If you enjoyed Hunger Games, The 5th Wave, and Divergent you'll love Worldcatcher by Casey Waldam!
Worldcatcher by Casey Waldam January 2023 Genre: YA Sci-Fi/ Romance, space opera, dystopian From the sun-drenched streets of Riverside to the chilling, unfathomable void of space, unfolds a tale of love, lost memories, interdimensional war, and the relentless search for identity.
Ben Kensi, a top high school basketball player, is haunted by dreams of a green-eyed girl wielding PSI powers. When tragedy strikes heartbreakingly close, he's cast into a realm beyond our galaxy. He soon finds himself aboard the flagship of a beleaguered human civilization from another dimension—the Alliance.
As he endures grueling training and stands on the precipice of war with the dreaded Acheron, pieces of Ben's obscured past collide with his reality. The mysterious green-eyed girl transitions from a figure in his dreams to a tangible link to a history rife with love, betrayal, and powerful PSI abilities.
Yet, with Earth's very survival at stake, revelations arise that shake the core of Ben's identity. Is he truly the savior foreseen to prevent interdimensional war, or is he just a pawn in a grander scheme? As destiny's crossroads near, Ben is forced to face the ghosts of his tormented past and determine his role in the looming cosmic conflict.
In "Worldcatcher", alliances waver, hidden truths surface, and the very fabric of reality becomes questionable. Dive into an epic interstellar journey where nothing is as it seems.
About the Author Website Casey Waldam writes YA science-fiction novels that explore themes of love, strange worlds, and superheroes with PSI powers. Casey is best known for "Worldcatcher," her latest action-packed science-fiction thriller centered on love and redemption. It's available on Amazon.
People often are frightened over worldbuilding for a series. It is a daunting task already handed to SFF writers, to make a completely new world (or give a whole bunch of new aspects to our own), and when you have to keep the world fresh book after book, it can be overwhelming. But you must remember: no world is complete after book one (…if you’re doing a series, anyway. You one-shot authors are on your own.)
I thought when I started to write a series that outliners (or “architects”) are better equipped for the job. This kind of writing lends itself to planning. Lots of planning. We will know why a certain kind of people do things a certain way and even if our entire plan doesn’t end up in the book (it shouldn’t, actually), we will know it’s there, which will make the writing stronger.
I am so jealous of this luxury. I know there are outliners out there telling me (and other ‘pantsers’ or, to put it kindlier, ‘gardeners’) that their job is hard because they need to have the book in place before they get started.
We know it’s hard. It’s so hard we can’t do it.
But one thing I’ve discovered in writing the Midsolar Murders series is that those of us who literally don’t know what’s in the next chapter until we’re done with the current chapter can also have some interesting worldbuilding options.
We used to be called “pantsers” because we wrote “by the seat of our pants” which, if you think about it, is a very weird statement. But I’m not here to talk about the origin of strange sayings. The point is that we just write whatever comes to our head. Which sounds like hell when you think of planning out a series of books; we can’t just write whatever comes to our head for hundreds of thousands of pages. We have to have some kind of consistency! But I have found solace when using the more up to date term I mentioned above, “gardener,” in which the writer plants plot seeds and see what grows.
When it comes to worldbuilding, gardeners have so much fun.
The key to gardening is to drop a million tiny hints. Just little asides here and there. If they never come to anything, then they don’t stand out as dangling plot threads. But later, if you need something, you can search through your planted ideas and see which one would fit. Then you feel very clever.
For example, I had a story where a character casually mentioned that her uncle was a lawyer. I don’t even remember the context, but I do remember that when I was planning out a sequel, I thought, “hey, there’s an uncle out there. What can I do with him?”
In SFF, when you’re creating a race of creatures or are building new communities, making alien races, or making new magical laws, you want to avoid absolutes. Instead of saying “these people never celebrate holidays” or “that religion was confined only to this one town,” you say instead that, “They don’t celebrate any holidays that I know of” or “I haven’t heard of anyone believing in that religion outside of that town.” Phrasing like this leaves little doors propped open. If no one ever celebrates National Potato Week in your book, then you’re covered. But two books later, you can have a character come across a monk running a Feast of the Woven God ritual and sees that everyone is freaking out about it. This leaves yourself room. If a religion or illness or language was confined to only one town, if that town gets wiped out, then you have a slight door open if you mentioned that no one was known to do X outside of that one town.
Using dialogue to bring in exposition is great here because characters are fallible while third person narrators are trusted. A character that says, “He always talked about being an only child” will leave room for a long-lost sibling later on. Having a bigoted person angrily state an absolute makes people think that the statement is more of an opinion than a fact, and leaves all kinds of outlets to prove them wrong.
Having absolutes can get you into trouble as the series goes on when some people may follow one of your worldbuilding rules to a logical conclusion you didn’t think about. (I’m not here to put down authors whose work I will never match, but some authors have created worlds with gendered absolutes and didn’t take into account how queer people fit in to the world, and when questioned, they kept making more and more exclusionary rules until their world didn’t make sense at all. And their readers were pretty angry.)
Are all elders at this church women? Or is there a rule that the elders must be women that many have broken in the past? Or does a history revisionist claim that all elders have been women? See how these slight modifications leave avenues for more worldbuilding?
Things as simple as mentioning relatives that haven’t been in the story yet, or missing years in the history books, or a part of a magical creature’s life cycle that no one has ever witnessed, or even something as simple as “no one knows how X does Y” allows the story to go on and raising a question that you may or may not choose to answer in the future.
(For the record, writing a speculative fiction story with nothing but, “We don’t know how X does Y” is not recommended. You have to make some decisions.)
I recommend making notes, and remembering when you’ve left something open, mark little hints that readers may never see, but you know are there. And if you didn’t put any in, or you’re an outliner who feels left out of this piece, you can always throw in a few asides while editing.
Chaos Terminal (The Midsolar Murders) by Mur Laffert November 7, 2023 Genre: Space Operas, Amateur Sleuths, Science Fiction Adventures 384 pages Mallory Viridian would rather not be an amateur detective, and fled to outer space to avoid it…but when one of the new human arrivals on a space shuttle is murdered, she’s back in the game.
Mallory Viridian would rather not be an amateur detective, thank you very much. But no matter what she does, people persist in dying around her—and only she seems to be able to solve the crime. After fleeing to an alien space station in hopes that the lack of humans would stop the murders, a serial killer had the nerve to follow her to Station Eternity. (Mallory deduced who the true culprit was that time, too.)
Now the law enforcement agent who hounded Mallory on Earth has come to Station Eternity, along with her teenage crush and his sister, Mallory’s best friend from high school. Mallory doesn’t believe in coincidences, and so she’s not at all surprised when someone in the latest shuttle from Earth is murdered. It’s the story of her life, after all.
Only this time she has more than a killer to deal with. Between her fugitive friends, a new threat arising from the Sundry hivemind, and the alarmingly peculiar behavior of the sentient space station they all call home, even Mallory’s deductive abilities are strained. If she can’t find out what’s going on (and fast), a disaster of intergalactic proportions may occur.…
Praise for the Midsolar Murders by Mur Lafferty
“A super entertaining read with great character development, neat aliens, and an engaging plot.” —Buzzfeed
“Station Eternity balances both the science fiction elements--meeting aliens, understanding how to work with them—and the mystery elements very evenly; it genuinely works as both genres (and works best as both). I'm already looking forward to however many more of these stories we get, because it was just so much fun.” —Locus magazine
"A clever and suspenseful sci-fi mystery, with intriguing characters and attentive worldbuilding. ” —Library Journal (starred review) “The Midsolar Murders series starter offers fascinating world building, a complex mystery, a devious espionage plot, and delightful interactions with a multitude of alien species that fans of science fiction and compelling mysteries will savor while they anticipate the next installment.” —Booklist (starred review)
About the Author Website Mur Lafferty is an author and podcaster from Durham, NC. She made her name with podcasting (I Should Be Writing, Ditch Diggers, and Escape Pod) and has written for magazines, roleplaying games, and audio and video podcasts.
She's the author of Station Eternity, The Ophelia Network, Solo: A Star Wars Story, I Should Be Writing, Six Wakes, The Shambling Guides, and part of the team that writes Bookburners. She has been nominated for many awards, and even won a few.
5 unknown Sci-Fi movies you probably missed in 2022
2022 seems to be a hit or miss for sci-fi movies. We get excellent "Predator: Prey," awful "Moonfall" and messy "Jurassic World: Dominion" that broke the hearts of many "Jurrasic Park" fans (including me). All movies mentioned above have been put on the back burner by "Avatar 2". It caught the attention of all cinema-goers and sparked many debates.
In this post, I'm going to set the blockbusters aside and focus on some lesser-known sci-fi movies.
“Vesper” is a vision of the future after the collapse of civilizations and ecosystems. A 13-year-old girl named Vesper and her disabled father try to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. On their way, they meet Camellia. Vesper uses her bio-hacking skills to help their new companion and get a chance to live in a new, better future.
This movie captivated me with its atmosphere. The slow pace lets me focus on the well-thought-out plot and father-daughter relationship.
2. "After Yang" Director: Kogonada Genres/Themes: androids, family, AI, loss
“After Yang” is based on a sci-fi story by Alexander Weinstein. It tells a story of a family and their friend, Yang. Yang is an android and when he breaks down, Jake (the father) wants to bring him back to life. Jake discovers that their friend knows more than everyone thought.
“Yang” doesn’t need any big expensive special effects to tell a sad but suspenseful story. The futuristic aesthetics is very simple and credible, the movie focuses on common everyday life but there’s still a gentle feeling of anxiety. Something is up.
Sarah, the main character, receives a horrifying diagnosis – a terminal disease. She decides to clone herself. Later, it turns out that the diagnosis was a mistake. Sarah is absolutely fine, but she has a great trouble – the clone is alive and well too. The law says that only one of them can live on. Sarah and her clone prepare for a duel to the death.
The movie surprised me with a simple but original idea and a pretty specific sense of humour. Is a big chunk of action and entertainment.
4. "The Deal" Director: Orsi Nagypal Genres/Themes: postapocalypse, dystopian, family
Earth and natural resources were destroyed by a pandemic. The Bureau builds a new totalitarian society and established “The Deal”. By accepting it, people get job, healthcare and housing but after 20 years they have to die. A mother and a daughter need to escape The Bureau and break the deal.
Even if that movie really isn’t a masterpiece, it bribed me with its gloomy atmosphere and interesting worldbuilding.
5. "Deus" Director: Steve Stone Genres/Themes: space, message from the space, Mars
Spaceship "Achilles" is supposed to study a mysterious object on Mars. The object sends a transmission with one word – Deus (latin word for "God")
I know "Deus" turned out to be a quite dull movie with overused tropes but it's my guilty pleasure. All this creepy stuff from outer space has a special place in my heart and Deus satisfies my basic needs.
Genre, keywords: sci-fi, grimdark, military, space opera
Length: 70 000 words After years of tension, war has finally come to the Union worlds. Hordes of rebels, seeking revenge for their lost worlds, ravage the Peripheral Zones.
One of the leaders of the rebellion is Charon Antares, a strict and shrewd warrior who doesn’t accept any weaknesses or cowardice. He has been struggling for years to liberate his planet, Zetherion, from the Union control. When another one of his braver mission ends in disaster, the rich and powerful sovereign plans to deprive him of his authority. To save his status, Antares agrees to execute her insane order that may cost the lives of thousands of his people.
A young and easy-going girl named Cerridwen lives in a peaceful world. One day, by accident, she comes in Antares’s way. When she finds out about the tragedy that happened to her family, she vows revenge, but without collaboration with Antares and the rebels, she will not be able to fulfill her plan.
Meanwhile, a group of the Union scientists decides to end the rebel’s invasions, once and for all - they build a deadly, inhumane weapon out of sight of the government.
About the author: Website Email: dagmar.rokita@skiff.com
Dagmar Rokita is a Polish writer and artist. She writes and illustrates dark sci-fi series called "Bloodstained Skies." There are two things that inspire her: the imaginary world of geek culture and the deepest corners of human psychology. Huge doses of heavy metal and history are her creative fuel. She wants to become a famous artist because she needs money to buy sophisticated food for her cat.
That’s how ex-freedom-fighter Lem Benzaran feels. Exiled after going AWOL to save her world, she lives in a changed galaxy in the aftermath of a purge that wiped entire planets clean of people like herself. A vague prophecy plagues her isolation: she’s destined to cause the Universe’s heat death.
Jei Bereens is one of Lem’s only contacts with her old life. Once his command team’s golden boy, Jei’s now under constant surveillance as a distrusted super-weapon. Worse, amidst waves of withdrawal from his lost love’s nerve pheromone, Jei’s struggling to break free of the childhood rival who’s learned to use that vulnerability to trap him in his mind.
That rival, Jared Diebol, now holds almost every card he needs to take full control of the forces bent on homogenizing the galaxy. Driven to desperation by Lem and Jei, Diebol’s created a mind-control device that may finally turn Jei into the world-destroying machine he needs to end this war. If Lem tries to stop him, Diebol vows to kill her at Jei’s hand.
Between Jei’s struggle for freedom, Lem’s desperation to escape her destiny, and Diebol’s hunt for control—someone has to give, and someone has to die.
Praise for Neodymium Exodus:
“The fascinating characters matched with inventive biological details makes this an adventure that’s sure to enthrall.”—Publishers Weekly
“Snappy teen protagonists (Lem is sixteen, Bereens a handful of years older), an epic conflict over the very structure of society, and battles both stealthy and dramatic combine to make an entertaining, quick read set in a lightly sketched but intriguing world.”—Booklist
The tunnels of the Beryllian mines echoed with crunching rocks, a constant baseline to one of the premier research facilities in the galaxy, where hands-on learning and work experience attracted almost everyone with a pulse. Along the rough hallways, through bubbling laboratories, lively classrooms, and bustling forges, teenagers of all species chirped, gurgled, or otherwise laughed or complained, chattering to each other in their various accents.
All in the same filking mandatory language, though.
Lem Benzaran shook bitterness and sweaty hair off her forehead with a violent toss of her head as she swung the pickax in the darkness again. Here in the shadows of this hidden shaft she couldn’t afford to use automated mining equipment herself—but she could hear it running in the lit tunnel outside, and its whir annoyed her as much as that one girl’s grating voice.
“Bla bla bla boys. You sound just like a lieutenant I used to know, Kym,” Lem muttered, tossing the pickax to the side again to get her fingers around cool stone. Still stone. Still not earth. Not that she expected real soil here on Beryllia, not dark and rich like the jungles back home, but she hoped to hit red dust and pebbles at some point soon.
Jei’s waiting.
It had been a couple weeks since Lem’s last communication with either her former sparring partner Jei Bereens, or her Biouk adopted brother, Cinta. She missed Cinta’s giant, expressive furry ears, and she wondered if his fangs had started to grow at all. Shyte, she hadn’t even seen his face in almost a year, since he had to kind of keep their long-distance conversations under wraps after—well. Cinta now had to travel all the way off-post, back to the Biouk village where they’d grown up in the treetops, to place short calls to her. Even Jei, once every commander’s golden boy, couldn’t reach Lem without sneaking off to find an open network in whatever civilian city he happened to be in for whatever mission, and from what Lem understood, the Frelsi’s top bigwigs had him on a short leash with lots of time-out in between.
No one else really wanted to talk to her these days.
Lem shook her head to snap herself into focus. It didn’t matter. It didn’t matter what anyone else wanted or said. What mattered right now was getting out of this idiotic school back to the real world. Lem’s palms sparked in the darkness as she gripped the boulder in front of her and pulled—come on, come on, dislodge—think backwards, think harder, get that electromagnetic nervous system powered up, pull—
No good.
She paused, glancing over her shoulder out of habit as she panted with the taste of iron in her mouth. There was no one else here. Far behind her, only the faintest ring of light outlined the rock that hid the entrance to her secret mine shaft from the people in the main tunnel. She was safe here.
Lem resented the forces that made her watch over her shoulder anyway.
The former Frelsi Cadet no longer had to hide her thoughts, but she’d kept her powers secret all this last year. Couldn’t have word getting back to the Growen that she’d turned up on the center for learning in the galaxy. Theoretically Beryllia was a pretty good place for a human Lem’s age to blend in: with high security and ample research programs, most young civilians spent some time here at one point or another.
Most young civilians didn’t get sent here after living most of their lives with a militant freedom force, though. Shyte, it was harder getting along with people here than undercover with the filking gray kid-killers. Lem gritted her teeth as she swung the pickax again. She resisted—swing—resisted—crash—resisted the urge to snarl. At least in the Growen torture camp she’d had a battle-buddy. Shyte, even disguised in Growen uniform at least she’d had a purpose. Most people like Lem ended up in refugee forts with the Frelsi, so most people here either sympathized with the Growen, or just knew nothing about the galaxy beyond “do your homework and get a good career.” If Lem had to hear one more teacher remark about the “Contaminated extremists...”
Lem grunted as a pocket of dust exploded under her next blow. Sure, Growen soldiers talked like that, too, but Growen soldiers actually had to cash the checks their tongues wrote. And most soldiers didn’t have time to actively spread nonsense to impressionable young civilians.
Impressionable young civilians...listen to me, like I got age on them or something. But the numbers didn’t matter. Everyone here seemed like little kids to Lem.
Lem straightened, dropped her pickax, and pulled her mace off her belt with a fierce exhale. Eh, she had nothing on the other civvies here. She was one, too, now. She wasn’t Frelsi. She wasn’t fighting to save the galaxy from homogenization. Gossip and accusations from Frelsi Command and former comrades alike rang in her ears, as if carried on the vibrations of the machines in the tunnel outside. She was erratic, they’d said, possibly even a traitor. She stopped moving for a moment, like her body had forgotten what she was doing—like it was locking her forever in that dark, curtained conference room, looping over and over through last year’s shyte hearing.
Lem shook herself off, spinning her mace with a frustrated grunt and a deep breath. I knew what I was getting into when I went undercover with the Growen. It’s fine. She flicked a groove on the mace to switch it on; red laser washed across the staff, rippling around and avoiding her fingers to blossom into a spiked orb on one end that danced like the ancient models of the atom. With clenched teeth she leaned in to the wall, pressing the spiked orb of light into the stone. Lem didn’t want to damage the staff casing or its DNA-sensing components by whacking it against rock over and over, but the controlled plasma could carve a good-sized chunk with gentle pressure…there, now the rock began to heat, crumble, and glow under her push. She’d alternated between this, the pickax, and her em-abilities for the last few hours.
It was fine. She’d just figured she’d die before getting disgraced. She kinda wished she had.
Of course you don’t mean that.
Oh, Njandejara. A cool draft in the darkness answered Lem’s thoughts; the still voice of her invisible friend sounded far away today, as if shouting into her thoughts from down a deep, deep tunnel, or from the distant past. You don’t mean that, it said—it, because he sounded like an it, today, just a sentient flicker of temperature in the stone. What about Jei?
Well. Yeah. Lem huffed, breathing through her effort. That was worth the stupidity of being alive. Her sparring partner was free from that witch because Lem hadn’t died.
“That wasn’t all me, though,” she grunted back. Jei could take down a filking regiment with his bare hands now. Lem grinned, despite herself, remembering the sudden lurch as he, deaf and blind, ripped her ship out of the sky in rebellion against his lady’s mind control. Lem had no doubts that Jei would have taken out his tormentors on his own eventually.
But—as a tiny rivulet of sweat began to trickle down Lem’s spine, the voice, or the coolness, or perhaps simple logic, rebuked her—she had to admit it wasn’t likely Jei could’ve then escaped with his life. Killed everybody, yes—survived, no. Not against two Stygges with that kind of hold on him.
She was glad, at least, that she’d been there—that, at least, was not a waste.
And if she could get through this filking planet crust to the extraction point, she could finally see him again.
Suddenly the boulder hiding Lem’s secret tunnel straight up exploded behind her.
The sound of the blast threw Lem’s nerves into high alert; sparks lit around her in a forcefield as she whirled, mace raised. Splintered rock fragments like knives shot past her as a beam of light hit her face.
“What the bloodseas?” Lem exclaimed.
The silhouette of a shocked civilian stood at the entrance to Lem’s secret tunnel, his hand outstretched like a claw, jaw agape. Lem couldn’t see any explosives or mining equipment on him—had he—?
Jen Finelli is a world-traveling scifi author who's ridden a motorcycle in a monsoon, swum with sharks, crawled under barbed wire in the mud, and hiked everywhere from hidden coral deserts and island mountains to steaming underground urban tunnels littered with poetry. She was once locked inside a German nunnery, and recently had to find her way through swamp-filled Korean foothills dotted with graveyards on Friday the 13th under a full moon without a flashlight. On her quest to rescue stories often swallowed by the shadows, she's delivered babies, cradled the dying, and interviewed everyone from prostitutes to Senators. If you want cancer-fighting zombie fiction, dinosaur picture books, scientists jumping into volcanoes, or talking cars and peyote legislation, you might like Jen. You're welcome to download some of her stories for free at byjenfinelli.com/you-want-heroes-and-fairies, or join her quest to build a clinic for the needy at patreon.com/becominghero. Jen's a practicing MD, FAWM candidate, and sexual assault medical forensic examiner--but when she grows up, she wants to be a superhero.
For reading this far in the bio, you get a book free! (This one's not available in the stores.)
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Unrest smolders in a galaxy where most citizens endure the oppressive society of the Northrite corporation.
Run by six masked council members, the Northrite exploit the powers of Elemiscists—those with magical abilities—and keep them as indentured servants. When a nearby sun turns blood red and begins pulsing, people flee their homes, and the millennia-old government is plunged into chaos. Six diverse individuals from across the galaxy become entwined in a struggle for survival and to overthrow the Northrite corporation.
These six share a strange dream: a figure composed only of shadow, holding the pulsing red sun in its palm. Jaycken is an audacious and sarcastic young military recruit who dreams of harnessing Elemiscist powers, and Rynn is a sheltered but perceptive young woman who flees her home planet in search of her missing mother. Nyranna is a cunning Elemiscist slave, seeking to free her people from oppression, and Seeva, an operative and activist, tracks down a branch of the Northrite corporation that funds poachers and decimates endangered creatures for profit. Elion is a morbid bounty hunter, and Cirx is a medieval knight who seeks revenge for the death of his people.
Praise for The Forgotten Sky
“Like nothing you’ve read this year. Layered in story and intrigue and brimming with character.”—J.L. Lux, Team Seeva, author of The Fall of Dalmorall
“… compares favorably to … Dune, and Schultz’s impressive worldbuilding skills are apparent …”—Kirkus Reviews
"R.M. Schultz is a master storyteller, and his effects are spectacular ... The Forgotten Sky ... is a gorgeous treat not only for fans of science fiction but for any reader who adores superior storytelling."—Readers' Favorite
Seeva Seeva didn’t expect fresh powder in this frozen tundra, but the brittleness is also odd.
Her slender legs aid her in stepping out of the icy sinkholes she creates. Now she wishes her feet were larger, much larger—like snowshoes—so she could scamper across the surface.
Seeva squeezes her pulser gun’s grip within a gloved hand and flexes her fingers. Her glove freezes to the metal and tears as she studies a spotty trail of blood that has thickened over the last kilometer.
This planet … again, but now its remotest region.
Shadows loom ahead. Two silhouettes: trees, crystal trees. They appear as bony hands with gangly, naked fingers, tearing their way from beneath the ice.
Ori—Seeva’s only companion, a flying creature resembling a monkey but covered in black and white feathers—howls, his tone armoring his sorrow. His flapping wings are as silent as his breathing, as silent as the calm of night.
Crunch. The snow sounds like breaking bones beneath her boots.
Seeva hunts the hunter, rushes to protect the defenseless inhabitants of this planet against humans, or humanoids, and their destructive nature.
Ice crystals drift up into the light, the snow dust of the tundra turning softly and twinkling: luminous, midnight blue, violet, carmine, shimmering like miniscule fairies who can only shout in color, the colors of the winter night.
Thirteen moons seem to suspend the sky over Seeva’s head. Glowing spheres or sickles form a vault of pale light; silver and azure shades paint the snow. Floating ice particles create a nimbus around the moons, some of which are as large as suns while others appear like crescent blades that could be carried on her back, waxing blue and waning copper. Another’s lighted surface is pocked by meteoroid strikes.
All Seeva recognizes in this shape is a skull with a depression fracture.
Biting cold.
Another strained step, and Seeva’s foot punches through crusty snow. Air almost as thick as ice burns as it claws its way into her throat and then explodes in her lungs like smoke inside a burning building. Even the heated inhalation mask and the coils in her snowsuit barely keep the subzero temperatures out of her lean body.
A cloud of breath plumes from her mask into the night, turning to hoarfrost in the air before being sheared away by a rising wind.
Who the fuck could have done this? Tracked their victims through this region?
A gust of salty wind batters Seeva’s masked cheeks, the smell of blood hanging thick. She sees it: a splatter of black liquid against the restless white haze of hills and jutting mounds.
Her stomach solidifies into a dense ball of tension. Sparse hairs on her arms stick up; her scalp tingles.
Red light falls in a soft curtain, coating the landscape, washing out the moonlight. Seeva glances skyward.
Something is out there, something massive, beyond the moons. It pulses with a red glow like the heart of a god.
Seeva knows anarchy reigns out near the drifters, at the extremity of the galaxy, where unusual planets and peculiar people dwell. Where habitable worlds are sparse and civilizations sparser. Where many become lost. Where beyond the drifters lies the dead zone, an emptiness between galaxies that is always dark. Where no suns and no planets roam, where no one ventures.
A lock of Seeva’s sable hair lashes out from its typical location, clipped around the oak-dark skin of her neck like a scarf. The strand appears like black water, only hungrier, obscuring her vision as the wind skirls around her. She tucks it behind the orange-tinted view of dynamic lenses, projections from her v-rim—a thin silver band stretching from the ends of each eyebrow, a central dip at the bridge of her nose—a viewer for all the information she needs plus a link to the galaxy’s central network.
Seeva marches on, her feet sinking through brittle snow, her breath spewing into brittle air.
She wonders what kind of person could do what she’s worried she will find: the victims, the source of the blood trail. What backward fools with hearts of molten coal treated others like crops?
Seeva recalls a trial and lawsuit her Silvergarde Alliance discovered occurring on the neighboring planets, one hushed up from public scrutiny. The Northrite council, the primary governing agency of the galaxy and the largest corporation, was attempting to obtain mining rights to these planets.
She also recently heard of a newly discovered planet blanketed by a liquid sea—instead of clouds—the water suspended in its atmosphere by the gravity of its thousand moons and tensile troposphere. Only in the past year had people discovered land below, and then found native humans already living there, living in medieval conditions on a continent isolated from the rest of the galaxy.
Consciously aware humanoids have been venturing out from their planets of origin, dispersing throughout the galaxy and between solar systems, since the first age. Before Elemiscists discovered Striding, traveling so many light years could take families generations to reach another planet in their own galaxy, even traveling at the speed of light … generations … unless the occupants were placed in cryosleep. Slowly, over tens of thousands of years, the mixing of peoples and humanoids is now commonplace. And humans, as if by divine design or grievous error, have spread throughout the galaxy like the most adept colonizing virus.
Seeva is too similar to them all for her liking, even with her short stature of one of the ancient races, one dating back before the time of the communicating galaxy, before the time of even the written word. The small women of old, the ancient, dark-skinned sirens. But she’s not special: no magic, no enigma, no fading into fog.
The pulsing red light radiating from the heavens grows brighter, pulling Seeva back to reality.
“What the fuck’s causing this and what does it mean?” She points the muzzle of her pulser gun skyward.
“Time to leave,” Ori seems to say with only his pink and emerald eyes as his head rotates fully around his body. He’s wary of hidden spirits in this desolate place, wary of memories, of emotions. Ori’s native planet. She knew he’d be affected coming back here.
Seeva recalls a recent dream: a sound like wind shuffling leaves, a shadowy figure concealing something in their palm, something red and beating. Coincidence?
She strides forward.
Hunter, I know your path. I feel your presence. This trick with the light will not stop me.
Ori’s wings beat against the wind without a whisper.
A tower of a mountain soars upward in the distance, dark against the flashing red and pewter sky. A range of sharpened cliffs—which appear as black flames frozen in their fury—run before her, jagged peaks of petrified fire roasting the belly of the night.
Seeva follows the blood trail, climbing in lunges and bursts. Her feet crunch and slip on icy stairs of rock as minutes wear out and fall away, the flashing red overhead the fiery breath of a monster kindling her anxiety.
Beyond the crest of a white mound, a ravine of snow emerges. Massive forms lie scattered about, limbs stiff and stretching toward the moons.
The victims.
As Seeva approaches, a shape becomes more distinct. An enormous animal. Purple hide as tough as leather wrought with iron. Stocky body and legs. Clubbed feet. Spike-like horns should have protruded in dense rows across its body, but only blunted stumps remain. Black liquid has pooled around the carcass, staining the snow with a macabre, amorphous shape resembling a distorted man.
The innocent and the weakest are always the first victims, in times long past and in the present. Only the perpetrator—this butcher—and their master and how to find the two of them changes. But this … this pointless slaughter.
Something inside her lashes out in anger, through the cold in her heart, with tongues of flame.
R.M. Schultz lives in the Pacific Northwest with his wife, daughter, and many pets. He enjoys the outdoors, playing the guitar, and reading and writing across genres but always includes fantasy or science fiction elements in his work. He founded and heads the North Seattle Science Fiction and Fantasy Writer’s Group.
POSSIBLE ULTIMATE TOUR EXPERIENCE TICKETS: Let’s Get The Party Started, Represent, Lost In Space, Snark It Up, The More The Merrier, The Wings Of Change
Shadow Spark Publishing Genre: Science Fiction, Space Opera, LGBTQ+ Pages: 425 CW: death of parent (mentioned), death of mentor, verbal abuse, graphic violence and death, blood, homelessness, trauma, guilt, kidnapping (mentioned)
A space opera heist brimming with action, twists, and turns that doubles as a story of personal growth, mentorship, and sacrifice.
Ailo is a streetwise teen surviving alone on the remote moonbase, Tarkassi 9. She wants nothing more than to flee into the wider world of the Arm. When her chance arrives, she makes it no farther than the first ship out of the system. That’s where Jati, the Patent War veteran and general fighting the Monopolies, gives her a second chance. It’s an unlikely partnership, but Ailo’s rogue status is just what Jati’s People’s Army needs to drive the final spike of victory into a weakening Garissian Council.
A team of experts assembles and hope rests on Ailo’s skill, stealth, and tenacity to pull off the impossible. It’s a wild gambit, and a moral code may need to be bent, or broken, to achieve success. When an internal shadow rises, casting doubt on their plans, Ailo and Jati are forced to weigh the cost of revenge against honor and justice.
About the Author: Website-Twitter-Instagram Jonathan Nevair is a science fiction writer and, as Dr. Jonathan Wallis, an art historian and Professor of Art History at Moore College of Art & Design, Philadelphia. After two decades of academic teaching and publishing, he finally got up the nerve to write fiction. Jonathan grew up on Long Island, NY but now resides in southeast Pennsylvania with his wife and rambunctious mountain feist, Cricket.
Mara Keres. A trained warrior and formerly highly respected peacekeeper.
Note "formerly."
Once, she had her life under control. Once, she had the trust of the galaxy.
Now she rots in the same prison she used to sentence people to. Solitary confinement for six years. Would've brought anyone else to their knees.
Not her.
Then an offer resurfaces, almost too good to be true. Ghosts of her past and demons come back to haunt her, will she ever make it out alive?
Sometimes, facing your worst memories is worth the risk.
Featuring a badass anti-hero, secrets, betrayals, twists and turns, this gripping story will keep you on the edge of your seat and leave you wanting more.
Mara's Choice: Space Opera Adventure Novelette (Book 2 Of The Mara Files)
Excerpt From The Book
The light faded
Like a starship jumping into hyperspace
It disappeared
Lost forever
————————————————————
Cackling laughter, a blinding flash, and screams of the dead and dying.
Distant starship gunfire lighting up the sky above. A small settlement in flames.
She awoke, body wracked with pain, sweat pouring down her forehead. A strangled scream erupted from her throat, her breathing heavy, haggard, and slow.
No... Just... another dream.
++++++++++++++++
Scratch. A single slash across a series of little straight lines. Bloody h*ll... already? Today marked her sixth year in prison -- six, long, years.
Groaning, she stood, shivers running down her spine.
Just a dream. Just a dream.
The shiny surface of the wall caught her reflection. Stopping, she stared. A dark-skinned, gaunt face, years of stress etched across her cheekbones and forehead. Hair going grey at the roots. To think she was only forty-something.
She dropped to the floor, jumping straight into an exercise routine. Stop thinking about it!
Coming into pushups, she struggled to do them in full. Bloody hand restrainer, useless for everything. Suppose that was what they wanted.
Sweat poured down her cheeks, arms shaking with the effort. Keep going.
++++++++++++++++
She slumped to the ground, exhausted.
Moments passed, and the woman dragged a loose stone out from the ground. Hands trembling, she pulled the precious object out, gently and slowly. The smooth fabric cooled her quivering, sweaty fingers.
A thick sash of red, gold, and green symbolizing both a triumphant and harrowing victory. They could take everything from her, but she would never forget what she'd done, who she was. She was a warrior -- a war hero. The only thing left of her former self, and she would cling to it forever.
Click, clack, clunk. Her head snapped up. Gears in the door turned, spinning faster as bolts thrust open.
What...?
Fumbling to hide it, she dragged the stone back across, evidence of a hidey-hole disappearing. Under her clothes went the prized object, warm and reassuring against her cold chest. She scrambled back, head thundering, eyes wide with anticipation.
Blinding light. A short, stocky figure with light brown skin, wearing a uniform covered in badges, stood over her. "Mara."
She rubbed her eyes. Was she hallucinating?
"Your behavior has improved. We have decided solitary confinement is no longer necessary."
She tried to form a reply, nothing came. She hadn't spoken since... Who knew? All her mouth could manage was a grunt.
"You shall be transferred to your new cell, effective immediately. Stand."
Her leg groaned under the sudden effort. No, come on! It whirred into life; she stood, towering over her Warden.
"Well?"
"Aye... Ma'am."
Her first words in years.
About the Author: Website-FB-Twitter Instagram-Pinterest Leo Flynn writes poetry & gripping, action-packed SciFi, like The Mara Files, his debut, an exciting science fiction short story series.
Other galaxies, reading, talking too much about writing and music consume his waking hours.
Can you, for those who don't know you already, tell something about yourself and how you became an author?
It all started with an assignment I got in sixth grade to create a book about myself. In it, I announced that in ten years I’d be a published author. Right around my 22nd birthday, I found that book. Had I become an author? Nope. So, I decided that it was totally feasible to accomplish my kid dreams, and I went for it.
I checked out a guidebook on how to be published for dummies (this isn’t a joke). Then, I followed its advice. I joined a writing group, started going to conferences, honed my craft by taking on an internship with an editing company (because I thought there was no better way to learn to write than to learn how to tell others how to write), and built connections. A friend of mine got a publishing contract with a company, and she recommended me. And that’s how I broke into to the wild business of publishing!
What is something unique/quirky about you?
Before having all my little babies, I lived in a school bus with my husband. My husband tore out all the seats, and we got to work remaking the inside of it into a little home.We had a bedroom, a little kitchenette, a bathroom, and a living room. We even had a giant tub in the bathroom that fit the two of us and a full-sized couch.
While living in a school bus may sound like luxury (haha), I wasn’t the biggest fan, so I highly recommend not jumping on that bandwagon. I won’t get into the gritty details, but let’s just say that a lot of basic like electricity and heating struggled to work, and, even though we were renting a piece of land, we looked sketchy sitting there. The cops may have showed up at our house a few times in the middle of the night. But, it ended up well enough because when we moved into a real house it felt like a luxury!
Where were you born/grew up at?
My dad was military, so I basically grew up all around the USA. That was a good time. My dad was stationed in Georgia for a year, so I pulled some of my distant memories of the place to write this book.
How to find time to write as a parent?
I have three babies under three, so finding time to write is basically impossible these days. It’s a good thing I wrote this novel when I only had one newborn who slept all day.
Describe yourself in 5 words or less!
Redneck Intellect.
How did you come up with the concept and characters for the book?
The two female protagonists are me, which is weird to say because they’re foils of each other, but it’s true. I’m a crazy perfectionist like Kokab. There have been times in my life when I’ve been so obsessed with being a good person that I couldn’t really function. There’s a part of me that really feels that rigidity and confusion about customs, and I definitely sometimes feel like social things can take a second to click. But then, there’s this other side of me that is all Ags, super excited and exuberant about things, with high energy and happiness.
The male protagonist Carter, is kind of just a mesh up of my husband and also what I think the ideal guy is.
What did you enjoy most about writing this book?
I think I most enjoyed the process of working on it with others. I have an amazing critique group, and it was so fun to brainstorm with them and then steal their ideas that they had for my book and look like a total genius. Looking like a genius is great fun.
How did you come up with the title of your first novel?
Becoming Human is the whole theme of the book. Theme is really important to me, and the book is all about what makes us human and what the point of the human experience is.
If you had to do it all over again, would you change anything in your latest book?
Of course. I’m one of those people that could keep picking at something forever and ever. But I won’t since it’s now been through all the beta reading stages and three stages with Immortal Works’ editor. I’m pretty sure I’d make a lot of people annoyed if I went in and tried to change things now.
Did you learn anything during the writing of your recent book?
Ags is really obsessed with the humanities, so it was really fun to go out and learn about a plethora of different paintings, and stories, and ballet, and such.
What is your favorite part of this book and why?
One of my favorite parts of the book is Kokab and Carter’s first date (spoiler, sorry..not sorry). It’s just so cute and awkward and real. I feel like it’s how a real first date goes with two teenagers who are crushing on each other.
What did you edit out of this book?
Well, this book was originally a completely different story so half of the ensemble of characters, most of the scenes, and the overall storyline. The theme stayed the same though, so that’s good.
What do you think about the current publishing market?
I’m a big fan of Indie publishers. I like them because they have more wiggle room for originality and wholesomeness.
Advice they would give new writers?
Join a really good writing group. They will teach you how to write. Go to conferences. Use the conferences to learn but also to meet people. Making friends with people who are authors will help you break in yourself.
Becoming Human by Amy Michelle Carpenter December 8, 2020 Genre: YA Science Fiction A redneck boy. An Earth-obsessed alien. And a robotic girl... Three wildly different teenagers must work together, and accept one another, to conserve humanity.
A breathtaking debut with Southern charm, whimsical worlds, and meet-cuteness, for fans of Marie Lu and Lois Lowry.
Carter doesn't believe in aliens. And he certainly doesn't defend his dad's claims that they exist, even if they aired on national television. But then, the girl he's falling for starts doing strange things, magical things, things that seem a bit out of this world.
Kokab hungers to be a Perfect in a world where her emotions are her greatest flaw. But when her planet faces extinction, her sympathy makes her the best ambassador to persuade humans to accept her people. Failure means invasion, but success means she will never become a Perfect. Ags dreams of graduating from the Academy and becoming a guardian of Earth.
Obsessed with all things human, she's eager to spend time on the unique planet. But when she uncovers an impending invasion, she's willing to lose everything, including herself, to stop it.
"Human and alien, complex and sweetly personal, Carpenter's thoughtful world blends sci-fi with coming of age as three unique worlds collide. This book will make you laugh, make you fall in love, and then make you re-evaluate what it means to be human." McKelle George, HarperCollins author of Speak Easy Speak Love
My copper hair is gone, replaced with uneven strands that drop from my scalp in 203 shades of brown...I press my finger to my cheek, and my skin indents against the pressure. So weak and malleable. My stomach drops. I am changed, no longer an Almost. Not even a Different.
Amy Michelle Carpenter is a developmental editor with Eschler Editing and a professional blogger. She's written hundreds of blogs and news articles for local and national companies. She also has a children's story in an anthology.
As the daughter of an Army officer, she grew up traveling the country and has lived by sandy beaches, southern woods, towering cities, and the rocky mountains. Now, she resides in the countryside of Tooele, UT with her husband and baby girls. She enjoys seeing what wildlife and farm animals dare venture into her yard only to be chased by her toddlers. Wherever family is is home.
Giveaway
ebook copy of Midnight Sun, $15 Amazon giftcard – 1 winner each
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