Three Things About My New Release Jamokan

 

Our topic this week is to name three things we like in any area or topic. Since I just released a new book, here are the top three things that make me happy about JAMOKAN:

1. That I wrote it at all in this crazy pandemic year. I really struggled and then finally...finally the Muse relented and agreed to be creative despite all the stress, social distancing, lack of time with the grandchildren,sad things going on in the world...85K words later - the book!

2. I particularly enjoyed exploring this character who had kind of gotten shunted aside since the series began. He had quite a mix of emotions going on...

3. The reader who PM'ed me they'd sat on the couch for five hours straight and read the book as soon as it downloaded to their kindle because they could not stop reading. WOOT!

The story:

Badari Alpha Jamokan and his pack are growing discontented in the sanctuary valley, tired of coming in second place to the pushy new South Seas pack when it comes to assignments and everything else. On top of the discord within his pack, Jamokan is distracted by the search for the right woman to be a proper Alpha’s mate to partner with him in combat and in everyday life. Even the Badari goddess is warning him in visions that he and his pack are on the wrong path for a happy future. In desperation, he receives permission to take his entire pack north to the mountains for a two week hunting expedition, where he hopes to use the time and rugged surroundings to settle the soldiers down and restore order and discipline.
And figure out his own future.

When his men unexpectedly locate a hidden Khagrish lab, he goes to investigate and see if there are humans to be rescued. Little does he suspect he’ll be called upon to break one of the highest commandments of the Badari packs and bring a new disaster to those who look to him for leadership.
Before she became a Khagrish prisoner, 

Rosemari Parcher was a hydroponics technician on a gritty colony world, who unexpectedly won a planetwide contest. Tapped to receive her heart’s desire and move to a totally different life in the luxurious Inner Sectors, her life had become a happy dream. Kidnapped in space by enemy aliens and given to the Khagrish, she and other humans are the unwilling subjects of a bizarre medical experiment where a quick death seems to be her only hope. Rescued by Jamokan and his pack, she finds herself deeply attracted to the Alpha but the devious Khagrish aren’t through with Rosemari or the experiment.

This is the fifteenth book in the Badari Warriors world (and the thirteenth book in the numbered series) and each novel or novella has a satisfying Happy for Now ending for the hero and heroine, not a cliffhanger. Genetically engineered soldiers of the far future, the Badari were created by alien enemies to fight humans. But then the scientists kidnapped an entire human colony from the Sectors to use as subjects in twisted experiments…the Badari and the humans made common cause, rebelled and escaped the labs. Now they live side by side in a sanctuary valley protected by a powerful Artificial Intelligence, and wage unceasing war on the aliens. Some overarching issues do remain unresolved in each book since this is an ongoing series but romance always wins the day in my novels!

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Andre Norton's Influence

Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is In Memoriam: a tribute to a writer you admire who has left us.

I have to concur with my fellow SFF7 member Marcella Burnard and say Andre Norton is my person, although my reasons are somewhat different, I think.

First of all I’ve written about Andre Norton and her influence on me many times. For example:

The earliest influence on my writing was Andre Norton. Her books were favorites of my science-fiction loving Dad and he gave me Catseye at a very young age. He figured cats, outer space, archaeology – why wouldn’t I love it? And I did…

I read every book of hers that I could find, intrigued by the infinite possibilities of a future civilization in space. I particularly enjoyed the glimpses and hints she gave of other, alien civilizations that came before, beings that we would never know firsthand but would always puzzle over when we found traces of their existence. She called them the Forerunners. I relished the adventures her characters had in a well-established world. The camaraderie her main characters always found with a select group of like-minded people, be it the Space Rangers or the Free Traders, made me (an only child for eight years) happy!

There was clearly not enough romance in the books, however! That’s one of the reasons I started writing my own science fiction around the seventh grade and never looked back. I understand at the time Ms. Norton was writing and especially in her science fiction (as opposed to the Witch World fantasy series), romance wasn’t a “done” thing. Thank goodness we can write science fiction romance now and have fully formed female characters who want their part in the adventure and in solving the problems to arrive at a Happily Ever After.

… Andre Norton presented her readers with mysteries and back story that often never got fully explained to the audience or to the characters. She provided tantalizing glimpses of all the other stuff, just enough to leave me wanting more. Because I always enjoyed that element of her plots so much, I try to create similar worlds to the best of my ability. For the SFRs, which occur in a future galactic civilization called the Sectors, I have a detailed backstory for myself about things and events that happened before the humans ever got out there. I work hints into the plots as I can.

When it comes to the planet-based happenings, I like to have a mix of mystery and mythology, unique to that world but also sometimes tied back to those unknowable civilizations that “came before”. Then as I write the story, I ask myself “why this…” and how does that…” and “if I lived on this planet what would I…” The novels may be science fiction, based in a technological, galactic civilization, but I want there to be that element of something else, something mystical, that can’t quite be explained. By anyone!

I never met her, I never corresponded with her, I only devoured her books, even her Gothic romances. I still have my collection of battered ACE paperbacks. Those are nearly the only actual books I’ve kept over all these years and through many moves (because I love the convenience of the kindle) and will NOT part with. I periodically reread my favorites by her.

The most significant thing to me about Andre Norton, aside from the pleasure her books gave me, was that she was a woman and she wrote books that were science fiction but not laden with technical and engineering jargon and details of how the author thought science might evolve. She skipped over all of that and got to the story. I loved her assumption that humans would get out there into the galaxy and we’d have adventures. I knew I could write stories but I also knew I’d never be any good at creating actual technical discussions of how the darn blasters worked. So for a long time I doubted I could ever get published but then I'd remind myself of all her books and know that I could.

Who cares how a blaster works? Not me. My characters use them and a lot of other nifty tech and no one - especially not me! - tries to explain the inner whatever...

In a house full of very heavy duty science fiction, and a Dad who worked as an engineer on the Saturn 1B and the Saturn 5 rockets, Andre Norton gave me permission to tell the stories I wanted to tell.

I was also thrilled to ‘know’ of a woman who made her living as a writer. Being very fuzzy on how publishing worked, my image for years was Jo from Little Women toiling away in her attic, and I never could figure out how one made a living on a penny a word BUT hey, it could be done! Andre Norton did it!

To be clear, for most of my life I didn’t dream of being a fulltime author because despite Ms. Norton, I never thought of it as a way to earn my living until late in 2010 when I decided now was the time to figure it out and give it my best shot while I still had the day job. Then in 2015 I went fulltime as an author.

Early in my career as a published scifi romance author, someone asked me why I always mentioned Andre Norton as an influence. They put it in disparaging terms, which I don’t remember exactly, something like “she’s so outdated”…well, to put it simply, without Andre Norton there would not be Veronica Scott.

And a good story is never outdated…

For a post I wrote a few years ago about some of my favorite Andre Norton novels, go here.

Blurb a Buddy? Seasons of Sorcery!

Our topic this week at the SFF Seven is: Blurb a Buddy: Have an author-buddy with a recent/soon-to-be released book? Promo them!

What can I do? All my besties DID just have a new release - but with me! So I'm sharing SEASONS OF SORCERY, with amazing stories by Amanda Bouchet, Grace Draven, and Jennifer Estep. I've read them all and they're each delightful, as varied as the seasons we all selected.

Oh, and there's one from me too. And we finally have All The Buy Links!

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WINTER'S WEB BY JENNIFER ESTEP 

An assassin at a renaissance faire. What could possibly go wrong? Everything, if you’re Gin Blanco. This Spider is trapped in someone else’s icy web—and it seems like they don’t want her to leave the faire alive . . . 

 A WILDERNESS OF GLASS BY GRACE DRAVEN 

The stretch of sea known as The Gray rules the lives of those in the village of Ancilar, including widow Brida Gazi. In the aftermath of an autumn storm, Brida discovers one of the sea's secrets cast onto the shore—a discovery that will change her world, mend her soul, and put her in the greatest danger she's ever faced. 

 A CURSE FOR SPRING BY AMANDA BOUCHET 

A malevolent spell strangles the kingdom of Leathen in catastrophic drought. Prince Daric must break the curse before his people starve. A once-mighty goddess trapped in a human body might be the key—but saving his kingdom could mean losing all that he loves. 

THE DRAGONS OF SUMMER BY JEFFE KENNEDY 

As unofficial consort to the High Queen, former mercenary Harlan Konyngrr faces a challenge worse than looming war and fearsome dragons. His long-held secrets threaten what he loves most—and he must make a choice between vows to two women.

As a bonus, our Saturday Siren Veronica Scott also had a new release this week! 

Check out her post about it.

New Release EMBRACE THE ROMANCE: PETS IN SPACE 3

This is an exciting week for me because we’ve released our third annual Pets In Space anthology! My 41K word novel in the collection is a new Sectors scifi romance entitled Star Cruise: Mystery Dancer and I’ve taken a futuristic look at the ‘Anastasia’ urban legend. Is my princess the only survivor of a terrible massacre? Or is she an imposter? I also created a three eyed alien genie ‘cat’ as my scifi pet this year.

Anthology Blurb:

Pets in Space™ is back! Join us as we unveil eleven original, never-before-published action-filled romances that will heat your blood and warm your heart! New York Times, USA Today and Award-winning authors S.E. Smith, Anna Hackett, Ruby Lionsdrake, Veronica Scott, Pauline Baird Jones, Carol Van Natta, Tiffany Roberts, Alexis Glynn Latner, E D Walker, JC Hay, and Kyndra Hatch combine their love for Science Fiction Romance and pets to bring readers sexy, action-packed romances while helping our favorite charity. Proud supporters of Hero-Dogs.org, Pets in Space™ authors have donated over $4,400 in the past two years to help place specially trained dogs with veterans. Open your hearts and grab your limited release copy of Embrace the Romance: Pets in Space™ 3 today!

STAR CRUISE: MYSTERY DANCER blurb:  Tassia Megg is a woman on the run after the death of her elderly guardian. Her search to get off the planet in a hurry comes when chance directs her to an open dance audition for the luxury cruise liner Nebula Zephyr’s resident troupe. If there is one thing Tassia can do, it is dance!

Security Officer Liam Austin is suspicious of the newest performer to join the Comettes. She shows all the signs of being a woman on the run and seems to fit the Sectors-wide broadcast description of a missing thief, accused of stealing priceless artifacts. As he gets to know Tassia during the cruise, he starts to wonder if she’s something more – a long vanished princess in hiding from deadly political enemies of her family perhaps? And what’s the story with the three-eyed feline companion other crew members swear Tassia brought aboard the ship? Does the animal even exist?

As the ship approaches its next port of call, all the issues come to a boil and Liam must decide if he’ll step in to help Tassia or betray her. Life is about to get very interesting aboard the Nebula Zephyr as Liam tries to uncover the truth. Could F’rrh, the peculiar alien cat he has been hearing about, be the key to the mystery and Tassia’s fate?

The excerpt – Tassia explains part of her story for the first time:

Remembering his previous intuition that she was on the run and hiding secrets, he held her tight. “I need to know the whole story now, sweetheart, so I can protect you. Help you. Before we have to explain anything to Captain Fleming.”

Tassia took a deep breath, set the mug on the table with a thump, and sat straight. “I’ll have to tell the captain so I might as well start by telling you.” She gazed deep into his eyes. “I trust you.”

“Tell me what?” Nothing she could say was going to change his feelings for her but he sensed major trouble might lie ahead. No matter what challenges Tassia had, he’d stand with her and do his best to defend and protect her.

Raising her head as if she wore a crown, she said, “I’m the Imperial Princess Alynnskaya Tassiamilla Oleavna, sole survivor of the mass assassination that sparked the Ruatsar Rebellion.”

He stared at her, not sure he’d heard correctly, waiting for her to clarify the oddly timed joke, and then he realized she was deadly serious. She was the embodiment of the persistent urban legend, whispering through the stars, telling of the mysterious survival of one member of the doomed family.

“It’s a long story, but the RNR forces have been hunting for me almost my entire life.” Her voice was weary and her hands shook. “They’ve also been trying to regain the crown jewels, which the enemy believes I possess, but whatever bits of jewelry I had were sold long ago for food, a roof over our heads, or passage to the next solar system by the woman who was my rescuer and guardian angel.” She watched him. “I’m trying to reach asylum at the court of my great aunt, but it’s been a long and difficult journey through many Sectors.”

BUY LINKS

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Website: https://www.petsinspaceantho.com

Pets in Space™ Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/PetsInSpace/

Backlist Love For Wreck of the Nebula Dream 'Titanic in Space'

My first two books were published six years ago, in January 2012 (Priestess of the Nile from Carina Press, a Harlequin imprint) and Wreck of the Nebula Dream in March 2012, self-published. I decided for this post, since we're midway between the two, to feature Wreck today, partly because scifi romance and self-publishing have been my primary career path since that time. Although I did meet Jeffe as a direct result of having been published by Carina…and she introduced me to Marcella…and here I am on SFF7 (although that development happened a bit later.)!

I enjoyed writing about the Nebula Dream so much (although I destroyed her) that I’ve since written several books set on a more fortunate interstellar spaceliner, the Nebula Zephyr.

Here's the background of Why I Wrote Wreck. (Portions of this post first appeared on Pauline B. Jones' blog.):

Since I was a little girl, I’ve always been fascinated by stories set during a disaster – the events, how could the characters have known or sensed what was about to happen, what do they do, what could they have done, what would I do…Growing up in Upstate New York, the closest I personally got to disaster as a child was probably digging unreinforced snow forts!

But, the family legend is that my maternal grandfather had a cousin who survived the sinking of the Titanic in 1912. (I’ve since decided after a lot of searching around on the internet that she was probably not a relative, despite the unusual last name.) And as a result, I was thoroughly intrigued with that disaster in particular. I think after I’d seen the 1950’s movies about the sinking – “A Night to Remember,” which goes pretty much straight from the nonfiction book of the same name, and “Titanic,” a sudsy tragedy with Barbara Stanwyck – I was thoroughly hooked. (Saw them on late night TV folks, not in the 1950’s theaters LOL.). I devoured any account of the sinking. I read books and sought out movies about other disasters as well, both natural and manmade, like Pompeii and the Sepoy Rebellion and Apollo 13…

But Titanic is the epitome of disaster. Premonitions. Too much speed  on a clear night. Too much trust in the unsinkable technology. So many people, too few lifeboats.  The wireless operators staying at their posts, talking to the world on the internet of its time, Marconi wireless, yet no one could help. The Carpathia driving through the Atlantic, knowing they’d arrive too late. The Californian ten miles away, able to save everyone, yet unaware of the tragedy.  The musicians playing. The brave officers.  The lovers separated. Or staying on board together to drown.  The popular captain who’d never actually been in a sinking situation. The corporate executive who steps off the sinking ship into the last lifeboat and spends the rest of his life reviled. The steerage passengers, kept below too long. The rich, the famous, the children… I mean, the dramatic elements go on and on, yet it was all very real, and extremely sad.

Now I’m a writer obviously and I’ve done so much research into Titanic over the years, you might expect me to have written a novel set on that ship. Well, but for two things. First of all, I feel Titanic is complete. Not to say I won’t keep reading books about it and watching movies and TV mini series set aboard the ship, but as a novelist, it feels done. My Muse isn’t inspired to go there. Which leads me to the second point – my Muse likes to write science fiction adventure/romance, with Special Forces operators and smart, gutsy women, in dangerous situations. So it was probably inevitable that all that Titanic inspiration would turn into the catastrophe that strikes my Nebula Dream in the far future. I just had to figure out why my military hero would be traveling on such a ship. Once I knew that answer, I was off to write.

I looked to the events of Titanic for inspiration, not to do a literal retelling out in interstellar space. My plot includes science fictional things that would never happen in the cold North Atlantic. (No spoilers here!) But I also deliberately included two children among the small party trying to survive – Paolo and Gianna, who for me symbolized the many children who sadly perished on Titanic. There are some other subtle nods to the events of Titanic and a few outright similarities – the Nebula Dream is the newest, most advanced cruise liner of her time, with new engine technology, her captain and the company’s representative out to make a speed record at all costs…until….well, that would be  the story, now wouldn’t it?

The blurb: Traveling unexpectedly aboard the luxury liner Nebula Dream on its maiden voyage across the galaxy, space marine Captain Nick Jameson is ready for ten relaxing days, and hoping to forget his last disastrous mission behind enemy lines. He figures he’ll gamble at the casino, take in the shows, maybe even have a shipboard fling with Mara Lyrae, the beautiful but reserved businesswoman he meets.

All his plans vaporize when the ship suffers a wreck of Titanic proportions. Captain and crew abandon ship, leaving the 8000 passengers stranded without enough lifeboats and drifting unarmed in enemy territory. Aided by Mara, Nick must find a way off the doomed ship for himself and several other innocent people before deadly enemy forces reach them or the ship’s malfunctioning engines finish ticking down to self destruction.

But can Nick conquer the demons from his past that tell him he’ll fail these innocent people just as he failed to save his Special Forces team? Will he outpace his own doubts to win this vital race against time?

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The Best of Both Worlds For Me

This week’s topic is about doing worldbuilding for the pleasure of doing it, as I understand the guidelines.

I write in two very different worlds – ancient Egypt and the far future. (I also have one fantasy romance out, The Captive Shifter, but as yet I haven’t written enough there to really discuss today. Although yes, I have massive worldbuilding in my head.)

Ancient Egypt is a very well established world, with oodles of research out there to revel in and draw from, and gorgeous artifacts galore, some of which I’ve seen with my own eyes and marveled at. I have multiple book shelves full of tomes about ancient Egypt – everything from translated love poems to scholarly treatises on one tomb by itself -  and I love doing the research. There are so many more stories and story possibilities than I could use in a lifetime.

 I picked my era, which is around 1550 BCE, when the Egyptians drove out the Hyksos and embarked upon an age of expansion and stability in the New Kingdom. I invented my pharaoh to allow myself more latitude in the stories I could tell, although he’s based on several real rulers of the time.  My added element is the fact that I have the Egyptian gods and goddesses involved in daily life the way the Egyptian believed and hoped they were. My readers have told me that I make them feel as if they were in ancient Egypt, despite the fact I have this paranormal or fantasy element going on, and I also commit certain deliberate anachronisms to make my books work better and sound plausible to the modern reader who may not be immersed in all the research about the time. (Not writing actual historical where every detail is expected to be 100% accurate.)  I have a page devoted to this on my webpage in fact. As an example, Egyptian deben wasn’t actual money per se, no coins but more of a concept of relative value, but my characters deal in actual money.

I really enjoy trying to fill in the blanks left for us by the elaborate tomb paintings and the artifacts, to figure out and portray what daily life might have been like for a lady in Pharaoh’s court or living on a country estate. How was it to take a ride in a war chariot and go so much faster than you’d ever moved in your entire life? What did a priestess of the Crocodile God do all day, running her temple?

In short, I have a heck of a wonderful time dwelling in ancient Egypt on my terms, telling my story and then returning to my own modern life.

Pretty much any topic I have questions on, I can find at least a few kernels of useful information in the research materials or online and then let my imagination soar.

Now the science fiction romances are a different story and there I created my interstellar society, the Sectors, from scratch.

Except not really, because my chosen author theory is that we as humans are going to remain pretty much the same, whether in the past or thousands of years into the future. I really resonated with the well-worn, lived in, used spaceship type of universe depicted in the “Aliens’ movies and the early “Star Wars.” I also loved Andre Norton’s science fiction and the structural set up she had going on. 

My Sectors are kind of similar to all of these influences, although I’ve added elements of my own including various alien civilizations both friend and foe. The longer I write Sectors novels, the more I add to the world building. I do have some secrets that only I know, which may or may not ever be revealed in a novel, but which give me the high level context to write the stories.

So I have fun in either universe I’m inhabiting – Egypt of the Pharaohs or the far future in the big galaxy. Currently I have my next Sectors novel at the developmental editor and I’m about midway through writing the first draft of my next Gods of Egypt novel. I'm living the best of both worlds!