Short stories

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    First Frost e-story …

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    So I finally have some cover art to share for First Frost, the prequel e-story that I’m doing for my Mythos Academy young adult urban fantasy series. Pretty cool, huh? And here’s the story description:

    I am Gwen Frost, and I have a Gypsy gift.  It’s called psychome­try — that’s a fancy way of say­ing that I see images in my head and get flashes of other people’s mem­o­ries off almost every­thing I touch, even guys.

    My gift makes me kind of nosy. Okay, okay, maybe a lot nosy — to the point of obses­sion some­times. I want to know every­thing about every­one around me. But even I don’t want to know the secret that a girl in my class is hid­ing or the ter­ri­ble loss that will send me to a new school — Mythos Acad­emy, where the teach­ers aren’t prepar­ing us for the SATs, but to bat­tle Reapers of Chaos.  Now I have no friends and no idea how my gift fits in with all these war­rior whiz kids.  The only thing I do know is that my life is never, ever going to be the same …

    This e-story takes place before the events in Touch of Frost, the first book in the Mythos Academy series. You can click here to read an excerpt of the e-story.

    The e-story will be released on July 1 (I can’t believe July is only two weeks away), and it’s now up for pre-order at Amazon as a 99-cent Kindle download. I’m not sure when it will go up at Barnes & Noble, but I’m guessing probably sometime in the next few days.

    Please note that the e-story will be avail­able through Ama­zon and other online book­sellers, not as a free story here on the web­site. I know some folks might be disappointed by this, but more people look at Amazon and other book sites than visit my website. So I think releasing First Frost as an e-story is a good marketing opportunity and hopefully a way to reach new readers.

    You don’t have to read First Frost to start or enjoy the series, but if you want to see exactly how Gwen winds up at Mythos Acad­emy, you might like it.

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    Gin and ghosts, oh my …

    16 Comments

    I’ve signed the contract and turned in the story is so I guess I can finally announce this. I’ve been invited to write a story for The Mammoth Book of Ghost Romance anthology — and it’s going to be a Gin story. 😉

    Right now, I’m calling it Haints and Hobwebs: An Elemental Assassin short story, although that title might change a bit. And since someone will probably ask this, some folks in the South use the word haint for ghost, and I thought it would be a cool variation to use in the story.

    The story takes place in between the events of Tangled Threads and Spider’s Revenge. I don’t want to give away too much of the plot, so I’ll just say that the story is told from Gin’s point of view and has her doing what she does best — which is taking care of business as the Spider.

    The book will be out in October 2011. I don’t have a list of the other authors writing stories, but according to this post I found on Carolyn Crane’s website, she’ll be one of them.

    I’m really, really thrilled about this. It’s such a cool honor to be invited to participate in an anthology, especially one of the Mammoth anthologies, which I’ve heard so many great things about. As a reader, I love anthologies — I think they’re a great way to try several authors for one price. As an author, I’ve been wanting to be part of an anthology for a while now and hopefully pick up some new readers who may not have tried my work before.

    Anyway, I’ll post more details — including the exact release date — when I have them. But for right now, here’s a preliminary version of the cover art. Enjoy!

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    Venom short stories and more online …

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    For those of you who don’t know, I’ve been doing a series of free short stories to go along with my Elemental Assassin urban fantasy books. I love playing in my own little sandbox, so to speak, and I thought the stories were something fun that I could do for readers — for free. 😉

    Anyway, here is the info on the two stories that I’ve posted to go along with Venom:

    Poi­son: This short story takes place when Gin is a teenager and is told from the point of view of Finnegan Lane, Gin’s fos­ter brother. After a party one night, Finn finds himself in a sticky situation. Click here to read it.

    Wasted: This short story takes place in between the events of Web of Lies and Venom. One day, a beau­ti­ful woman walks into the bank where Finn works, and trou­ble soon fol­lows. Click here to read it.

    You guys wanted more Finn, and you’re getting him with these stories.

    Also, please note that Wasted takes place before Venom. Since I didn’t want to give away or spoil a particular plot point in Venom, I don’t exactly explain what someone needs Finn’s help with in the short story. But once you read Venom, you’ll understand what I was trying to get at. At least, I hope you do.

    Also, I’ve gone ahead and posted the first chapter for Tangled Threads. Yeah, I know it’s kind of early to post it, since Venom hasn’t even come out yet, but I had some free time, so I went ahead and posted it And for those of you who get Venom, the first chapter of Tangled Threads will be in the back of the book anyway.

    There are a few mild spoilers in the chapter for stuff that takes place in Venom, but really, I don’t think it’s anything that you guys couldn’t see coming. So read now if you want, or wait until after you’re read Venom. Click here to read it.

    Anyway, I hope you guys have as much fun reading these as I did writing them. Happy reading! 😉

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    More free Elemental Assassin short stories …

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    The release date on Web of Lies is drawing ever closer — May 25. To whet readers’ appetites, I’ve written a couple of free Elemental Assassin short stories — Web of Death and Web of Deceit.

    Web of Death takes place in between the events of Spider’s Bite and Web of Lies and focuses on what happens when Gin gets some unexpected visitors one night.

    Web of Deceit is another prequel story about Gin’s first solo job as the Spider when she was a teenager and is told from Fletcher Lane’s point of view.

    There are no major spoilers in either one of the stories, and both of them can be found on the Excerpts page, along with Spider’s Bargain, the first free short story that I wrote. I just thought writing the stories would be something fun and cool that I could do for readers, since I’ve gotten such great response to Spider’s Bite. I hope everyone enjoys the free stories and can check out Web of Lies when it comes out as well.

    Happy reading! 😉