I know there’s a lot of these going on this week, but this sale is specifically clean reads only. That might be unique enough to give it a look?
Click here to hop over to the sale!
I have four of my books over there, but you can also find them here!
Finally, the sequel to The Song of the Rose is here: Of Stars and Ashes! The continuing saga of the alien Rox and their home system of Beta Pictoris B continues. These books are a series but can be read as a standalone.
Cinderella in space … if the glass slipper was a warship.
Rasha l’Cervantes, a Rox girl with beautiful golden horns, has been subjected to forced servitude along with the rest of her clan. While working in a quarry, she accidentally befriends a young neurolite, an armored insect that will one day grow up to become a spaceship. She also befriends a fellow prisoner, the ex-prince of her clan.
Kraz l’Cervantes made one bad political decision and now faces the dissolution of his clan. Everyone hates him except for a brave girl at the quarry: Rasha, who refuses to let him wallow in depression and forces him to eat.
The prisoners are separated and three years pass. Rasha recieves a summons to Kraz’s Choosing, a party where he will select a bride. But it is really an attempt to find the missing pilot of a neurolite frigate: a rogue frigate who is a danger to the fleet. Now Rasha must decide whether or not to Choose Kraz … if the deadly frigate doesn’t claim her life, first.
This is the second book in the Celestial Fairytales series, but can be read as a standalone.
Contains: Sweet romance, friends to lovers, no smut, spaceships, evil space fungus, military action, chases.
The seventh book of the After Atlantis series is finally available, after long delays and a major rewrite. Here it is!
Tane Casak, Guardian of Mercury Island, has been framed. Already accused of being a supervillain because of his defense of his team and his island, Tane is present when the governor of Atlantis is assassinated. Now the military and HeroTube are coming for him, and Tane awaits them with grim purpose.
James Chase, Islesworn, is part of the team sent to apprehend Tane. Recognizing him as the Guardian he’s searched for for months, he plans to stop the superhero team before they can harm Tane or capture Mercury Island.
But when a team of Atlantean Exiles attack both Tane and James’s team, alliances shift and enemies become allies. Because if they don’t, Mercury Island will fall into the hands of the evil Exiles, and not even the healing powers of Jayesh the Bloodbound will save them.
Available at most retailers, or will be soon:
I’m working hard to get the whole series available as paperback. In the meantime, here’s the rest of the series:
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| After Atlantis 1 | After Atlantis 2 | After Atlantis 3 |
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| After Atlantis 4 | After Atlantis 5 | After Atlantis 6 | After Atlantis 7 |
The Guardian books follow the adventures of the crew on Mercury Island, and their battles with Dr. Regulus, genius engineer who repurposes abandoned Atlantean magitech and sells it to the highest bidder. Islesworn picks up with the American heroes and their encounters with the other two Lost Isles of Atlantis, and the culture of HeroTube. This culminates in Mercurion, where the Vid:ilantes team cross paths with the Guardian team. Explosively. After this, the series will move on with everyone working together and it is delightful. The whole series is actually urban fantasy with superhero trimmings, and it’s appropriate for all ages.
I’m starting this off by saying that Crio Bru has no idea who I am and I am not being paid to endorse them. This is all just my opinion.
That said, I’ve spent a lot of time on Pinterest lately, just scrolling dismally through my feed late at night while trying to rock the baby to sleep. I’ve seen a lot of those video ads. But the only one I ever clicked on was for some company that sells ground cacao that you brew like coffee.
Turns out they’re called Crio Bru, this little company that sell organic, fair trade cacao. It’s roasted and ground like coffee. There’s lots of different roasts and varieties, and they’re branching out into flavors like hazelnut and caramel. I stared and stared at that ad, then I went to their website and stared at their pictures. And I knew what I wanted for my birthday.
Trouble is, you can’t make it in a coffee pot with paper filters. Well, you can, but it won’t be as good. So I asked my husband for a little French press coffee pot and some of this cacao for my birthday. I just wanted to try it out and see what it was like.
My birthday arrived and so did the coffee pot and cacao. My hubby had ordered me a sampler pack with a bunch of different flavors in it. So far I’ve tried the Venezuela one and the Double Chocolate one.
Oh my goodness. This is the best hot chocolate you’ve ever tasted. It has this rich depth of flavor that hot chocolate mixes or cocoa powder can only hope to attain. It’s satisfyingly bitter, and adding sugar and cream just kicks it over the top. I’ve gotten to where chocolate candy is just too overpoweringly sweet, so being able to have chocolate where I control the sugar content is perfect. I make mine with honey, so it’s only semi-sweet.
The kids and my hubby love this stuff, too. We’re currently experimenting with how many times you can re-brew the same grounds before it loses its flavor. We’re up to three times. My coffee pot only holds three cups, and there’s nine of us, so we go through it pretty fast. I think I’ll be upgrading to a larger pot soon.
I’ve read that the Aztecs used cacao as an aphrodisiac, because it’s supposed to enhance your mood. Commercial chocolate never did that for me. Too many additives, too little actual cacao, I guess. Well, this cacao drink actually does boost my mood. I feel very good inside after drinking it, and it leaves me cheerful. The only other thing that does that to me is my calcium supplement, which has MSM in it. (MSM does similar things and makes you feel really good.) Apparently cacao is high in magnesium and antioxidants, so it’s very good for you.
I don’t eat a lot of luxury foods, so this has been very fun to experiment with. I’m also happy to support a cacao company that doesn’t use slave labor to harvest the cacao, like the big candy companies do. If you’d like to treat yourself, especially as the weather cools off, head over to Crio Bru and order a sampler pack. The cacao is about the same price as coffee, so if you can afford one, you can afford the other. Hit up their website and treat yourself!
I’m excited to announce that a new Vid:ilantes novella is available!
A novella that takes place a few months after Bloodbound. Kari and Jayesh send emails back and forth, slowly becoming friends. But Jayesh is dealing with a mysterious super, a knight in armor who can destroy supers with a touch. At the same time, Kari is watching a creepy house where the inhabitants are building an Atlantean waygate–technology that has been lost for three centuries. Can Kari and Jayesh trust each other enough to work together, or will the knight and his magitech destroy them both?
Available on most retailers here
I didn’t mean for there to be a novella in this trilogy, but after Bloodbound, the characters needed some space to breathe. It also introduces the Big Bads of the final book, so it’s important to read. I guess it’s not really a trilogy anymore? 🙂
A few years ago, we were on a long car trip. I was sitting there, thinking about YouTuber drama. Then I started thinking about all those Marvel movies, and how cool it would be if superheroes recorded videos of their crime fighting exploits and put it all on some kind of Youtube. Maybe … HeroTube. And the best heroes got invited into the big networks, and got big name sponsors, and the best ad affiliates. And they were always trying to outshine the other supers in order to win those sweet, sweet ad clicks.
Then I went, why don’t I just plug my SpaceTime characters into this universe? They needed a new home, and I’d unpublished their original books because the books weren’t that great. Heck, I could bring over the villains, too.
That was the beginning of what came to be called Vid:ilantes, a book about superhero Youtubers. And it’s finally available!
In a world where everyone develops superpowers at puberty, James Chase is an aspiring superhero, dreaming of having his own popular HeroTube channel. But when practicing his powers opens a portal to an island in another dimension, he unwisely posts this video to HeroTube. It goes viral and James finds himself in over his head. The networks want him. The villains want him. And worse, he has tapped into one of the lost secrets of Atlantis, one that many people would kill to steal.
Now James must join forces with his roommate Indal, along with a super on the wrong side, and an irritable nonhuman inhabitant of the island, if he wants to save the world–and himself.
Now available at most retailers! Click here!
I’m already writing the next book and having a blast. The Vid books tie in with the After Atlantis books, so you might give those a look while you’re waiting on book 2. (It answers a lot of questions raised in Islesworn, like who is the Guardian and what is the Mercurion?)
Anyway, I am so excited that this book is finally out there for folks to enjoy. Hopefully I can have book 2 finished and out in another month or so. 😀
Today, the third book in the After Atlantis trilogy is live! These books have been a long time coming, and I’m so excited to have the whole trilogy finally out there.
All’s quiet on Mercury Island after the events of GUARDIAN’S VOW, but Tane has not forgotten Gladiolus, her curse, or his role in breaking it.
But an old threat has arisen–the scientists responsible for the alterations done to Cirrus and Maria have returned. They are eager to recapture their old experiments … and their descendants. They promise Gladiolus a breakthrough treatment for her blind eye, circumventing the curse. Accepting this treatment means Gladiolus must leave her old life behind, including Tane and the Atlantean Islands.
But the monster who laid the curse cannot be thwarted so easily, and accelerates Gladiolus’s sickness in revenge for her choice. Now Tane must rescue Gladiolus from the curse, and his friends from the clutches of the scientists, and he’ll need the full might of Mercury Island’s superweapon to do it. Available on most retailers here!
Book 1 is available here and book 2 is available here, in case you’d like to start from the beginning.
These books have been languishing on my hard drive for two years, awaiting edits and nice covers. Thanks to my husband (a ferocious editor who holds my feet to the fire) and my friend Sherri who is an eagle-eyed copyeditor, I’m confident that these books are ready for primetime.
They also represent my writing struggle of two years ago. Two years ago, I was burned out on writing and publishing. I’d trained myself to outline a book before writing it, and only churned out sub-par stories. The fun was somehow gone. I couldn’t seem to achieve the depth and fun I’d had while writing fanfics as a teen. As a teen, I’d written without an outline, just chasing the characters and plot through all the logical twists and turns of their choices and actions. And I’d written some glorious stuff. What had happened? Was I losing my ability?
Turns out, my brain works best with no outline and a sandbox to play in. I wrote these three books as one long story, just re-learning how to write in a way that gave me joy. These books do have some rough edges that I chose not to remove, because they’re artifacts of my learning process as I was rediscovering my joy.
And the whole trilogy is basically an inverted Beauty and the Beast story, only with superpowers and hecking big lasers. I described book 2 as “Beauty and the Beast with Serenity’s ending.” You know that scene at the end of Serenity when the doors open and River is standing on a pile of bodies with two dripping weapons in her hands? Yeah, that, only with less blood.
So now, this trilogy is finished. And it’s time to shift over to Vid:ilantes, another series in the same world that will dovetail into the After Atlantis books. I’m looking forward to writing a crossover, when my American superheroes and my Atlantean heroes inevitably meet and clash. It will be glorious.
This week was the final push to get Guardian’s Vow through final edits and out the door. My two proofreaders were invaluable, especially my husband, who sacrificed two whole evenings to catch my missing commas and name-change gaffes. I’m satisfied that the book is clean and ready for primetime.
This is book 2 of the After Atlantis trilogy:
Tane and the rest of the island crew have gotten Mercury Island back and are parked a mile in the air above the islands of Atlantis. They are frantically preparing to meet the attack of the warship Fellstorm, which is coming to capture Mercury Island.
When they are joined by Gladiolus Lark, a half-blind girl with a magical malady, the team dynamics begin to shift. Friends draw closer, and even rivals are persuaded to work together. New powers are unlocked as the team delve into the mysteries of Atlanticite crystal, and even the island, itself.
Now the arms dealers National Weapons Enterprises approach to capture the island, and the sea monster Tyrannith waits in the ocean below. Tane must make a terrible choice–to save his friends from one enemy, he must appease the other. He can’t talk NWE down … and appeasing Tyrannith may cost him his life.
Book available on most retailers now! And here’s Book 1, in case you want to start at the beginning.
This is superhero fantasy, so called because it’s people with superpowers in a fantastic setting. It’s set in modern day, but postulates that when Atlantis sank, it became an island chain like the Bahamas. Cruise ships visit regularly, and there’s lots of people constantly excavating the ruins and dredging up all kinds of magitech. There’s a type of magic crystal called Atlanticite that amplifies or just outright grants superpowers. And our heroes accidentally uncover the biggest superweapon of Atlantis and wind up with targets painted on their backs. It’s great fun, if a bit unconventional.
So far, publishing a book a month has been going great. I also just discovered that I have enough short stories with rights reverted that I can compile and release a short story collection. I am enthused about that. So, February’s book will be the final book of the trilogy, Guardian’s Wager. March’s book will be a parallel book in the same universe, Vid:ilantes, a book about superheroes who film themselves doing heroics and post the videos on HeroTube for those sweet, sweet affiliate clicks.
I am excited about this lineup!
The final book of the Puzzle Box trilogy is finally here! Check out this gorgeous cover:
Summary:
After the events of Malevolent and Malcontent, Libby and Mal are reeling from their soul separation. Libby has learned to use life motes in new, amazing ways. Mal has regained his humanity, yet is crushed under the weight of the devouring power laid upon him. Despite this, their devotion to each other has grown into passionate adoration.
When a new type of undead appears, Mal tries to stop the revenant’s insane misuse of magic. The revenant is aided by a terrible monster called the Hunger. Not even the Marchers can stand before them.
Now Mal and Libby must discover their own deepest secrets to end the zombie apocalypse and defeat the revenant and the Hunger, or lose everything they hold dear.
It’s hard to summarize the third book of a trilogy without giving away every last detail of books 1 and 2, but there you go. The other two books are on sale right now, so if you want to dive into the trilogy, now is a good time! I’m working on the paperback, and hope to have that out in the next few weeks. In the meantime, here’s the links to the first two books, Malevolent and Malcontent.
In his book On Writing, Stephen King observed that people love to read about work. That’s why Tom Clancy novels are thinly disguised manuals about how things work, yet people read them by the truckload.
The cozy mystery crowd is the same way. Is there knitting on the cover? There’d better be technical knitting stuff in the book. In one of my Facebook groups, a reader complained that Silence of the Flans didn’t actually have any flans in it.
When I read mysteries that involve the victim being poisoned via blueberry pie, I want to know about that pie. Did it have a normal crust? Or was it a Marie Calendars sour cream blueberry pie? Is there some twist to baking it, like all the tricks it takes to make a perfect cheesecake? How do you hide a bitter poison in a sweet confection, anyway?
The cozy mystery genre is hot right now, but it’s been flooded by a lot of indies who don’t really understand the genre. They promise a culinary cozy, then the dessert in question is barely mentioned. Does the heroine run a cupcake bakery? Tell me about cupcakes. I want to know the sizes, the types of batter, the way the icing is piped. Does the heroine sell those tiny cups of frosting that were so popular a few years ago?
When I set out to write a culinary cozy with dragons, I picked ice cream, since it’s my favorite dessert. I love eating it and I love making it. In the book, the heroine debates things like almonds vs walnuts in rocky road. She constructs the perfect coffee ice cream.
I looked up tons of recipes as I wrote. Having never made Rocky Road before, I checked that out. Turns out it’s a kind of frozen chocolate pudding with nuts and marshmallows folded in. I researched coffee ice cream. You make a custard with coffee in it, the higher quality, the better.
This book is packed with cooking. When the heroine isn’t interviewing people or eavesdropping on conversations, she’s mixing up ice cream or batches of brownies. At home she cooks breakfasts worthy of a restaurant.
Food is comforting. Eating it with friends is comforting. In all my books, across all genres, my characters experience downtime and safety with food. I guess I have too much hobbit in me.
My first dragon cozy, Fire and Ice Cream, launches today. I hope people like it, because I want to write twenty more of these. The characters are adorable and the mystery is fun to figure out. And there’s so much food.
Tianna Tokala is starting a new life in Carefree, Arizona, working in an ice cream parlor. She also has the magical ability to turn into a small dragon called a drake. All she wants is a quiet life where she can make ice cream with her wonderful ice breath.
But when her manager is found dead with a bowl of Tianna’s Rocky Road ice cream beside her, Tianna springs into action. With a knack for observation and her enhanced drake hearing, she delves into her manager’s smoky draconic past.
Aided by a secretive drake, a single mother, and a four-year-old dragon shifter, Tianna must unravel the web of lies that surround this dragonic death … or there may be more fire than ice cream.
K. M. Carroll, Author 