Assassin’s Lair

By Michael Staton

Science Fiction, 418 pages
Cover art by Richard Stroud

Peace has returned to the Setor Empire. A new emperor sits on the throne. Setor’s nemesis, the sorceress Illisandra Zayla, died in a river tower soon after the thief Stealth rescued Prince Derrius Hextor from kidnappers. But an amnesic woman walks the warrens of the border city of Opal, and when she regains her memory she’ll decide the fate of the empire. In the Winter Palace, the emperor’s brother Myron has been corrupted by tainted magic and plots a civil war. Soon, a cataclysmic battle will take place, one that will be the scene of powerful war magic not unleashed in a thousand years. Stealth has her own battle to wage inside the walls of the Winter Palace. Enraged by the sexual intrigues, she must decide if she’ll stay with her lover Derrius or steal away to resume her thieving ways. What Stealth and the amnesic woman decide will not only determine the coming battle’s winner but the fate of the magical sword Larenia’s Shadow, hidden away inside the Assassins’ Guild’s mountaintop keep.

The Dead Sea Codex

By Sarah Wisseman
Suspense, 255 pages
Cover art by: Richard Stroud

Blurb:

Archaeologist Lisa Donahue travels to Israel to arrange a loan of artifacts for her Philadelphia museum. Even before she finds a scrap of ancient manuscript in a ceramic jar, she is the subject of intense interest from strangers. A Lebanese computer salesman follows her to her Jerusalem hotel where someone has delivered a mysterious message for her. Then she runs into an old boyfriend who hints at an extraordinary archaeological  find being sold in pieces on the black market.

Instead of spending her visit in a dusty storeroom documenting old pottery, Lisa finds herself hanging off a cliff and exploring caves near the Dead Sea, racing to find a lost codex before Christian fanatics destroy it.

Excerpt:

All eyes focused on her long blond braid and American blue jeans. Not for the first time, Lisa Donahue wished she had better protective coloring for traveling in the Middle East. Any moment now, someone would holler the remembered tag, “Hey, blondini!”

She inhaled the mixed aromas of deep-fried chickpea balls, roasted spiced lamb, and corn sold by the aggressive street vendors around her. Fragments of Hebrew, Arabic, French, and English assaulted her ears as native Israelis and visitors from many nations milled around the Tel Aviv plaza.

It was wonderful to be back. She’d been afraid the reality wouldn’t live up to her rose-colored memories of seven years earlier, when she’d been a wide-eyed archaeology student. She needn’t have worried—Israel was still noisy, vibrant, smelly, and altogether enchanting.

A live chicken, destined for dinner, squatted and clucked in a string shopping bag near Lisa’s feet. Above the bag stood a plump housewife, obviously daydreaming about chicken stew with dumplings. A few feet away, several Orthodox Jewish men wearing black hats and long curls muttered and gesticulated. Two female soldiers wearing dark green uniforms gossiped and smoked French cigarettes, and a Bedouin in flowing robes talked loudly on his cell phone.

When the Egged bus showed up, the crowd surged towards the door. As Lisa struggled to stay in front, she remembered that Israelis didn’t like the idea of “lining up.” The best way of getting on a bus—or through any kind of door—was to pretend you were an Israelite crossing the Red Sea, vigorously parting the crowd with your elbows.

Lisa bagged a prime window seat and pushed her purse under the seat in front of her. A thirty-something businessman with sleepy brown eyes and a five-o’clock shadow took the seat next to her. She dozed as they left Tel Aviv, opening her eyes occasionally to see palm trees swaying against a metallic blue sky and tall tan buildings.

As they traveled out of the city, cement high-rises and modest houses gave way to scruffy bushes and reddish-brown soil—soil that blanketed thousands of years of history.

No one could sink a spade anywhere in Israel without turning up potsherds or scrolls or ancient fortifications. When Lisa was an undergraduate here, a friend suggested the easiest way to become an archaeologist was to convert to Judaism, marry an Israeli, and dig up her new backyard.

The Hebrew chatter from the driver’s radio kept Lisa from really sleeping. As she felt the bus begin to climb, she forced her eyes open so she wouldn’t miss her favorite scenery—the passage through the Judean Hills. The flatness of the land around Tel Aviv gave way to rounded, undulating hills, girdled with stone walls. The brown earth looked thirsty, as it did everywhere except in the cool green uplands in Galilee to the north.

She glanced sideways to see the businessman watching her. Normally, Lisa liked talking to people when she was traveling. It was part of the adventure and she could try out her half-forgotten Hebrew or bits of French or Italian.

But this man’s gaze reminded her of the Chevrolet salesman with slicked-back hair who put a hand on her knee when she was sixteen on her way to visit colleges by Greyhound bus. She moved the hand. He put it back. She moved it again, sliding as far away from him as she could. Now, ten years later, she wished she’d stood and yelled, “Get your hand off my knee, you pervert!”

Lisa caught herself before she smiled. Glancing sideways, she noticed the businessman’s thick eyebrows and coffee-colored skin and wondered uneasily how long he’d been observing her reclining form. His gaze, no longer sleepy, made her feel undressed. She sat up straighter.

“You are from America, yes?” he asked with an oily little smile.

“Yes,” Lisa replied curtly, sick of being hit upon because she was young, blonde, and foreign. She began a mental catalogue of tips for young women traveling in the Middle East: Do dye your hair brown or black; Don’t wear jeans; Don’t fall asleep on public transportation…

“On holiday, perhaps. You visit our museums and archaeological sites?”
Did she look like a museum curator? She met his brown eyes briefly. “Business trip. I work for a museum at home.”

“How very interesting. Then surely you visit the Israel Museum and the Shrine of the Book—the home of the famous Dead Sea Scrolls?”

Lisa was startled. He seemed to know about her, which was impossible. “Yes, actually. I’m an archaeologist, here to look at some ancient ceramics.”

“Perhaps you plan an exhibit for your own museum?”

Several alarm bells went off in her mind. Was he an Israeli Customs officer trying to prevent the export of illegally acquired antiquities? But he was wearing a well-tailored gray suit and polished black shoes, not a uniform.

“Are you in the museum business, too?” she asked.

The man laughed gently. “No, no, I am archaeology enthusiast only. I sell computer parts—for the Beirut branch of Microsoft.”

The Red-Haired Witch

By JoEllen Conger

The Queen of Candelore Series, Book 4

Historical Fantasy, 383 Pages

Cover art by Richard Stroud

Blurb:

Nine year-old runaway bride, Princess Salina Maria, counts on her giant bodyguard, Yeoman Sherman of the Iberian Queen’s Guard, her appointed Royal Companion to help her escape the eminent nuptials in a stampeding wedding carriage. However, the wicked bridegroom, Prince Ivor Irinushka of The Far Northland, a malicious warlock, uses his Black Magic to locate her.

Excerpt:

Lena planned to make preview of the nearby woods. She had asked the queen’s permission to take the air today on horseback, which had been approved. Her squire rode a half pace behind her, carrying on a conversation that wouldn’t have been possible should he have ridden at his respectful full-pace behind.

“Boyd,” she asked, “be there any ruins nearby we could go explore?”

“Just as a lark, ye mean?”

“Aye.” She tossed her hair. “Ye know, some place where I could just go and have fun looking about and making guesses at whatever happened there so long time ago.”

“I think I know what ye mean, Princess. I hear ye still be liking to play make-believe.” He laughed.

Yet she noticed it tweren’t a hurtful laugh. She half turned in her saddle to take a better look at his expression. He smiled at her, and she couldn’t help but be caught up in his good humor.

“Ye could be the queen, and me the king,” Boyd said. “Wait, I know of a great place!”

“Be it far from here?”

“Nay, not really, but well off the beaten track…but it be way in the bottom of a canyon and badly overgrown; hard to get to. It used to was a flour mill…but the stone done got cracked, and it fell in half. So, the miller left.”

“Really? It sounds delightful. Not the stone breaking so that its owner had to desert their home. Can ye take me there?—Will ye take me there, without tattling?”

“Yer just a girl. Ye be sure ye want to do this? There be brush and thistles, and low tree branches. Yer dress will surely be torn.”

“I’ll take me dress off…if’un ye promise to button me up again.”

Boyd gave thought about this adventure, and that he wouldn’t even be able to share this story with his buddies at the barns. He laughed. “And there be poisonous spiders,” he said, turning his fingers into claws. Pretending to be a wicked wizard, he growled.

Lena enjoyed his wicked laughter. She couldn’t help but smile. “But there be running water there? Aye?” She thought surely the dragon twins would love playing in the brook. They had never seen running water in brooks or rills. This could well be the adventure they sought.

Boyd led the way. As soon as they reached the middle of the canyon, they tied their horses concealed under a grove of trees. Boyd blushed unbuttoning the back of Lena’s bodice, and turned away as she slipped out of her riding skirt. She put her belt back on and looped the back hem of her petticoat between her legs and fastened it with her belt buckle. She stepped out from behind her pony, wearing only her white, sleeveless petticoat and her borrowed squire’s knee-high boots.

“I’m ready,” she called.

If It Kills Me

By Mona Jean Reed

Suspense/Thriller, 436 pages

Cover art by Richard Stroud

Blurb:

Her dad’s song became her song—a slave’s song, a wary song of anger without the means of expression, a song of surviving--a song of escape.

Like any slave, she’d do what she had to do.

“Dad,” she whispered. “Somehow, I’ll get home. If it kills me, I’ll get home.

Excerpt:

Roz wondered if she’d ever see her dad or her brother again. She bit her pointing finger and some tears escaped, but she made no sound.

At some point, Roz slept and knew nothing more until the darkest hour of the new day. A sound like a person sniffling with a bad cold startled her awake. A novel she’d read said that if awakened in a potentially dangerous situation, the best thing is to pretend sleep. This gives you time to plan your best moves and surprise your enemy.

Without moving, she opened her eyes a little. The fire had burned so low that only embers remained. But the moon’s light let her see very well. Through a thin place in the brush shelter, she could make out a foot—a foot, not a hoof. It moved and she saw its tail. It had a tuft of hair at the end—not the brushy tail of a hyena,

Though she didn’t move, her frightened heart exchanged places with her lungs.

What should she do? Scream? No. Wake their master? Probably. But he slept on the other side of the fire.

If she called him, she’d wake Chaney. Mustn’t wake Chaney. If the squirt started screaming, who knew what that animal would do? The snuffling sound grew louder by the second and their unstable fortress shivered. That beast meant to tear it down.

Roz had to do something. What could she do? Still not moving, she searched through her pitiful store of knowledge.

Throw rocks?

No.

Stare at the beast and point at it until it went away?

Worked with a snarling dog.

Not likely. Not at all.

Fire?

That’ll do.

Their collection of sticks and small logs lay near her head. Still lying down, she raised her right arm in slow motion. Her fingers felt for a stick or two to fuel their blaze—something small that wouldn’t crush the fire’s remaining embers.

The creature’s noisy breathing stopped. Slowly Roz dropped the handful of twigs into the embers. Within seconds they blazed up.

The animal reacted with a guttural cough and a soft growl. It probably wouldn’t bother them if she made a bigger fire.

Still frightened, Roz sat up slowly, picked up a few larger sticks and put them on the fire. She waited for the larger sticks to catch and blaze.

Nothing else she could do, except pray that the beast wouldn’t decide to knock down their defense before she got the fire going. She prayed and she kept praying.

Again, the brush fortress shivered. Without thought, Roz leaped to her feet and grabbed the largest hunk of firewood in the pile.

The piece of firewood fit her hand like the handle of a hammer; the larger end looked enough like a club to be one.

Roz encouraged herself by thinking of the young King David of Israel. He had killed at least a lion and a bear when he was just a boy.

Maybe, with God’s help, I can convince this beast to go away.

Please Jesus, let it be so.

She squatted and rocked from side-to- side, like a tennis player ready to leap in any direction when her opponent slammed a serve at her.

Could be that if the Lord directed her hands, and if this creature wasn’t starving, she could convince it to leave with a solid blow on the nose. She thought about it and stopped panting in terror.

I won’t be afraid.

400 Years Between Stars

By Benjamin F. Jones

Futuristic/Sci-Fi, 414 pages

Cover art by Richard Stroud

Blurb:

Reaching the planet’s surface, Dyandra is horrified to discover that only half of the crew touched down. The rest are trapped in space by a mutiny. With inadequate provisions and separated from family and friends she must battle for survival in an environment she doesn’t understand.

Excerpt:

One

Alexandra looked at the slack faces of her fellow crewmembers and wished she’d taken the sedative too. The deceleration couch gripped until it hurt. Her pill was stowed beneath her but she wasn’t going to get it—not this close to separation.

Her daughter was in another lander, one of sixteen. Alexandra tried to thread her. The network was busy. That had never happened—but then neither had landing. The ship was 400 years between stars; they had almost reached their goal: Tane.

She listened to the landing craft running through diagnostics.

The ship rattled with sounds she didn’t recognise.

A thread from the ship’s AI whipped her alert. She thumbed the valve to release the couch and staggered upright. The room was a network of struts, installed in the lead-up to landing. She hit her head and swore. The AI’s thread listed open hatches—several of them. How can that be? I was the last to leave the mothership. I sealed those hatches myself.

Her arm struck a bulkhead and she swore again.

Freya opened one eye and looked at her.

“What’s happening?” Her friend’s question was ill-formed and smothered with emotion. It connected directly to Alexandra’s mind but felt elusive as a breath.

“I’ve got to go,” Alexandra threaded back. Freya was barely conscious; her thoughts kept bursting through with links to older memories and snapshots of them together.

“I’m scared.”

“I’ll be back.” Alexandra pushed away Freya’s contact that wrapped through the network.

Alexandra broke the seal on her own craft and went out into the mothership’s central corridor superstructure which housed the ship’s drive and the AI, a long tube with hatches that lead to the landers. There were sixteen craft and they should all be readied for separation. Part of her hoped the open hatches were due to a sensor malfunction. Hatches don’t open themselves—every non-essential component had been cannibalised to repair life support functions and make repairs to the farm modules.

Alexandra threaded the countdown on the network. Twenty minutes to sort out the problem and get back to my craft.

It was not a sensor error—the hatches were open—now that she was in the mothership she could see them.

“What’s going…?”

She threaded the ship’s AI but it had disappeared from the network. Alexandra felt fear growing—her whole life she’d never known the AI to be unreachable. The machine was their lifeline, the controller of the mission. She tried her daughter…unavailable. Alexandra rested her hand on the bulkhead nearest to her and took a breath. In her forty-seven years of life, she had known nothing but routine maintenance and repairs.

She felt alone—uncomfortable without the AI. She threaded Freya but the contact was a mess of terror. Her friend would be no use until the launch window was a million miles behind them.

Looking up the central core of the ship, she could see several open hatches. The drive eased off. She fought back nausea but she’d experienced half-gee before, so it didn’t last long. The change in the drive’s tone brought it to her consciousness.

She moved towards the nearest open hatch. The reduced gravity made her climb rough and uneven. Arms flailing, she tried to reach out for a hold and her elbow smashed into the bulkhead. A superficial injury, but the pain added another layer to her lack of coordination. The metal edge of bulkhead had ripped through her coverall; her blood showed against the material—red on natural cotton.

She heard a shout from above her.

“Alexandra...”

At last someone has come to help. Donna was hanging out into the central corridor, holding onto the safety rail with one arm. Her blonde hair was tied back, revealing a wide expanse of forehead.

“Help me with these hatches,” yelled Alexandra.

“Go back to your craft,” Donna called back.

Alexandra couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

“We separate in minutes,” Alexandra said. “Get the farms closed up—we won’t survive without them.”

Donna laughed. The sound caught Alexandra by surprise. Has she gone mad?

“Alexandra, for the sake of everyone on board—go back to your lander—please.”

The tone made Alexandra falter. Panic had stopped her seeing Donna clearly. Donna’s face wasn’t smothered with fear, nor was it sedated; her face showed regret.

“We have fifteen minutes to do this or the whole mission is...” Alexandra pulled herself past Donna and started to wind closed the hatch to one of the farms. Seconds bunched up. Working in half-gee had the added disadvantage that she couldn’t brace against her weight. She cursed loudly each time the windlass completed a turn; her elbow hurt.

The latch on the farm unit’s airlock closed with a worn thunk. The status lights that showed the farm’s readiness for launch flicked from red to green. Alexandra didn’t have time for a smile as she moved to the next hatch. She was aware of Donna yelling from farther along the central corridor. What was wrong with her? Arms crying in agony, Alexandra turned the windlass on the second hatch. She was breathing hard. Her ears popped—she swallowed to clear the discomfort. The ship was making adjustments to pressures, readying for separation.

“Stop!” Donna yelled.

Alexandra put all her effort into closing another hatch. Her back ached. Her fingers were numb and she could feel nothing but adrenaline. She wasted a couple of seconds trying to thread the AI—nothing. She queried the network. The result filled her with hopelessness; this wasn’t a couple of hatches that had accidentally been left; this was planned. It was mutiny.