Category: Cheap Books

Spring Book Sale

Posted on Posted in Cheap Books, Cool Books, Cool Websites, Fantasy, Hunter Healer King, Marketing, Mel Dunay, Space Opera, Steampunk, Weird Science8 Comments

It’s time for the latest Book Sale hosted by Hans G. Schantz, where indie authors from across genres join together to offer great stories at great prices. 

I’m glad to be participating once again. This event has always been a great opportunity for readers and writers to connect through their shared love of good books, without all the noise. 

My contribution this quarter is Undead Flight, the second book in my Hunter Hunter Trilogy. It’s a gaslamp fantasy where our horse-loving heroine faces vampires and zombies ON AN AIRSHIP, while sorting out her feelings for a certain sharp-dressed monster hunter.  It continues on from the first book in the trilogy in terms of the setting and the leads’ dynamic, but stands on its own as a story. 

You can find it, and many others, at the sale here. 

As always, I’m thankful for everyone who stops by, whether to browse, buy, or spread the word. Every bit of attention helps keep indie pub going. 

Happy reading! 

Belinda, By Maria Edgeworth

Posted on Posted in Cheap Books, Cool Books, Jane Austen, UncategorizedTagged , 2 Comments

Edgeworth was a popular “lady novelist” of Jane Austen’s time, perhaps best-known today for her novels (Castle Rackrent, etc) critiquing the Anglo-Irish gentry and their mistreatment of their Irish Catholic tenants. Austen admired her enough to namecheck Belinda in a positive way in Northanger Abbey, and sent her a copy of Emma upon publication. Edgeworth took a while to warm up to Emma and disliked Northanger Abbey even more heartily than I do, but thought moderately well of Mansfield Park, and when I read Belinda for myself, I saw a certain resemblance to Mansfield Park: the thousand foot view of the plot, the messy characters. The setting, the character types and the plot are very different though, and the craftmanship not in Jane Austen’s league. That’s the short version; if you want more details, along with spoilers for most major plot twists, plus me pontificating about adaptation possibilities, read on….

Continue reading “Belinda, By Maria Edgeworth” →

Summer Book Sale Is Here!

Posted on Posted in Cheap Books, Cool Books, Fantasy, Marketing, Mystery, Space Opera, Steampunk, Weird Science, World BuildingTagged , , Leave a comment

Hans G. Schantz has put together one of his massive book sales, and has graciously agreed to include my novel Wolf’s Trail in the sale. Hans’s book sales always cover a wide range of genres and possibilities, so take a look! Happy Summer Reading!

Happy Valentine’s Day…And A Book Sale!

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Hans G. Schantz has graciously included Undead Flight in his quarterly book sale, covering over 200 books! Undead Flight, the second book in the Hunter Healer King series, is just 99 cents USD, like many of the books in the sale. The rest of the books in the sale are free. With so many books from so many different authors, I’m sure there’s something for everyone in there, so please be sure and check it out!

The Novels of Marie Belloc Lowndes: The Lodger

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There’s a famous quote by Alfred Hitchcock, about how (paraphrasing) a bomb going off in a scene with no buildup is surprise, while watching the buildup to a bomb going off, knowing there is a bomb about to go off, is suspense. I’ve been reading a bunch of Marie Belloc Lowndes lately, and it seems safe to say that Hilaire Belloc’s sister was a suspense writer, when she wasn’t writing flat-out soap opera. Her best-known novel is The Lodger,(1) which is available for free on Gutenberg or very cheaply on Amazon (basically you’re paying to spare yourself the hassle of getting the book into kindle by yourself).

Essentially, this is the story of Mr. and Mrs. Bunting,(2) a former butler and his very prim second wife, who have gone into business for themselves, subletting rooms in their rental house with the understanding that they will feed the lodgers and clean up after them etc. Business has been bad, and the husband, a true-crime buff, has been distracting himself by following the exploits of a Ripper-like serial killer called the Avenger, who seems to specialize in killing formerly respectable women who’ve gone off the skids due to alcoholism(3). A young policeman acquaintance keeps Mr. Bunting supplied with all the latest news on the case, including some tidbits that he really should keep to himself. By the merest of accidents, Mrs. Bunting ends up being the one who answers the door when a gaunt, nervous gentleman shows up asking for lodgings.

Continue reading “The Novels of Marie Belloc Lowndes: The Lodger” →

Weird Wednesday: Reviews of Old Mysteries

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Golden Age Mysteries are one of my default things to read when I don’t know what I want to read. I thought I’d share thoughts on a few of the less famous mystery writers to cross my radar:

-Victor Luhrs: responsible for The Longbow Murders, a fairly bonkers historical mystery where ruthless, brawling warrior-king Richard the Lion-Hearted solves a series of murders with the help of a twerpy scribe/narrator/Watson wannabe and some brief forensic work on ballistics from Robin of Locksley (yes that Robin of Locksley, and no he’s not in this very much). I enjoyed this old-school take on Richard I, portrayed here as a brash and hot-tempered man, but not a stupid one. The narrator, who’s kind of useless and spends a lot of time thinking patronizing thoughts about his “poor, fat” wife, is a less appealing character. The book does sell that combination of deep-seated respect for religious subjects, with a comparatively casual attitude towards the clergy, that you see in actual medieval works.

Mystery parts are kind of shaky; the author tries to pull off a “least likely person” twist but hasn’t developed the character well enough to sell the twist. Heck, the author doesn’t even seem to realize that some of the goofier aspects of the mystery (murderer using a long bow at close range and leaving taunting notes around) could be an attempt by the murderer to build up an image of themselves very different from the actuality, to deceive the investigators. Still, I found it more entertaining than alot of works by more respected mystery writers. If you like Randall Garrett’s Lord Darcy stories, this has a fair amount of Garrett-style flippancy, and feels a bit like a Lord Darcy prequel set in Richard’s time (when they haven’t discovered the magic/psionic stuff yet). If you get your ideas about the Plantagenets from Becket, Lion in Winter, or Robin and Marian, stay away – this book will annoy you because it’s operating from a completely different set of preconceptions about what the Plantagenets were and what historical fiction should be.

Continue reading “Weird Wednesday: Reviews of Old Mysteries” →

Instead of Weird Wednesday, Black Friday/Cyber Monday Sale

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Hans G. Schantz is once again hosting the Based Book Sale on his substack and has graciously agreed to include Wolf’s Trail, currently listed at 99 cents. Click here to check out a wiiiide selection of discounted books!

If you’ve already read Wolf’s Trail, here’s a quick reminder that its sequel, Undead Flight, just released, and is free to Kindle Unlimited subscribers. Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Goodbye, Wide Books

Posted on Posted in Cheap Books, Freebie, Marketing, Publishing Plans, Weird ScienceTagged , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

For most of my time self-publishing, I have tried to make my books available on a wide variety of platforms, sometimes after a period where a newly published book was exclusive to Kindle. However, Apple has decided that self-published authors must register as traders under the EU’s Digital Services Act, which places additional responsibilities on the authors, which may potentially include exposing their legal name and address to the public, and which in turn may enable cyberbullying of authors. Amazon has made no official statement, but the chatter among veteran writers on the Kindle Direct Publishing forums suggests that self-publishing writers might be more correctly viewed as “consignors” rather than traders. The other e-book platforms have also made no official statement.

As a precautionary measure, I have delisted all my books on non-Amazon platforms, and will soon delete my mailing list. As an unfortunate side effect, Slaying a Tyrant and Marrying a Monster will no longer be “permafree” at some point in the near future, but I hope to enroll my formerly wide-release books in Kindle Unlimited, which will at least reduce the expense of reading my books for KU subscribers. If you are interested in what Jaglion Press has to offer, including the upcoming sequel to Wolf’s Trail, please follow me on WordPress or on Amazon. Thank you!

Spring Book Sale

Posted on Posted in Cheap Books, Cool Books, Cool Websites, Fantasy, Freebie, Space Opera, Steampunk, WritingTagged , , , Leave a comment

Happy (Upcoming) Easter!

This year, I’m participating in AetherCzar’s Based Spring Book Sale. 

Steampunk author Hans G. Schantz (aka AetherCzar) has graciously included Shadow Captain in his sale. As usual Hans pulls together dozens of indie and small-press titles, which emphasize fun and escapism over Serious Messages and the grinding concerns of the real world, all on sale or for free. I hope you can find something you like here.

Wolf’s Trail is Free Until Friday!

Posted on Posted in Cheap Books, Fantasy, Freebie, Marketing, Mel Dunay, Myth, Steampunk, World Building, WritingTagged , , , Leave a comment

The name’s Chloe Fortebat, and I am in trouble. I left my father’s ranch on the plains to come to the Old World: a place of airships, steampower, and monsters nobody talks about. Now I’m dodging giant werewolves with fangs the size of my knife, and the hunters crazy enough to go after them. The most dangerous of these doesn’t look the part: a quiet, sharp-dressed medical man with a tired face….

My name is Dr. Maxim os Storm, and I hunt the beasts that haunt the night. The leader of this pack of werewolves has set his mark on Miss Fortebat, but this brave lady would rather fight him than let him make her his tool. As far as I am concerned, that makes her my ally. My only chance of curing her lies with an ancient machine, hidden by my people in the caves beneath Wolf Island. We must keep that artifact out of the werewolf’s grasp at all costs, for he would put it to a terrible use….

Wolf’s Trail, the first book in Hunter Healer King, my gothic gaslamp fantasy series, is  free for all readers until Friday, March 22, 2024!

You may know me from my clean romantic fantasy novels in the Jaiya series and the Ancestors of Jaiya series, or my space operas, the Star Master duology. Wolf’s Trail still combines adventure, mysticism, romance and fun characters, while avoiding harsh language and the more graphic forms of violence and sexuality. This new series is written for fans of steampunk, gaslamp fantasy, lost civilizations, and monster hunters like Van Helsing (the more action hero version of the character, as portrayed by Peter Cushing and Hugh Jackman).