Some readers know that I give away most of my short fiction in blog posts (see the “Steve’s Shorts,” “ABC Shorts,” and “Friday Fiction” archives) and as free PDF downloads (see the list on my “Free Stuff & Contests” web page). But there are two free novels you can download as PDFs as well.

Defanging the Red Dragon is a a crossover novel: Half takes place in NYC and features NYPD detectives Chen and Castilblanco; the other half takes place in London and features Esther Brookstone and Bastiann van Coevorden. So, it’s #8 in the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco” series and #6 in the “Esther Brookstone Art Detective” series.

There’s just one plot, though: China is trying to steal Australia, the UK, and the US’s plans for new software and hardware upgrades to their nuclear submarines. (Remember the past scandal caused when Australia bailed out on the project with the French? That left egg on Biden’s face!) This novel’s spy-fi with a lot of mystery, suspense and thrills…and it’s free.

Intolerance is a complete shift. Esther Brookstone is involved in three different cases: A cold case from Ireland, the case of an old soldier murdered at a nursing home, and a case involving domestic terrorism. (That last case isn’t completely resolved and continues in The Klimt Connection, #8 in the “Esther Brookstone” series.) All three cases consider various aspects of intolerance, something that seems to be tearing apart civilized societies with uncivilized acts of terror.

Why did I make these novels free? The easy answer: Because I could! But a better reason might be that I didn’t know at the time if I wanted to publish any more Esther Brookstone books. I was going through “a rough patch,” as the Brits might say, and didn’t know if I could continue the mental marathons that novel writing requires me to run. Defanging the Red Dragon was also a holiday gift to my readers, as you can see from its title page. Readers can consider them both gifts, in fact.

While you can still jump directly from Leonardo and the Quantum Code to The Klimt Connection in the “Esther Brookstone” series (I provide enough background in #8 to allow you to do that without reading #6 and #7), a simple click will give you two free novels to read this holiday season. You can even download the two PDFs and give copies to your family and friends (as long as you respect the copyright).

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 14th, 2022 at 3:24 am and is filed under Writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.