*Beneath is the weekly reader-pimping post from the oyster. There will be a chapter later. But first I need cofffeeeeeeeeeee (Imagine it said like braiiiiinz)*
This week brings a nice haul of new books and a couple of familiar faces for those of you who haven’t picked them up yet. Again, I should note* that I was involved in the production of A Difficult Damsel to Rescue, so you’re aware. So go, buy, read, enjoy, and especially remember to leave reviews! As always, future entries can (and should!) be sent to my email. Happy reading!
Jason Dyck, AKA The Free Range Oyster
Autodidactical Multipotentialite, Mercenary Wordsmith, and Purveyor of Braggadocio
* I do this out of my own ethics. The FTC can address its gestures of affection to my callipygian endowments.
Alma Boykin
Hubris: The Azdhagi Reborn (A Cat Among Dragons)
Two little genes can bring down an empire.
Maker Seeri promised to create the perfect super soldier: strong, fast, telepathic, and endothermic. Three generations later, the survival of the Azdhag Empire, and perhaps of the Azdhag species, depends on six Azdhagi and an undersized True-dragon barkeeper.
Lord Kirlin’s disapproval of genetic technology rivals his disgust with Lord Tarkeela. Tarkeela thinks the Pack Lords deserve the disaster they created. Tarkeela’s ears on the street, the story-catcher Cheerka, suspects the Makers and Pack-Lords know more than they admit about the surge in dead and dying juniors. When the truth boils out of hiding, Pack Lords and commoners must hunt together, reunifying the Azdhag Pack before all hell breaks loose and hubris becomes nemesis.
Also available from these fine sources:
Cyn Bagley
Smoke & Mirrors
There is an underworld that normals do not see with their eyes. They have lost the terror and the wonder that they once knew as children. In this short story collection there are eleven stories and one bonus story of ghosts, goblins, ghouls, and other nasties that live in our world. Read if you dare.
This is a short story collection.
Also available from Smashwords
TK Naliaka
A Difficult Damsel to Rescue (The Decaturs)
SWAT officer Enrique Vargas was smitten with exotic Chlotilde Decatur from the first glance. Helping to save her brother’s life got his foot in the door, but the tough young cop faces new challenges when it comes to courting the irrepressible daughter of the Decatur family.
Young love is never easy, and dating a Decatur brings dangers far beyond romantic drama. When their first date ends with a brutal shooting, the young couple’s courtship is off to a perilous start. As spectres from both their families’ pasts assail them, Chloe and Enrique must lean on each other and their loved ones to survive. Love, danger, and betrayal carry them from the Mountain West and Florida to the tyranny of Cuba and, ultimately to the brutal, lawless desert of the Sahel, where dark promises will be fulfilled. Joining the Decatur family can be a dangerous proposition!
A Difficult Damsel to Rescue, the second book in The Decaturs series, continues the high-stakes adventures of the Decatur clan. Love. courage, and determination go head to head with greed, hatred, and lust for revenge in this roller-coaster of adventure, and unlikely romance. This gripping novel was inspired by the likes of Louis L’Amour, Alistair McLean and the heroism of Stephen Decatur.
Michael Kingswood
Passing in the Night
Prelude to The Pericles Conspiracy.
A year-long shift in the middle of the interstellar void can get pretty boring. For the Fourth shift crew of the starliner Pericles, enroute to Earth from one of the colony worlds, the passage could best be called routine.
Until the forward sensors detect an unknown and unexpected object ahead. What they find there, in the endless night of space, will forever change the universe, for them and for all mankind.
Assuming they survive to tell anyone about the encounter.
Also available from these fine sources:
The Beast And The God-Woman
The greatest terrors come from within.
Yili never questioned the Gods’ decrees, as handed down to the people from the elders. Do not tarry long on the beach, for there lurks the Beast. Do not venture beyond the breakers, for the sea holds nothing but death and man lives on the island alone.
Until the day a strange object approached the island, borne by the wind and waves toward Yili’s home until it broke apart on the reef and deposited a woman and a man, who could only be Gods themselves, onto the beach. The Beast wants to destroy them. The elders distrust them. And Yili finds himself helplessly drawn to the God-Woman, at the risk of all he knows and loves.
The Beast And The God-Woman is a 16,500 word novelette, about 75 pages in length.
What Lurks Between
From a place beyond reality, it comes to consume the world.
For Barry, getting a transfer to a new position as an electrician aboard the Ketcham Space Station summed up his professional life perfectly: just one dead-end job after another. Little did he know that job put the fate of the world in his hands.
Waking up at home with no memory of how he got back from the Station, Barry soon finds that he brought something back with him. Something hungry. Now he has to stop it. Somehow.
Walt Pimbley
Forgiving Michael
“Mikey, what trouble he’s been!” thought Grandma Liu. “Why do we wish for smart children? Mikey’s so smart, he melted the basement and made us all run. Not on purpose, he’s a kindhearted boy. Except when he’s sending dirty pictures to his friends on the Internet and getting my children killed!”
A school project gone wrong. The secret to a doomsday weapon in a teen’s head. Michael’s wanted alive in Moscow, Peking, Tehran. Wanted dead by Tel Aviv! Even Washington’s grown a little peevish with this All-American boy. With sinister spies and comely assassins on the prowl, can Mike’s family find a way to safety?
Cesar Sanderson
Pixie Noir
You can’t keep a tough Pixie down…
Lom is a bounty hunter, paid to bring magical creatures of all descriptions back Underhill, to prevent war with humans should they discover the strangers amongst them. Bella is about to find out she’s a real life fairy princess, but all she wants to do is live peacefully in Alaska, where the biggest problems are hungry grizzly bears. He has to bring her in. It’s nothing personal, it’s his job…
“They had almost had me, that once. I’d been young and foolish, trying to do something heroic, of course. I wouldn’t do that again anytime soon. Now, I work for duty, but nothing more than is necessary to fulfill the family debt. I get paid, which makes me a bounty hunter, but she’s about to teach me about honor. Like all lessons, this one was going to hurt. Fortunately, I have a good gun to fill my hand, and if I have to go, she has been good to look at.”
Dave Freer, author of Dog and Dragon, The Forlorn, and many others, says: “To those of you who thought there was nothing new worth reading in Fantasy: Cedar Sanderson’s Pixie Noir proves that you are wrong. The author plainly knows and loves her setting and characters, and this carries through to the reader. The pace picks up throughout, so save this book for a weekend, or you’ll be complaining about a lack of sleep at work. A very good read!”
According To Hoyt 
Thanks for the opportunity Sarah–
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I should thank the Oyster as well– *waving at the seafood
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Clam’s got fans!
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I do LUV my seafood ;-)
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Many thanks, Sarah and Mr. Oyster Sir.
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Again, many thanks to Jason for his editing services, found right here on Sarah Hoyt’s blog, and merci beaucoup to Sarah for generously providing this space to encourage other new, independent authors. Been following Sarah’s musings for a year and just purchased her SF novel, A Few Good Men. It’s a fast, crisp read, easy to discover why it has been nominated.
The Decaturs is a new series introducing the audience to less-traveled places in an entertaining adventure, carrying readers who know Kalamazoo better than the modern stomping grounds near and beyond the ancient city of Timbouctou. As loyal to each other as the Sacketts, on the edges of today’s truly wild, western frontier – the African Sahel and even onwards to the lawless zones of India – ride along with the Decaturs and become savvy to some of the alien and exciting realms right here on planet Earth, just beyond the horizon. Everyone is invited to visit The Decaturs website for a bit of the inspiration for this adventure novel series, here: http://thedecaturseries.com and watch for the next four novels in the series, coming up soon. Both books, In Time of Peril and A Difficult Damsel to Rescue are available on Kindle to borrow. To go with this book plug this weekend, please watch for the start of the 24/hr promotion – free!
Today’s news could be SF and Mil-SF, but it’s real and it’s now. Timbouctou, Mali – the gold trade cross-roads, of the ancient libraries and holy shrines of mystics, just 12 months ago was once again the place to capture, as the regimes of North Africa collapsed and their cut-loose, competing bands of turban-wrapped Tuareg rebels, the ‘Blue Men’ of the Sahara, converged to recreate their mythical homeland of Azawad only to face the unexpectedly intrepid French Foreign Legion, battling on foot amongst a terrain so harsh and bleak the soldiers call it “Mars.”
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Read the first book last weekend, the second today. Good, entertaining stories, fun characters.
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Thank you! That was the goal, to entertain, so very glad to hear you enjoyed them. If you’d be interested in spreading the word and even the books around to friends to download, read and review, March 30 & 31 are freebies days, It would be fantastic and hugely appreciated. Moving ahead on finalizing Books 3, 4, 5 and 6 as the stories and characters keep rolling.
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Totally off topic, here is an idea for a story from Og, the neanderpundit-
http://neanderpundit.com/index.php?paged=6
There have been some stories like this, but Og has an interesting take-
Thanks for the pimping – er – suggestions, I’ll check them out
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I started reading Witchfinder Earc last night– I finally had to forcefully put the book down so I could get some sleep.
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Thank you!
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About the need for cofffeeeeeeeeee… I wish I could remember the “Ode to Caffeine” I posted into an online game’s guild chat channel one night. I’m no writer, but it seemed to be well received.
Of course, that might have been because it was an online game’s chat channel late at night.
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I ended up doing a bunch of errands, So only doing chapter now.
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In Time of Peril http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00J39Y32A and
A Difficult Damsel to Rescue http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00J39YHTY
will be free downloads for Kindle at Amazon on March 30 & 31st.
In Time of Peril and A Difficult Damsel to Rescue of The Decaturs series took root from this dramatic quote from the Barbary Wars 1812 play ‘An American Captive in Tripoli.’
“If to be the son of him who served his country in time of peril be that which you call noble, then I am of the noblest extraction; but if from pampered lord and vicious prince alone descend the gift, then I am not.”
“My father bears the proudest title a man can have. He is an honest man.”
Again, thanks to Jason and Sarah Hoyt for the opportunity to present these novels first amongst all these avid independent readers and writers. Enjoy, best regards to all. TK Naliaka.
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Please remember to advise when an ebook on offer is DRM free if that be the case. Most of unKindled have found ways to pick that lock but we prefer to not need to do so, out of respect (of not agreement) with the author/publisher’s wishes.
Put another way, if a book you are offering is sans DRM, for gawdsake tell us, else why bother doing it?
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Ah! Thanks for the tip. It’s been a bit awkward managing all this as my own books aren’t even available in my location. It’s hard to figure how all these things work when one can’t even see what everyone else is seeing – or alas not seeing as the case may be.
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Thanks — acquired and loaded for installation in the Nook whenever I find where the dang thing has gotten to. While you will get my dead tree books only when you pry them from my cold, dead hands I acknowledge the utility of virtual books and resort to them when occasion commands. I will try to put those at the head of my (digital) list and promise reviews* (eventually) only if I find them laudatory (not churlish enough to disparage what was gifted, not dishonorable enough to offer praise unmerited) and, when I eventually do get these read and (presumably) enjoyed, to pay actual lucre for further adventures.
*As I have a review readership of less than one and cannot promise any review in anything resembling a timely manner, this is a promise of little value, but it is your righteous due for giving me free reading.
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Perhaps it seems small to you, but it’s much appreciated. Thanks!
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Someone tell Cedar Sanderson to write another Lom story! I loved Pixie Noir.
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She has. S he’s almost ready to publish!
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Aw, thanks! And yes, Trickster Noir is due to release May 1… I’m sure you will be seeing a blurb here at ATH shortly after.
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Thanks, Sara, thanks, Oyster! Hope you like the new cover art. (I see neat covers on this post every week, and it gave me cover-envy!) The Apache is by Herb Paynter – he sells art on the web, and he’s a nice guy.
FORGIVING MICHAEL is near future sci-fi – 2015. Here’s another blurb:
“Mike was making stronger concrete for his high school science project. Some chemicals in the mix improved the bond, but they were pricey. While experimenting with more affordable substitutes, he found something mind-bending: a formula that immediately reverses the process of hydration!
“Unfortunately for his family, he finds this out by melting his parents’ basement. Hilarity does not ensue.
“One drop can suddenly turn an airport runway back into wet concrete, or melt a highway, a bridge, a skyscraper, a city.
“But when it dries and resets, it’s something stronger and more beautiful: Goldcrete.”
It turns spy thriller and gets political – one thing bloated government does very badly is keep secrets. It explores other stuff – why is porn bad for teens? What’s “appropriate dress?” Characters wrestle with national loyalty, family, friendship, and alcoholism. Believing Christians are NOT portrayed as rubes or hypocrites.
Plus it has cool armaments. They get used a lot.
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I’ve got to get the cover finished for “Abducted”, and get it up, now that a couple of Sarah’s fans have volunteered to do a pre-read! Sarah, you’re doing a fabulous service for your followers by allowing them to both advertise their art, and learn from you and several others the things that work, and some of the things that don’t. I can’t believe I’ve been a part of this group for close to two years now! It’s been a joy — and so have the “free” books! 8^)
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Yes, but… are you LEGAL? (runs.)
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I wish to congratulate Cedar for coming out as transgendered “Cesar”. ** applause **
Wait, what? Why did Sarah kick me?
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You’re a BAD person.
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So … she is still a ‘she’?
Oops.
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Worse for you, I believe she is sidhe.
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I though you’d be telling her to quit horning in on your territory, changing her name to something so close…
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I thought it was an homage.
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Nope, just a fumble-fingered mollusc. *grumble*
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Shucks, mollusc, I was hankering after a homage and Swiss, on wry.
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“Never say Shuck to a Mollusc!”
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LOL – I’ll plot my revenge carefully *steeples fingertips*
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Out of morbid curiosity, how far back in the blog archives do you think one would have to go to find a day without a pun in the comments?
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2007. I was only posting like four times a week, and mostly announcements.
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isn’t Cesar a dogfood? Ewwwww….
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And the name of a dog trainer with … ambivalent gender and his own magazine ….
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