Dear Reader Who Writes,

It has come to my attention that there may still be those amongst you who are not entirely au fait with who I am and my impeccable credentials for penning these pieces of perfect pedagoguery. More on why I fear this in a moment, but for now, I must yet again remind you, it seems that I am Moonbeam Farquhar Metheringham IV, Ivy to my friends, author of the science fiction and fantasy classic, ‘Fatswhistle and Buchtooth’. Mayhap it is because I have temporarily withdrawn this gem of literature from the maw of an unappreciative public whose ability to discern quality is clearly lacking.

The issue of having one’s fame less recognised than it should be, came to one’s attention when Mumsie returned from an evening at our local hostelry ‘The Pink Wigeon’. She stumbled into my writing room cursing and swearing about not being able to see as I had been writing by the light of a single candle to enchant and encourage my Muse.

“You’re wasting your bloody time, Moons,” she declaimed as she picked herself up from the floor. “No one has heard of you and no one ever will. I asked in the pub and no one had any idea. No one. Not one of the bastards.” Then she staggered back up the step from my underground lair and vanished into the night. Had she remained to hear it, my bright witticism of a reply came to me scant minutes later. “Mummy,” I would have said, “prophets are never honoured in their own hometown.” She would have had no answer to that one, I am sure!

How to Start Writing a Book – Lesson 26: The Write Voice

You may have heard it said that every writer has their own ‘voice’. But I suspect, dear Reader Who Writes, that no more enlightens you than it did myself when I first encountered that phrase many days ago now. But allow me to explain so you may acquire this essential aspect of your actualisation as an author.

Your voice is how you speak and your writing Voice is how you speak to your readers. It is that simple. When you choose the precise posy of willing words from the diverse dictionary of your capacious creativity, this – this dear reader Who Writes – is your own unique Voice.

‘But, my beloved teacher,” I hear you say, “Is this not what I already do? Am I not thus, fully fledged from the outset with my own vibrant Voice?” And I reply ‘Nay! And Nay! And thrice Nay! Oh ignorant one.” This is why is I who am the teacher and you the humble pupil, sitting at my metaphorical feet to benefit from my knowledge and wisdom in matters pertaining to the literary arts.

That which you fondly consider your Voice at present is merely your own fumbling effort to present prose in a manner that at least is not too distasteful to a reader. Consider yourself as an aspiring cook who has acquired sufficient skill not to burn their offerings. You will acknowledge that is a long way from being a Master Chef!

Your Voice is only achieved at the end of a long apprenticeship. It is the end result of your hard work. Of those long hours spent burning the candle at both ends (though I have yet to find a candle holder that permits this myself) so that you can emerge from the chrysalis of mere imitation into the fully fledged speckled butterfly of your own Voice.

For therein, dear disciple, lies the secret of attaining your own Voice. Copy that of your literary betters until you have imbibed their Voice and imprinted it upon your own. After all, who are you to think you can write with a more compelling Voice than those whose literary feet you are not fit to touch?

Until next we meet.

Moonbeam Farquhar Metheringham IV

Adoring Fans can join my Facebook Group

Two top analysts escaped their intellectual enslavement to the Empire, now intent on taking that same government down using any and every method at their disposal, not the least of which were their great analytical minds. Bryder was well-suited for this task, a chaos agent with laser-sharp instincts, a grudge against the Empire, and contacts with rebels throughout the universe. But Nayna was the one they'd really have to watch out for.

Bryder slid the first connector into place with a snap he could feel in his fingers. One down, two to go.

“Why don’t we start again and you explain the situation,” Ralf said. “Go from the beginning, and give me the details.”

“That’s my girl, keep him talking,” Bryder said, then played his tongue over his lips as he tried to force the second connector into its socket, given he couldn’t see it with the controller floating in the way. “Damn leads should have been longer so I didn’t have to do this blind,” he told the controller testily. The controller bobbed in front of his face with no sign of contrition.

“We don’t have time for this!” Nayna insisted over the airways and he could have kissed her because Ralf’s reaction was automatic: slow things down. The irony was that his reaction was training Nayna had likely given him: when someone wants something in a hurry, that’s a red flag to move with caution.

The gel suit had far less resistance to work against than the old inflatables spacemen used to work with, but even so, the fine delicate hand work was exhausting and he could feel it in his fingers, wrist, and shoulder. His face was noticeably getting warmer, thanks to the extra radiation and his nerves weren’t exactly helping to keep him comfortable. When he missed his socket again and the connector slipped off the tool, he had to stop himself from throwing tool out into the emptiness of space in his frustration, something foolish for any number of reasons. Not the least, of course, was that its loss would make a very difficult job impossible, but also that it was tethered and would probably smack him hard when it bounced back, perhaps even compromise the suit.

With a few Rellimarian curses and careful tongue placement, he managed to slide the connector back onto the tool. Maybe if he got a better angle… Using the handhold, he released his foot from the first foot restraint and slid his other foot into it. That left a free-floating foot, but, if he tucked it behind the other, he was unlikely to kick anything and give himself another repair task. Plus, this way, he had a better angle looking into the other side of the hole.

He sighed. No wonder he was having trouble. He was trying to install the connector upside down. Of course, that meant he had to reinstall the connector in the tool.

As he wrestled with hardware, he listened to her give a perfectly credible rendition of their escape story, only in this case, she wasn’t the mastermind with an incapacitated Bryder. Instead, he was a dastardly villain who had tricked her into loaning her room to the pilot because he was going to seduce her in his ship. She had no experience, she said forlornly with a very believable sniffle, and he said he just wanted to sneak out into orbit to give her taste of zero g sex.

Instead, he had kidnapped her, and, as soon as they had launched, knocked her unconscious. She hadn’t come to until they had come out of jump into a storm that had incapacitated the ship. No gravity, a fraction of life support and transmitter power, no engines. He had to hand it to her, variations on the truth sounded far more plausible, however unflattering they were to him, than total fabrications. And, with that, the second connector clicked into place. He glanced to the side at his Heads Up Display. It had taken him over an hour to get here. He’d better get cracking.

He took a long drag on the drink straw that reached a bag nestled between his shoulder blades and nearly choked when Ralf said, “I’m finding some of this hard to believe. I’ve worked with Bryder for years. Let me talk to him.”

Nayna said, without hesitation. “He’s dead. I spaced him.” Bryder spat it out involuntarily, contaminating his front helmet’s optics. Nor could he clean them again until he was back inside and could remove the helmet.

Shit. Shit. Shit. He had to hurry.

Ideal Insurgent by Stephanie Barr is out now.

Stephanie Barr has a new book out now, Ideal Insurgent.

Q1: This books seems like science fiction. What kind of science fiction is it?

Space opera. All my books are character driven and this one is certainly so. I’m a rocket scientist so I like to keep most of my science pretty science-like, but there are bits that are pretty speculative. Still, the real driver for the story, for the action, for everything are the strong personalities and intelligence of my main characters, Nayna and Bryder.

Q2: What was the hardest thing about writing this book?

My characters are supposed to be uber intelligent–I’ve always favored smart characters–but, in order to challenge them, I had to keep tossing them into impossible scenarios and then, as the author, figuring out how they could work their way out using their brains. Turned out, that was a lot of cleverness I was asked to come up with and I was taxed to the max. Even though smarts, in general, is one of my things.

Q3: I’ve heard (heh heh) that you like to squeeze a cat (or cats) and a dragon (or dragons) into all your books. How did you do so in this?

My cats are in everything. When I do science fiction, they often get to be variations on domestic cats (or wild cats for that matter). In this case, I built on a black Maine Coone and made it a badass fighter called a “methercat.” And my “dragon” is a critter called a were-dog  that looks like a cross between a doberman pincher and a Komodo dragon. It has the personality of a dog but can breathe fire, hence it’s named “Dragon.”

My name is Stephanie Barr and I write books, fantasy and science fiction and combinations thereof. A lot of them. I'm also a rocket scientist, raising my two autistic children as a single mother, and herd a bunch of cats. I have three blogs, which are sporadically updated: Rocket Scientist, Rockets and Dragons, and The Unlikely Otaku. Anything else even vaguely interesting about me can be found in my writing since I put a little bit of myself in everything I write . . .  

You can find me on Twitter, Facebook, on my Blog or sign up for my Newsletter.

The Master Stonemason was in his eightieth summer and he was all but blind, still his hands knew their work and each chisel stroke was as clean and precise as it had been in his youth. Once he had cut and carved he began the laborious task of polishing, trusting nothing to the hands of his sons, or his grandsons, or the apprentices who watched in something like awe. When one of his sons would have intervened to help the old man, his only surviving daughter stepped in front of her brother.
“Leave him. Let him make his last work as glorious as his first.”

When the last letter was incised and the last square inch of the finest Carrera marble was polished to a soft pure shine, the old man lifted his eyes to the sky and rested at last.

One by one, each man in the yard stepped up and laid a gentle hand on this thing of beauty the old man had crafted.

Last forward was the Master’s daughter. Her homely features were shaped into the tenderest of smiles and she laid her cheek against the cool marble.
“It is perfect,” she said softly, “now come home to your dinner”.
The old man took her proffered hand and they walked away together – leaving the young men to carry the headstone the Master had created to its place on the grave of his beloved wife.

©️jane jago 2018

I am old, and I really can’t see
The allure of ‘reality’ TV
Leave ‘Zippy and Bungle’
Behind in the jungle
With those who parade endlessly

© jane jago 2018

One encountered this book back in one’s tender teens when it was a set text for some examination or another. One’s peer group was set the task of reading this dull tome and writing about its dystopian view of nuclear holocaust.

Being a child of extreme sensitivity one approached the story of the end of the world with some trepidation. But one need not have worried, sailing through this pages affected one with no more than brain-crippling boredom…

Synopsis: Some people are in Australia waiting to die. In the end they do so.

Review: This is a book in which nothing happens. Repeatedly. Nobody does anything much. Basically they all stooge around waiting to die. There is no romance, no sex, no adventure, nothing to stir the soul.

Our teachers attempted to inculcate in us the belief that this was a case of masterly understatement. They failed. Even one’s contemporaries, whose hard-handed masculinity sent shivers of excitement and fear down one’s spine to one little pink toeses, apostrophed this as dull and uninteresting. Although one clearly remembers that it was not they who were bent over the headmaster’s skinny thighs and beaten for their opinions.

Conclusion: This book would be an excellent cure for insomnia.

Stars: Zero (one can still feel the cane across one’s tender flesh).

Moonbeam Farquhar Metheringham IV

Adoring Fans can join my Facebook Group.

An extract from Dues of Blood which is the final part of Transgressor Trilogy in the Fortune's Fools series.

Torwyn watched the cold eyes behind the high Vyazin nose and found himself thinking of the last time he had been in such a room with the man who had then been just a Warlord.
It had been in Alfor two summers before at the time of the Fair and he had been left chained so the Warlord could talk with him alone. For the longest time, Qabal Vyazin had just walked around his naked, freshly oiled body and said nothing, examining him from every angle.
Trained to such display from an early age, Torwyn kept himself still. He had been uncertain what to expect from such a man as this. Some nobles were quick to make their desires known and wanted a response to feed their egos. But this man seemed to study him from another perspective altogether.
At last, he had stood in front of Torwyn, and held his gaze with a vice-like stare which had been cold and dispassionate. Torwyn had lowered his own eyes after a short time and it was then Qabal had spoken, his voice enquiring.
“Tell me how it is you have such power?”
Torwyn had struggled with that, uncertain what he was being asked or how he could please this man with an answer.
“I have no power, Most Honoured One,” he had said at last, aware of the burden of the unemotional eyes upon him. “I am just a fighting-slave. I cannot command others.”
Qabal had stood very still and given a sharp upward nod.
“You know your place well,” he said softly. “But you also underestimate yourself. Each time you walk onto the sand you have more power than any man – the power of death over another human being. How does that feel?”
Most who paid for private time with the Sabre were interested in only one aspect of his anatomy: that which he kept between his legs. Qabal was clearly equally obsessed, but with another part of his body: that which lay between his ears.
Torwyn stared at the Warlord and hoped the sudden rush of contempt was not visible on his face. How could he ever explain the sick sense of fatality? How to describe the gut-churning fear? How to express the burn of adrenaline which had to push you further than thought? What possible way could he put into words the sense of intense self-disgust which choked the soul each time he had to kill? Standing before Qabal he had struggled to find anything in that which had to do with power. Eventually what he had said was what he thought Qabal had wanted to hear: a simple lie.
“It feels as though I am the ruler of the world – in that moment with my opponent’s life in my hand.”
Qabal had stared at him for a long time and then given that same odd upward nod.
“Then you and I are men of the same cast. Except that my arena is all Temsevar.”

E.M. Swift-Hook

When the hole in the sky let the dragon appear
The heavens grew dark and the humans felt fear
And the ships of the light, one by one they took flight
But they fell from our sight, in the bowels of night
Though each one was crewed by the bravest of brave
None could reach high enough homeland to save
When the beast ate the sun and the satellites fell
There were no stories left: there was no one to tell

©️JJ 2017

Zelia the first novel by Zora Marie is out now.

“You know, this is the first time I’ve ever gotten you into an actual dress.” 

“They’re not good for climbing,” Zelia said, turning to give Eleanor one of her mischievous grins. “So what did you want to show me?” 

“Something special that you need to see.” 

Eleanor took her hand and lead her through a maze of corridors, leading deeper into the stone castle. When they came to a large set of doors a guard nodded and pushed the door open for them. Orania stood at the edge of a platform staring down at the water falling beneath it. A statue of a man stood staring at the open sky above them, his hand on the hilt of his sword, and the brim of his helmet shading his eyes from the setting sun. 

“Do you know what this is Zelia?” Orania asked. 

Zelia shook her head, but Orania didn’t need to see to know. 

“It’s a reminder of where the O’Fell family came from. Do you know the story?” 

“They are descendants of Yargo, God of the Fallen Warriors. He hoped to unite the people by giving them someone they could follow. And this must be Lumid, guard of the bridge and keeper of the stars.” 

Orania turned from the edge. 

“That is right and you are going to release their souls to live with their ancestor, Yargo, among the stars. It is a tradition for a daughter of a fallen King to lay them to rest and since he has no daughter we have asked that you do it.” 

Zelia nodded, but she still didn’t quite understand why they would ask her. 

“Now, it’ll be getting dark soon. We should start gathering people outside.”

Men, women, and children had gathered on the walls and the field all around the long rows of pyres. Kion stood by her side with Orania, whatever Eleanor had done seemed to have eased Kion’s pain. Orania had just finished her long speech and excused Elizabeth for not being there, saying the grief was too much for her to bear. 

Orania gave Kion a nod and he handed Zelia a torch. As soon as she took it the flame grew brighter and an updraft pulled it higher into the sky. 

“I’ll be right beside you the entire time,” Kion whispered. 

She started with Skalary and Skyral’s pyres, but froze as she went to light Leena’s. Kion squeezed her shoulder as if to say it’s alright and she stuck the torch into the kindling. When the fire took off she stepped back and looked up at Kion, there were tears in his eyes as the soft light of the flames lit Leena’s face. 

“You can stay here Kion. I’ll finish.” 

She gave a light squeeze of his hand continued down the row. With each one she lit, she glanced back at Kion; the flames had grown, but he hadn’t stepped away. With everyone entranced by the flames, she moved from pyre to pyre a little faster and circled around from one end to the other. 

When she lit the last one, she threw the torch at the feet of the King as the flames of pyre already burned high in the sky. When she did, something happened that made all the crowd gasp. The flames turned blue and little orbs of light rose from the bodies of those fallen. As each one rose, the flames calmed back to their orange glow. 

“Kion!” Zelia pulled him back from Leena’s pyre as a wave a heat rolled out and Leena’s soul rose from the flames. 

One by one the blue orbs lifted into the stars, twinkling until they faded from view. Zelia glanced around at the mourners, what was left of families were crowded together, and those that stood alone held clasped hands over their hearts as they stared up at the stars. The crowd stood staring at the stars long after the souls had gone, but one by one people trickled away and the somber silence moved with them.

Zelia is also available from Barns & Noble, Kobo, iBooks, Google Play.

Zelia is the heroine in the new novel just released by Zora Marie.

Q1: What is your happiest childhood memory?

Racing Alrindel across the pasture on Eadon’s horse, Starjaina, before being caught by Kion for not being at archery practice. I miss those days.

Q2: What do you love most about your magical powers?

I don’t- well, I guess if you consider understanding the animals to be a magical power, then I love the connection it allows me to have with all of the different animals.

Q3: Where in your world would you most like to settle down to live?

If there were no wizards or Darkans, I’d have to say Elyluma. I grew up there and that’s where my brother Alrindel calls home, but for now there are things that keep me from there.

Zora Marie in her own words:

I’ve not always been honest with myself or those around me, but I plan to change that. I have never been very truthful about what my home life was like as fear and having already been turned away once held me back. After writing for a year I found my voice once again, in part thanks to a friend that has been my guide in more than just writing.

Now that I am no longer bound by the people who would rather see the spirits of others crushed than to see them blossom, I am determined to reclaim my life and do the things that I love. Acting, writing, and creating art are all just pieces of the puzzle that make up who I am. The true me has been drowning without a word for so long, but I am done.

What you see of me now, is me climbing the mountain to reclaim everything that I am and I am glad to have you following my journey. I hope that as I learn to open up about my struggles I can inspire you to take the first steps to being your true self, as so many of us fall to what others see for us rather than what our hearts see.

You can find Zora on Twitter, Amazon, Goodreads and her own Website.