Happy Saturday, Huns & Hoydens! We’ve a good load of books again this week, including an entry from the elder scion of the House of Hoyt! Go, read, review, enjoy; that is all. Well, except to note that future entries can (and should!) be sent to my email. Happy reading!
Jason Dyck, AKA The Free Range Oyster
Horde Herder, Mercenary Wordsmith, and Keeper of Useless Secrets
Robert A. Hoyt
Cat’s Paw
King of Cats Book 1
Many humans know there is a mountain at the end of the universe to which a bird flies every thousand years to sharpen its beak, until the end of the mountain comes, and thus the end of eternity. What few of them know is that of the mountain only a few small grains of sand remain. And the bird that is to end eternity is alive and ready to fly. At half past noon at the end of the universe, the last great hopes of everything that exists, ever existed or has yet to exist, rests with a stray cat with alcohol issues, a Siamese cat with gender issues, and a Persian cat with pregnancy issues. Things are just about to get fun.
Alma Boykin
Cities and Throngs and Powers
Honor or freedom or yes?
The Salazar family lost everything in the Collapse of 2015 except their pride. Two years later, Mr. Salazar pays a debt with his youngest daughter, Alicia. She must work at Illif House, the mysterious mansion on the plains near the Flatirons. Alicia discovers more than she could have guessed, including a chance at independence. When blood ties threaten to drag her back into the world she’d hoped to leave forever, Alicia must choose between her family’s honor and her heart’s desire.
Laura Montgomery
The Sky Suspended
A generation has passed since asteroid scares led the United States to launch its first and only interstellar starship. The ship returns and announces the discovery of another Earth. People are star-struck, crowds form in Washington, DC, and a boy from Alaska and two lawyers grapple with questions surrounding whether ordinary people will emigrate to the stars. Calvin Tondini is one of those lawyers, and he works his way to the heart of that question.
This is human wave science fiction.
Michael Kingswood
Glimmer Vale
Glimmer Vale Chronicles Book 1
Free this weekend!
Lydelton, a small fishing town in a remote valley called Glimmer Vale, is the perfect place for two fighting men on the run to stop and decide on a plan. But when Julian and Raedrick arrive they find the town besieged by a ruthless band of brigands. Worse, the brigands have taken up station in the mountain passes, blocking the two friends’ escape. With no way around the brigands and no option of returning the way they came, Julian and Raedrick accept an offer of employment. Their mission: defeat the brigands and restore peace to Glimmer Vale.
They are outnumbered at least twenty to one, long odds even if they recruit help. But that help may not be enough when the specter of their past rears its head, forcing Julian and Raedrick to openly face what they are fleeing or risk losing not just their freedom but the lives and fortunes of Lydelton’s inhabitants.
Glimmer Vale is a short, fun fantasy adventure novel, the first installment in the Glimmer Vale Chronicles.
Also available from these fine booksellers:
Tollard’s Peak
Glimmer Vale Chronicles Book 3
Winter in Glimmer Vale – a time to remain close to shelter or, preferably, indoors. Most definitely not a time to brave the mountain peaks surrounding the valley. Raedrick and Julian certainly have no intention of doing so until a man from their past, nearly dead from exposure, appears at the outskirts of Lydelton. Once recovered, he tells them of his friend who lies injured on the flank of Tollard’s Peak, the tallest mountain in the region. Unable to ignore the stranded fellow’s need, the two Constables form a party to rescue him.
But there is more to the story than it first appeared, and very soon Raedrick and Julian find themselves struggling against far more than the elements as they brave the perilous peak. It will take all of their strength and resolve to survive their quest and get to the bottom of the mystery that drew these men into the bleak cold of the mountainside. And they are not the only ones who are searching.
Also available from these fine booksellers:
C.J. Carella
Bad Vibes
Occult consultant Dante Godoy arrives to the small town of Redemption, Nevada, just in time to help Sheriff Matilda Knobb deal with two impossible murders. Together they will confront unspeakable evils in the night.
“Bad Vibes” is a 7,900-word short story introducing a horror setting that will be explored in future novels by C.J. Carella
Steven G. Johnson
Keep of Glass
Girls can’t be knights. Not in the real world. But lately, with all the strange things happening, the real world’s gotten a lot less predictable. So why can’t Galehodin fight for the King like her brother? Well, besides the strangers trying to kill her, there’s always the angry immortal who wants her soul… literally.
Michael A. Hooten
The Curses of Arianrhod
A Bard Without a Star Book 4
There is no magic strong enough to break a mother’s curse.
On the day Gwydion ap Don discovered he had a son, the boy’s mother Arianrhod cursed him to never have a name unless she gave him one herself. Now he wanders Bangreen, exiled from his home, and trying everything he can think of to break the curse.
Left with no other option, he takes the boy to Caer Sidi, where Arianrhod lives in her own exile. But even when confronted, she refuses to name the boy, or even acknowledge him. She wants to punish Gwydion for the rest of his life, despite the fact that he still loves her.
Gwydion almost loses hope, but a tiny sparrow leads him to the wise Ousel of Penwyth, who tells him not to break the curse, but fulfill it. So Gwydion and his son return to Caer Sidi, disguised as shoemakers, to trick Arianrhod into giving the boy a name. She calls him “the fair one with the sure hand”—Llews Llaw Gyffes—and the curse ends. But in her fury at being tricked she curses him again, this time that he will never bear arms until she gives them to him herself. Gwydion swears that he will trick her again, but can he come up with a plan that both fulfills the new curse and keeps his son safe from his mother’s wrath at the same time?
According To Hoyt 