn’t come to the front door “like an honest man with nothing to hide,” as he often finished so many of his complaints nowadays. But why didn’t David want them to know where he had parked?

Upcoming release sample: WHITE ROSES

Mt. Zion Ridge Press

Listen to the Books on the Ridge podcast for a discount code to get $1 off ebook, audiobook or print from Mt. Zion Ridge Press!

Snow frosted the stiff grass over Angel's grave. Toni shivered, seeing in her imagination the white roses that had been there every time she came to the cemetery, until her parents couldn't take the pain, the cruel, silent taunting from the unidentified killer, and moved them to Indiana. Shaking, she crouched and leaned against the simple cross that held Angel's name, and her dates of birth and death. She had a hole in the index finger of her driving glove, but she ignored the wet and cold to clear out the engraved letters in the gray and pink granite.

There were no roses on Angel's grave. She supposed she should be grateful. How long had the roses continued? Until he found a new true love to haunt with notes and roses and demands for eternal loyalty?

"He's doing it again," she whispered, and her throat tried to close up.

Toni blinked away tears that felt as if they had been building up for years, just waiting to burst out. Her head ached from the pressure. She rubbed the tears away with the back of her fist. Now wasn't the time for crying. Not yet. When the White Rose was caught, exposed, and punished, then she could cry. Then she could finally ask her parents to forgive her for keeping Angel's secrets from them. Why hadn't she tattled on her sister? Their parents wouldn't have approved if they found out Angel had a boyfriend. They would have made her break up with him. She wouldn't have gone to the park to meet her boyfriend. She wouldn't have died, strangled by fencing wire and left lying in the dirt.

Tabor Heights still felt small, quiet, and safe. Just like it had when Toni, Angel and their parents had moved here. She had liked her small classes in school and the quiet, tree-shaded streets. She had felt safe going anywhere she wanted.

Toni hadn't felt safe since Curt Mehdlang went to the park to look for Angel and came back with the police, pale-faced and red-eyed from crying.

She had to get that job at the Picayune. She needed a job, and working for the local newspaper would give her all the information she needed, immediately. People expected reporters to ask questions.

"Please, God, if You're listening to me anymore, I have to have that job. I have to do it for Angel."

Standing, feeling a little wobbly in her knees, Toni stepped backward from the grave. She wondered where the other murdered girl was buried. She wondered what the current target of the White Rose Killer was doing right that moment. Did she feel curious about the man who wrote her those demanding, frightening love notes? Did she feel angry?

Toni thought about contacting the police, to ask to talk to the girl. Would they believe her, if she told them about Angel and her theories about the White Rose? Would they think she was a crackpot, capitalizing on someone's terror? Would it do any good to tell anyone? 

Bottom line: she had to do something. Even if she had to do it alone.