Consider this article a follow-up to the one titled “My Lost Novels.” While #6 in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series is a free PDF download and #7 will be, I’ll preview both books here. The previews follow the summaries for each novel.

Defanging the Red Dragon. Esther Brookstone, ex-MI6 spy and ex-Scotland Yard Inspector in the Art and Antiques Division, and her husband, Bastiann van Coevorden, ex-Interpol agent, along with NYPD homicide detective Rolando Castilblanco and his wife, TV reporter Pam Stuart, become embroiled in geopolitical intrigue as the West tries to thwart a plan China has for stealing its nuclear submarine secrets. Taking place mostly in the US and UK, this suspenseful story has multiple twists and turns and is also the tale of two cities, New York and London, and the bustling life found in both, from the rich and powerful to the most scurrilous criminal elements. Here’s the preview:

The waiting ended. Esther was the first to see the twinkling light on the ocean’s horizon, but she didn’t tell the other two.

When Crosby saw it, he brandished the knife again.

“Out, old woman! They’ve come for us.” He seemed relieved. “Don’t worry. I’ll make it quick. We have to go through a thorough basic training after enlisting.”

She exited the car and stood by the door. He came around the front, the Chinese man following him. When they passed dead center in front, she hit the alarm button on her key fob. The headlights and taillights started flashing, and the horn blared and alternated with a siren moving up and down through several octaves. The two were momentarily blinded, and Esther dashed off into the brush and tall seagrass at the side of the car park. She didn’t get far, though.

In the dark, she could only make out the dark form, a shadowy threat, and part of that shadow corresponded to a rifle. Military-style automatic, she thought. She weighed her chances against this new foe. One on one, but he has a gun.

The alarm stopped, so she could hear what he said. “Quiet, Mrs. Brookstone!” came the hissed whisper. “We’re getting into position. Come with me.”

They moved closer to the boundary between beach and vegetation determined by a tall berm about half her height. She felt much better now, and even more so when she heard the whump-whump-whump from a helicopter that reminded her of that first extraction in East Germany. A loud megaphone warned the two from the car and any scrotes on the beach to freeze and put up their hands. That warning was answered by gunfire.

“SCO19 from the Met?” she said to the stranger.

“MI5, madam. Can you shoot a gun?”

“Damn right I can!”

Intolerance. Esther Brookstone, ex-MI6 spy and ex-Scotland Yard Inspector in the Art and Antiques Division, becomes involved in solving a cold case, a murder committed in Ireland years earlier; in thwarting a plot to kill immigrants and refugees; and in a murder case involving a famous Irish author. Her husband, Bastiann van Coevorden, an ex-Interpol agent and now a consultant for MI5, and various others help her in these cases. As one character proclaims, “God help me. She turns up everywhere.” Life after Brexit has become very dangerous in the British Isles! Here’s the preview:

Seamus, swinging the chain like a wild man with a whip, met Ben as he put foot on the landing. He didn’t even have time to shoot. Ben fell backwards, taking his colleague with him. Nate saw Seamus moving down the stairs toward him. He picked up that second man’s gun and emptied the whole cartridge. Yet Seamus kept coming, blood pouring from his huge chest.

Nate ducked under the chain and punched Seamus in the chest. That enraged the man, who tossed the chain over the stair rail and grabbed Nate. The DI felt his ribs crack and his breath leaving his lungs, but he managed to pull unbalance his foe. They tumbled down the stairs. Nate landed on top of Seamus.

“You okay, Guv?” Ben called down to Nate, who was slow to get up.

“Cracked ribs, I think. You?”

“Could be better. I think that damn chain broke my jaw. Thank God for the helmet.”

“And thank God this bastard is dead. And here we were only going to interrogate him.”

Of course, they were going to do that with caution. After hearing Kat’s tale, Nate had been sure that Seamus was their man.

Nate looked at the body. Would they ever have the full story? What had gone through this crazy man’s mind?

Nate sat on the first riser and called for EMTs, SOCOs, and the pathologist. They would take a while to sort things, but for him the case was closed. He then remembered someone else he needed to call, someone he felt very close to.

“Hello? Sara? We have Tommy’s killer.”

***

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To get these two novels…. It’s easy: Go to the list of free fiction you’ll find on the “Free Stuff & Contests” web page, click on the title you want, and start reading…or click on the PDF download button to get your own personal copy. Tell your relatives and friends about the novels. They can either do the same thing, or you can copy your PDF and give them a copy. I only ask you to please respect the copyright and not sell any copies you make for profit.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas! 

Sci-fi often extrapolates current science or “invents” new science we might see in the future. A.B. Carolan’s new book Origins (see last week’s preview) does both, but it’s mostly based on ongoing scientific discovery about human beings’ past. Denisovan and Hobbit hominids have had more press lately than Cro-Magnons and Neandertals because they’re new discoveries. They flourished thousands of years ago, and bits of their DNA are found in modern humans’ DNA (modern humans are mainly Cro-Magnon descendants). A.B. summarizes the current situation in his end notes:

“When I began thinking about a plot with genetics as a theme, Anna Utkin [an early short story of mine] turned me towards human prehistory. The final inspiration occurred when I found the portrait of a young Denisovan girl. (The interested reader can google ‘What did Denisovans look like?’ to see answers to that question—I focused on the BBC version.) It might seem weird, but I immediately thought, ‘Here’s a young girl who doesn’t look like any girl I know.’ That led to other thoughts along the lines that we often react negatively to people who don’t look or act like us and don’t seem to fit into our personal ‘tribe.’ Could I write a story that takes such a girl and makes her into a reluctant hero—almost a superhero even? I could and did, and you have just read the first installment. I hope more will follow.”

“That BBC portrait* has an interesting history, by the way. From genetic material in a pinky and jaw bones (not from the same archaeological site, mind you), researchers were able to construct the entire Denisovan genome and then use it to show us what that Denisovan girl must have looked like. For me, that portrait is Kayla [A.B.’s protagonist], a twenty-first-century Denisovan descendant who is super-smart and can kick ass with the best superheroes”

“The search for the origins of modern humans and their cousins continues to be the focus of exciting research, and the Denisovans, only discovered recently, are no exceptions. Unlike the equating of ancient hominids to burros and horses, i.e., species unable to breed and have fertile offspring, a theory found in Yuval Noah Harari’s Sapiens (his first two chapters, in particular), which Steve and I read long after I wrote the manuscript for this book, the DNA evidence shows ancient hominids did interbreed. Yet I had to wonder: If they could do so, why not more? Why aren’t we more of a mix of Cro-Magnons (always called Homo sapiens by Professor Harari), Neanderthals, and Denisovans, as well as other ancient hominids thrown in? Considering that Cro-Magnons’ descendants have come to be the dominant species, maybe that just means that they were the bad-ass denizens of ancient Earth? Maybe they were so bent on conquest that they didn’t have that much time to intermingle? I then asked myself: Would they even do so if that hominid evolution was interrupted by visitors from the stars?”

(more…)

[Note from Steve: A.B. tells me this is only the first book in a trilogy. I sure hope there’s more! It’s part of the “ABC Sci-Fi Mystery” series, of course but is also a thriller. The mystery resides in Kayla’s origins, but thrills abound. I hope you enjoy this preview. The book will be published only as an ebook and will be available only on Smashwords and its affiliated retailers (iBooks, B&N, Kobo, etc.) and library and lending services (Overdrive, Scribd, Gardners, etc.), not Amazon. Coming soon from Carrick Publishing!]

Origins

Copyright 2021, A. B. Carolan

Summary

Kayla Jones has dreams she can’t understand. Her future seems determined as the brilliant STEM student who looks forward to a research career, but her past gets in the way. As if the chaos afflicting the world and leading to her adopted father’s death wasn’t enough, killers begin to pursue her. With some friends who come to her aid, she’s on her way to discover a conspiracy that can be traced to prehistoric battles waged by hominins bent on conquest of a primitive Earth.

Prologue

New Paltz, NY: 2019

Kayla had nightmares. They’d started when she was five, soon after she was adopted…maybe even before. She didn’t remember much before that. Bombs, yes; flying debris, yes. Waking up in a hospital, a bit fuzzy-headed. But she couldn’t remember who her real parents were, or where she’d come from. She knew that Kayla Jones wasn’t her real name, but she couldn’t remember what that either. The doctors and nurses had been nice, though…and caring. They told her she was a war orphan. At first she didn’t even know what those words meant because they spoke in a strange language she didn’t understand well at the time.

Her new parents comforted her every time she woke up screaming. They were black; she was light brown. That didn’t seem to matter to them, and it certainly didn’t matter to her. There was a lot of love in their comforting, and there was also a lot in her new home, a place not far from a big city many grownups called the “capital of the world.”

Her adopted father was a pastor; her adopted mother the church’s choir director and organist. Kayla liked the church music. The softer, slow music was comforting, while the louder and more rhythmic music that got the congregation swaying made her happy. At first she didn’t know what the words that went with the music meant either, but she learned the strange, new language with time.

Sometimes the dreams weren’t bad. There were those where she was watching men and women dressed in protective clothing working at counters topped with weird instruments and machines. They didn’t talk much—the area where they worked was quiet and a bit gloomy, and the lights would often go out—but she somehow knew what they were thinking. Those dreams were recurring too, but they brought her peace instead. And somehow that gloomy place seemed like home.

She also remembered a different room where she could sit and stare at the stars—millions of points of light seen from a bubble that surrounded her. Or were those someone else’s memories? In any case, she liked those dreams best. They also seemed like dreams about another home, a more peaceful place than the one associated with the nightmares.

The peaceful dreams weren’t as frequent as the bad ones, though. She never told her new parents any details about them. She wanted the dreams, even the bad ones, to be her special secret. They were the only things left from a past that she’d mostly forgotten. She wanted to know more about it, but she had to postpone that quest.

Chapter One

New York City: 2032

Kayla spotted her pursuer just in time. The second one of the night! Others had killed two of her friends on different nights, and she’d just managed to escape the one who’d killed Pam. Now she had to confront his accomplice in a dark warehouse on the city’s upper West Side. At least there’re no rats!

She dove into a pile of old cardboard and packing material as she heard more shots. Automatic. High-capacity magazine? Harry’s lessons were always with her. She counted the five bullets that had slammed into the wooden shipping crate where she’d been standing only seconds before. Her guess might be correct, but some magazines held more than others.

There wasn’t enough refuse to cover her. Nowhere to hide! She stood and looked around. Move, Kayla! Keep moving! Don’t become a stationary target. Harry’s imagined voice spurred her on. She squeezed between two shipping crates into the next aisle, ran along it, and then smiled as she spotted her pursuer move along the aisle she’d just left, but in the opposite direction.

Maybe he’ll think I’m hiding under the pile? Fight or flee? The last might lead to a bullet in the back just like the one Pam got. It’d been wild the last few days, but, if she did it right, this time she’d get a gun. And there’d be no cops here who’d suspect she’d murdered her friends.

She took several silent, running steps like Harry had taught her, seemed to walk up the side of the crate next to her, and grabbed onto the top edge. She swung onto the crate’s top and then moved back along the crates toward the refuse pile. Peering over the edge of the crate next to the pile, she watched her adversary put his gun back into his shoulder holster. He started tossing the cardboard on top of the pile into the aisle behind him. Now or never! She jumped him.

He was strong but no match for her quickness; he was also old and slow. And his first reaction was to go for his gun. She laid him out before he even had it out of his holster.

She scampered away with the gun tucked snugly in the small of her back, held there by the waistband of her jeans.

***

Her next step towards survival was to find food. She was famished. The hours without much food or water were wearing on her. Nothing to do with her, but she noticed bodies on the streets now. The city’s chaos and violence had continued. Have people organized into packs like wild dogs? They’d seen that on TV.

She suddenly felt a cold frisson down her spine as she realized there could be such a thin veneer of civilization. Scratch a human and you get a rabid dog, she mused. But I won’t be like that! I just can’t!

She spotted golden arches up ahead. She knew the place. The drive-in restaurant was usually full, but now with the chaos? Both police and mercenaries had warned there was safety in numbers, that citizens shouldn’t be out alone. She decided the numbers didn’t matter, and she wasn’t alone: She had a gun now. Sorry, Harry. Sometimes you need one. The fast-food mecca called to its pilgrim. Is there still food there? She’d have to be careful.

Everything looked normal to her once she was inside, though, except for the lack of customers. She bought a Big Mac cheeseburger and large fries, the meal coming with a medium Coke. The latter was self-serve, so she’d repeat that, figuring she needed the caffeine as well as the liquid. Harry had always told her to stay hydrated.

When she turned to look for a place to sit, she only saw littered tables. It was after the lunch hour, so tables hadn’t been bussed. People still had to work, and they had to eat. She thought the mess was a good sign. Customers had been there. Life still went on even with the city’s violence.

What the kid at the register said caught her by surprise.

“You a cop?”

She then remembered the gun…and Harry. She’d turned her back to study the menu over the drink counter as if she were making a decision. “Corporate security guard,” she said over her shoulder. “Any problem with that?”

“No, ma’am, not as far as I’m concerned. You keep order around here better than the cops.”

Ma’am? She realized how disheveled she must look. Or how young and courageous the kid must be. Or maybe my age? Maybe my scruffiness makes me look older?

“Any clean tables?”

“Sorry. We’re a bit shorthanded. Everyone’s scared now, so people call in sick. But I need the money. I can clean off a table for you, but there’s a booth back by the side entrance that’s almost clean—opposite the bathrooms.”

“Thanks. Stay safe.”

(more…)

[Note from Steve: Thanks to Penmore Press, this year you will be treated to another adventure involving those imperfect clones of Agatha Christie’s characters Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot, that is, Esther Brookstone, now ex-Scotland Yard Inspector from the Art and Antiques Division, and Bastiann van Coevorden, an Interpol agent and Esther’s paramour and wannabe protector. They’re 21^st century versions of the famous sleuths, of course. In this new novel, they will meet the artist Sandro Botticelli and the disciple St. John the Divine…and there’s no time travel. Without further ado, here’s an excerpt from the mystery/thriller Son of Thunder.]

Esther was a seasoned traveler, but she missed her plane.

That afternoon, when she called the lift to take her last little bit of garbage downstairs to the bin in her building’s garage, something she always did before a trip, she took only a few steps when a man popped out from behind a support column, grabbed her, and put a handkerchief over her mouth.

What she inhaled took the force from her kick to his groin….

“You’re no more a countess than I am,” said the blurred face belonging to a complete stranger when she awoke.  “You’re a meddling old hag.”

She said nothing.  She was waiting for her head to clear before she tried to assess her situation.  Her captor patted her on the cheek.

“Your husband wasn’t even a count under modern Italian law.  Alberto Sartini was only a greedy Swiss banker.”

Italian, she thought.  And I’ll castrate you for your insults!

“But to the business at hand.  I have someone on Moretti’s house staff.  That person informed me two objets d’art were found in an old armoire that used to belong to a priest, a Botticelli painting and a parchment, to be precise.”  He laughed.  “At first I was only interested in the armoire as a family heirloom.  When Moretti’s slut won that bid, I lost interest until I heard about what was in the armoire.” He paced the floor, his hands behind his back.  What an intense fellow!  “I’m not interested in the painting, whether it’s an authentic Botticelli or not.  Stolen art is difficult to handle unless you sell it cents on the euro to someone in the black market.  But the document intrigues me.  Does it prove my ancestor made a long journey with Sandro Botticelli?”

Esther was confused.  First, this man was an obvious amateur.  Second, had the priest who owned the armoire, painting, and parchment dallied in the pastime of many Renaissance priests who sired bastard children?  Third, why should anyone care about their ancestor taking a trip with the famous painter?

The conversation was becoming strange.  No, there isn’t any conversation!  She hadn’t said anything yet!

“Sorry.  I didn’t catch your name.”

“You may call me Bruno.  My full name is Bruno Toscano.”

Her head now clear, Esther studied his features. He had a buzz haircut that gave the impression of baldness compared to the bushy eyebrows that hovered like giant caterpillars above bottle-glass lenses with wire frames. Otherwise, he was a plain man who wore inexpensive and ill-fitting clothes.  He was shorter than she was.  Maybe I aimed my kick too high?

He continued his pacing and muttering to himself as if his ego and id were embroiled in a serious discussion, at times seeming to put himself into a trance.  She remembered how the glasses had magnified the malevolence in the cold, blue eyes.

“Very well, Bruno, untie me and I’ll try to answer your questions.”

He smiled.  Some dental work needed.  Everything about him was wrinkled—his shirt, his suit, and his tie that was too long.  She couldn’t tilt her head down far enough to see his shoes.  She supposed they were old and worn too.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?  You’re an old hag, but you’re not a fragile old hag.  I know about some of your exploits.  I don’t trust you, you see.  Not at all.  Not at all.”

“The parchment describes a trip to Ephesus and vicinity.  It’s almost like a travel log because it’s a word-map to St. John’s burial place.”

“St. John the Divine?  Who wrote that document?  Does the writer mention a Bishop Leonardo?”

“No mention of anyone, of him or Sandro Botticelli.  Is this bishop some relative of yours?”

“Not a direct relative.  We’re descendants of Bishop Leonardo’s brother.”  The man thought a moment.  Esther took the opportunity to test her constraints.  Loose, but not loose enough.  He stopped pacing and leaned over her.  “I’ve now decided a saint’s bones would be more valuable than an armoire.  If I can’t prove my ancestor traveled with Botticelli to search for the bones, finding them and selling them would be a suitable alternative to the armoire and painting.”

(more…)

A. B. Carolan liked a short story I’d written long ago called “Marcello and Me.” He asked if he could make it into a novel. Ha! Now he owns it. The following excerpt from his The Secret of the Urns is the same one that appears at the end of his second edition of my YA sci-fi mystery The Secret Lab. You might not have read that new edition, though—you should, especially if you didn’t read the first edition! By the way, A. B. doesn’t have a website or Facebook author’s page and prefers to keep his email address a secret, but he does have an author’s page on both Amazon and Smashwords. He’s a wee bit reclusive, you see, but if you want to send him a message, send it to me using my contact page.

The Secret of the Urns

Copyright 2018, A. B. Carolan

Chapter One

My leg was broken.  Way to go, girl!

That wasn’t my only worry.  Kids break bones all the time. Hard Fist’s climate would kill me, not the break.

There wasn’t likely to be anyone near, and no one knew where I was. I didn’t even know, and, even if I did, I couldn’t communicate the location to anyone. Nobody within yelling distance, and even radio signals would be blocked where I lay flat on my back in pain.

Although it was still hot, the white sun had just gone down behind the precipice’s edge, leaving me in shadow, except for Big Fellow’s pale light dominating the twilight sky of its satellite Hard Fist.  Soon night would fall, temperatures would plummet, and I would freeze.

At least the ubiquitous sounds from the satellite’s rainforest had started up again to provide me with some funeral music. Of course, those sounds would make the dirge a bit primitive; some might even say they were threatening. You could almost hear chanted words to the effect, “Humans don’t belong here!” Yeah, tell my parents that!

My usual cheery thirteen-year-old innocence and positive outlook on life had suffered a major blow along with my leg. I was thinking they’d morphed into stupidity instead. Fact is, I’m not stupid—I’m the child of a triad that had bioengineered my mental and physical attributes as well as they could, given the genetic material they had available, which was AOK considering each member of the triad had the same thing done for them. But I’d just acted stupidly, so I could almost hear old Darwin crowing about natural selection being the better choice.

So far, growing up on Hard Fist hadn’t been easy. The planet-sized moon orbits the gas giant Big Fellow, almost a star itself and about twice the size of Jupiter.  This largest planet in the Fistian star system lies at the E-zone’s edge, so its satellite is theoretically habitable, but barely so in practice, at least for Humans.  Some of my difficulties growing up there had their origin in the harsh environment. And now it might kill me!

Hard Fist broke all the rules. Tides were huge due to Big Fellow’s proximity. When they combined with strong winds from a storm, lowlands close to the shore flooded, so communities weren’t found close to the shore. Lush tropical forests took advantage of 0.9 relative to E-normal gravity and the greenhouse effect, but all that vegetation also saturated the air with free oxygen while fixing excess nitrogen. The whole atmosphere is in a strange equilibrium that scientists were just beginning to understand. Other nearby but smaller satellites toyed with Big Fellow’s powerful attraction enough to keep our moon from being tide-locked to the gas giant, another precarious equilibrium, although that didn’t matter much because Big Fellow wasn’t a star. These were strange equilibriums that had lasted for eons, though. I’d never wanted to understand their intricacies, but we all suffered from their capricious nature.

Even in the 21^st century, Human scientists knew there were many planets in near-Earth space. Turned out many are habitable; in other words, there are many places where Humans can live.  At the personal level, though, people don’t have to like living in those places.  For my tenure on Hard Fist, I had no choice.  I couldn’t leave my legal wardens, my parents, until I was eighteen—or, unless I received their permission to do so, which I’d been on the verge of asking many times recently.  Because I was often invisible to them in a manner of speaking, having a chance to ask or receive permission wasn’t likely to happen anytime soon, though. I did the best I could to cope.

I had difficulties with grown-ups in general.  Most of these problems could be traced to their not remembering what it was like to be a kid.  They were mostly scientists, engineers, and other technical people who were sent to Hard Fist to study that strange moon.  While there should have been a law against it, some of them had kids.  I’m one of those.  My name is Asako Kobayashi, a Human Fistian, the first one.  Others followed, but I’m unique, as if that mattered. Write that on my funeral urn, Mom and Dad2. Of course, they might never find my body!

***

Humans had found native Fistians on Hard Fist—we didn’t know how many exactly, but certainly a lot more than Humans.  The Human grown-ups didn’t socialize with them.  The “official reason” was that they were studying native Fistians and everything else Fistian, the entire biosphere, in other words, so they didn’t want to lose their objectivity.

By the time I turned ten (Earth standard years, not Fistian years), I knew the real reason: Humans generally didn’t like native Fistians.  Some even expressed their prejudices openly, especially recent arrivals.  Others never admitted to having them but exhibited them through their actions.  Almost everyone considered the moon’s natives barely sentient and primitive.  I knew better.

(more…)

Yes, the Mary Jo Melendez Mysteries series is now a trilogy…just as soon as I publish #3, that is (hopefully before 2018 ends). My muses (banshees with Tasers) listened to Mary Jo and the MECHs (“Mechanically Enhances Cybernetic Humans”) and hounded me to resolve everything that readers might consider unresolved at the end of the second book: What’s the future of the MECHs?  Do Mary Jo and Mario ride off into the Silicon Valley sunset?  Do the American and Russian governments leave things be?  This excerpt doesn’t answer any of those questions (no spoilers here, but there are some hints); you’ll have to read the novel to answer them (the answers might not be what you expect). This excerpt just gives you a taste of the action.

Goin’ the Extra Mile

Copyright 2018, Steven M. Moore

Chapter Eleven

I felt like an undercover cop, but was getting more focused; wanted to find out where Mario and the kids were. Maybe I was walking into a trap. Thought the Chinese wanted me for the same reason those Russian and U.S. teams had wanted me—they wanted to know where the M.E.C.H.s were. They thought I knew.

You might wonder why everyone wanted the M.E.C.H.s.  After all, there’s nothing special about fancy prosthetics anymore. But my cyborg friends had enhanced capabilities, namely interchangeable parts and super strength. The special technology also involved many direct connections to the human brain that made everything work so well together.  Put some smart armor on a M.E.C.H. and you have your super soldier.  Of course, M.E.C.H. tech would be good for a lot of other more benign applications too, but superpowers didn’t seem to care about them.

A.C.V.E. East, the East Coast branch of my current employer, and a Pentagon general hadn’t wanted to leave it at that either. They wanted to do a partial frontal lobotomy and install a chip in my M.E.C.H. friends to see if they could eliminate all the M.E.C.H.’s moral scruples and allow them to program their super soldier for each battlefield assignment.  As far as I know, we’d closed down that last U.S. effort too. Guessed the Chinese had heard about it, though.

The triad’s Seattle shakedown game was about the same as you’d expect with old East Coast mafia families. They targeted any small businessperson they could. Cops moved in, they moved out…temporarily. Or they bribed cops, I suppose.  Good old-fashioned thuggish entrepreneurship.

I spent five days riding around with a bunch of clowns whose only job was collecting protection money, about as old-fashioned as you can get. The clowns were a diverse lot, but they were all thugs.  Heard that the insurance Weh Li offered sometimes worked too—when a street gang hit a drugstore for prescription opioids, that gang was erased.  Zap!  Zap!  Food for the fish in the harbor!  The thought made me yearn for steak.  Wondered if my cop friends who had pointed out where to find Weh Li appreciated that.  Probably.  They’d warned me.

Knew I was in way over my head.  Undercover cops often live on borrowed time.  Figured they also had training on how to survive in their assignments and to know when to bail.  They were collecting evidence against criminals.  I didn’t care about putting Weh Li and his triad minions away; I did care about finding my family.  That was my only concern.  If something happened to me, that was O.K., as long as I somehow saved them.

(more…)

[Note to my readers: This post-apocalyptic sci-fi novel will be released late in 2017, if not before. This excerpt is to whet your appetite. It’s taken from the middle of the novel. Penny Castro, ex-LA county sheriff’s deputy has managed to survive the apocalypse and is currently forced to live with her adopted family in a refugee camp near Edwards AFB. She has just returned from a trip to fill tankers with water…]

One week later I learned the truth in the adage that you can be a victim of your own success. Even though I’d insisted that I didn’t want any more violence in my life—the trip to the Valley was more about curiosity almost killing this cat—the USAF now considered Ensign Penny as an asset, although a reluctant one.

“I’ve never been to Vandenberg,” I told Rodriguez.

He stood before me looking a bit forlorn. Couldn’t see him well from my camp chair with the blazing sun at his back. “If it’s any consolation, I tried to dissuade the colonel because I know you don’t want to participate.”

“Why do they think I’d want to participate?”

“One major reason: we airlifted someone from the Santa Maria area who had managed to cobble together a coded message we could recognize and broadcasted it at a radio station.”

(more…)

OK, Rogue Planet is a done deal, but maybe you’re too shy to click on the “Peek Inside” button on the Amazon book page, so I decided to repost this excerpt.  Before giving you a first look at this new novel, here’s the blurb:

Hidden away from near-Earth planets in remote spiral arms of the Galaxy are Human worlds that have lost contact with more progressive worlds and reverted to strange and primitive customs and traditions, their leaders using religion, superstition, and imported technologies to rule in tyranny.  Survey ships explored and catalogued these planets as suitable for future colonization centuries earlier, but groups with a special interest in ensuring a homogeneous and often despotic society didn’t bother applying for permission to colonize.

Following the ITUIP (Interstellar Trade Union of Independent Planets) Protocol, ships were restricted to observe and maintain a hands-off policy for these rogue planets, even when there was great temptation to intervene.  Eden, where a theocracy rules with an iron fist, is such a planet.  A group of rebels struggles to end the oppressive regime to forge a new future.

Set in the same universe as the “Chaos Chronicles Trilogy” and the Dr. Carlos stories, this sci-fi saga once again explores the never-ending battle between good and evil so prominent in my other books.

I had fun writing this hard sci-fi tale with a fantasy flavor.  I hope you have as much fun reading it, available in all ebook formats at $2.99 (Amazon and Smashwords) and print for $9.99 (Create Space).  And, as usual, you can read for free in exchange for an honest review (I’ll put it on Net Galley for a short time for those would-be reviewers who are too shy to query me directly).

Now, for the excerpt:

Chapter Four

The Entertainer

Two weeks later, Kaushal wound through a maze of corridors and tunnels, many underground, and found a secluded and breezy courtyard he remembered from his childhood in the castle.  The walls were high enough to trap most sounds he made practicing the roki, and lush vegetation muted the echoes.  He knew several places like this, and rotated between them, randomizing his choices to avoid discovery.

He only stopped playing and singing when he saw the shadow cast on the stone floor.  When she peeked around the corner of the column, he smiled at Princess Anju.

“Will you report me?”

She stepped from behind the column.  “No, as long as you don’t report me.”

“Agreed.  Are you in trouble?”

“My uncle would go into a fit of rage if he knew I’m alone with a Second Tribe slave.  He might kill me even, like he did my father.  And he’d likely kill you too.  Or, at the very least, castrate you.”

“I suppose my voice would turn to soprano in that case,” he said with a smile.  He had no idea where he’d heard that.  Was it the practice in his father’s court?  Even the Second Tribe frowned on female singers, so boys and men singing countertenor took their place.  Maybe they weren’t countertenors to begin with?

            “That’s not funny,” she said.  She sat on the opposite end of the bench, folding her hands in her lap.  “Can I listen to more?”

“You make me nervous,” he said.

“A performer with no audience is a hibjab shrieking at the moon.”

“What’s a hibjab?”

“Some animal on Paradise, I suppose, before the Ice Age.  It’s just a saying.  It means—”

He held up a hand.  “I figured out what it means.  You’re saying I should practice with an audience, and you’ll be my first audience member.”

She nodded.  “Please, continue.”

She listened to him for a while and then stood.

“I have to go.  Do you often come here?  I only found this place today.”

“There are many secret spots like this in the castle.  I can show you if you like.”

She raised an eyebrow but followed with a smile.  “I’d like that.”

***

            “You didn’t!”

“People in the court will love your songs and playing,” said Princess Anju.

“I don’t want to entertain the court.  Why should I?  You people have taken over my world.”

She frowned.  “Not I.  And don’t be so stubborn.  Other Second Tribe slaves are courtiers. It’s a privilege and an escape from a hard life.”  She put her tiny hand on his arm.  “Do it for me.”

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Before giving you a first look into my new novel, here’s the blurb:

Hidden away from near-Earth planets in remote spiral arms of the Galaxy are Human worlds that have lost contact with more progressive worlds and reverted to strange and primitive customs and traditions, their leaders using religion, superstition, and imported technologies to rule in tyranny.  Survey ships explored and catalogued these planets as suitable for future colonization centuries earlier, but groups with a special interest in ensuring a homogeneous and often despotic society didn’t bother applying for permission to colonize.

Following the ITUIP (Interstellar Trade Union of Independent Planets) Protocol, ships were restricted to observe and maintain a hands-off policy for these rogue planets, even when there was great temptation to intervene.  Eden, where a theocracy rules with an iron fist, is such a planet.  A group of rebels struggles to end the oppressive regime to forge a new future.

Set in the same universe as the “Chaos Chronicles Trilogy” and the Dr. Carlos stories, this sci-fi saga once again explores the never-ending battle between good and evil so prominent in my other books.

I had fun writing this hard sci-fi tale with a fantasy flavor.  I hope you have as much fun reading it, soon to be available on Amazon and Smashwords and all the latter’s associated retailers for only $2.99 (much more filling than a McDonald’s order, better for you too, and less expensive).  I have yet to decide whether there will be a print version (Create Space).  And, as usual, you can read for free in exchange for an honest review (I’ll probably put it on Net Galley for a short time for those would-be reviewers who are too shy to query me directly).

Now, for the excerpt:

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[Note from Steve: This sci-fi novel is a stand-alone epic about an ET virus and its effects on human society and its space exploration.  It will be released soon.  Maybe this excerpt will brighten your tax day?]

Groom Lake, Nevada

            Chief Master Sgt. Bob Sanchez studied his monitors and laughed.  “You have to see some of these signs, Lucy.”

Senior Master Sgt. Lucy Chang was studying high-res satellite images taken of the base.  The UFO fanatics’ signs were often creative.  Sometimes that was the only way base security could determine when they were planning some shenanigans.  She stopped, walked over, and joined Sanchez, looking over his shoulder at his screens.

He glanced up and smiled.  Among their colleagues, it was no secret they were sleeping together.  Their commanding officers wouldn’t approve, of course, but everyone collaborated in keeping their secret.  It was a code of honor followed by everyone working at the top secret base; it existed because life was hard enough in the desert without the added stresses associated with liking someone and not being able to do anything about it.

Still, she didn’t like relationships started at work, never had, but there weren’t many alternatives at the base.  Sanchez was a nice guy, but she didn’t know if he was husband material.  Until she figured that out, she was OK with the present situation—two consenting adults having a bit of fun.  Nobody’s business, and everyone looked the other way.

“They’re entertaining, I’ll give them that.  Even the drawings.  That one even looks like Major Moore.  I like that sign saying, ‘We’re all going to become zombies!’  No wonder they wear Grateful Dead T-shirts.”  She laughed and looked at her watch.  “We have a new record, I think.  The president made his announcement not long ago.  Where’s Guinness when you need him?”

Sanchez pointed at another sign.  “That’s why.”  The sign said, “Aliens Have Taken over the White House!”  “How do you know what’s on the T-shirts?  They’re all sweaty and dirty.  I can’t imagine why, though.  It’s only 105 degrees out there, and I have it on good authority these people don’t often bathe.”

“Not surprising with the lack of water.  This desert bakes anyone.  It’s so dry we’d both turn into Egyptian mummies even without embalming fluid.”  Her hair brushed against his cheek.  “They’ve all become desert rats.  I’m from Seattle, but I’m becoming one too.  What we won’t do for a job.”

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