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fw_smalllogo120pxNow would be a good time to buy any science fiction books you are missing from Fictionwise, with 30% off their already excellent prices. That includes all of the Dray Prescot books:

March is “Science Fiction” month, so this is the perfect opportunity for an out of this world sale! Through March 31st, every Science Fiction MultiFormat eBook is discounted 30% while every Secure Science Fiction eBook receives a 30% Micropay rebate when paying with a credit card or PayPal!

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wyattlastflightofthearrow_thumbAnother exciting classic from the master of intrigue. Daniel Wyatt’s The Last Flight of the Arrow is available from all the best online ebookstores, including Fictionwise, eBooks.com, Amazon.com (for the Kindle), Mobipocket.com, and Sony. Enjoy…

Here is the blurb:

February 20, 1959, the Canadian prime minister stood before the House of Commons to announce that his government had decided to cancel the CF-105 Avro Arrow supersonic fighter-interceptor program. What were the reasons? Over three hundred million dollars had been spent on the aircraft considered by many to be twenty years ahead of its time. It was also suggested that the new missile age – brought on by the advent of the Russian satellite Sputnik – had made manned interceptors obsolete.

But what were the real reasons? And were the Americans involved?

In this tale of intrigue, the Russians plan an air strike on North America. Canadian and American Intelligence get wind of it through secret channels. The Canadians pretend to terminate the Arrow and then – with the help of the Americans – deploy the machine for what it was designed for. It’s mission: catch the Russians with evidence of its strike force. While the public mourns the death of the supersonic fighter, the Arrow blasts its way across the Pacific on a vital, long-range, photo-recon mission to save the Free World and avert World War III. Behind the controls is a hand-picked Royal Canadian Air Force pilot.

Target – Siberia.

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Beyond the Gyre cover

The fourth and final volume in the “Song of the Arkafina” series by Suzanne Francis is now available from Fictionwise, Mobipocket, Cyberread, Amazon (for the Amazon Kindle), eBooks.com, the Sony eBook Store, and all other good ebookstores. The series began with Heart of Hythea and continued with Ketha’s Daughter and Dawnmaid.

Here is the blurb:

The island of Asaruthe has sheltered the Dawnmaid, Myriadne, for the past sixteen years, but Yr has fallen prey to a deadly plague, and it is clear she must leave soon. Katkin du Chesne and her daughter Poppy travel with Myriadne and help her free the Firaithi from Maggrai’s diabolical laboratory in the former Infirmarie on Isle St. Valery.

Meanwhile, Gunnar Strong Arm’s twin sons, Jakob and Lut, are feuding with each other. When Jakob carelessly gap shifts, he leaves a trail that Maggrai’s minions can follow back to Asaruthe. The death and havoc they wreak will send Lut on a mission of vengeance against Maggrai — and his brother, Jakob.

In the final battle, the Dawnmaid must find a way to converse with her enemies, the Angellus, before they attack the secret haven of the Firaithi with their unquenchable fire. What is it they have been defending through all the turns of the Gyre? The answer astonishes both Amaranthine and human alike…

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Gangs of Antares by Alan Burt Akers, being volume 45 of the saga of Dray Prescot of Earth and of Kregen, and the second book of the Balintol Cycle, is now available from Fictionwise and all other good ebookstores, such as eBooks.com, Mobipocket, Cyberread.com and for the Amazon Kindle.

Here is the blurb:

Lit by the ruby and emerald fires of Antares, the planet Kregen, four hundred light years away from Earth, is a world harsh yet beautiful, terrible yet alluring. There any man or woman may achieve what the heart desires if they plan and struggle and keep faith with their innate purpose. Kregen has its share of weaklings and the faint of heart; but their names are not writ large in the footnotes to the Sagas to be found under the Suns of Scorpio. Dray Prescot has adventured widely over Kregen both at the behest of the Star Lords and to further his own vision. Now he is in the subcontinent of Balintol, where strangeness unlike any that he has previously encountered awaits him.

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Due to delays in receiving some of the manuscripts from Kenneth Bulmer’s agent, it has become necessary to revise the dates for publication of volumes 46 to 52 of the Dray Prescot books. Dates are now To Be Confirmed. I am hopeful that this situation will change very soon.

Publication of Intrigue of Antares [Dray Prescot #44] has gone ahead, but it will not now appear at Fictionwise until Monday, July 21 July 28.

Gangs of Antares [Dray Prescot #45] will also be published everywhere on Monday, July 28.

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Dawnmaid is the third book of the Song of the Arkafina series by Suzanne Francis, which began with Heart of Hythea and continued with Ketha’s Daughter. Available now from all the usual ebookstores, including Fictionwise (update: not available from Fictionwise until Monday June 21), eBooks.com, Cyberread.com, Mobipocket, eReader.com and Amazon Kindle. The final book in the series, Beyond the Gyre, will be available in September or October November.

Here is the blurb:

Gwenn and Gunnar travel to Khalama to fulfill a last request, but when they arrive, nothing is as it seems. For one thing, the man whose lifeless body they faithfully transported, Arkady Svalbarad, turns out not to be dead after all. And his old teacher, Dawa Tinley, is strangely absentminded. When Gunnar disappears, Gwenn has to make the best of her situation, so she turns once more to Arkady. The consequences of their union will bring both mortal peril and new hope to the peoples of Yrth.

Katkin and Huw have holed up in an old farmhouse for the winter, but the addition of two children to their family has left Katkin feeling trapped and miserable. After Huw is arrested for a terrible crime, she must decide whether to run, or stand by his side. When Katkin is reunited with an old love, the choice becomes even more difficult, until a betrayal and a chance meeting steer her to the right path. When she finally arrives on Starruthe, she is just in time to help Gwenn with the baby, but is it too late for Gunnar? Only Gwenn and keth’fell can save him now.

When the Dawnmaid comes into the world, it will take a miracle to hide her from Maggrai, who has come back from the future with a weapon of total annihilation. But Gunnar also has a secret weapon, though he is loath to use it. Will he come to terms with his true identity in time to protect the Dawnmaid from Maggrai’s wrath?

Contains adult themes.

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Intrigue of Antares by Alan Burt Akers is the rip-roaring new adventure for Dray Prescot on the planet Kregen, and is now available for the first time in the original English from all good ebookstores including Fictionwise, eBooks.com, Mobipocket, eReader, and Amazon Kindle. It is the first volume of the Balintol Cycle, and volume 44 of the saga of Dray Prescot.

Here is the blurb:

Reared in the harsh conditions of Nelson’s Navy, Dray Prescot failed to find success on Earth but has succeeded in winning fortune on Kregen. He is called the Emperor of Emperors, the Emperor of Paz, but he himself regards these titles as meaningless. Paz, a vast grouping of continents and islands, is inhabited by innumerable races and nations – so why should they band together under Prescot? The Star Lords themselves have chosen him for this heavy task, for he has the yrium, that particular charisma that binds other mortals to his service. Now, in this the first volume of the Balintol Cycle, the Star Lords have dispatched him to the town of Amintin in the continent of Balintol. Under the streaming mingled lights of the Suns of Scorpio, Dray Prescot must set forth on his new adventures…

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Scorpio Triumph, being volume forty-three of the saga of Dray Prescot and the final volume of the Lohvian Cycle, by Alan Burt Akers, is now available from Fictionwise, eBooks.com, eReader.com, cyberread.com, Mobipocket and Amazon Kindle and all other good online ebookstores.

Previously only published in a German translation in 1993, this is the first time that fans of Dray Prescot have been able to read this book in the original English. This edition also contains a new glossary to the complete Lohvian Cycle compiled by Els Withers.

Here is the blurb:

Reared in the harsh conditions of Nelson’s navy, Dray Prescot has been transported to the exotic and barbaric, beautiful and cruel world of Kregen, four hundred light years from Earth, under the double star Antares, the twin Suns of Scorpio.

Paz, the hemisphere of Kregen where Prescot has adventured and succeeded, is threatened by the reiving Shanks from Schan, the other half of the planet. He has been pitchforked into the job of organizing the resistance, a so-called Emperor of Paz, and has managed – temporarily – to drive off the Shanks and their mentor, the mysterious Carazaar. Now he must concentrate on finding the rubies forming the Skantiklar. These have been scattered in seasons past, and if brought together will confer stupendous sorcerous power on the possessor of the Skantiklar.

Down in the continent of Loh expeditions have ventured below the City of Eternal Twilight into the Realm of the Drums in search of one of the rubies. A Wizard of Loh, Na-Si-Fantong, has been collecting the rubies, and it is believed he wants them for no good purposes. He has succeeded in obtaining a ruby and vanishes into the maze of tunnels under the city. Not really convinced of the importance of the Skantiklar, Prescot has to go in pursuit. Alone, he threads his way through the labyrinth, already feeling he will never catch Na-Si-Fantong…

Scorpio Triumph concludes the Lohvian Cycle of the saga of Dray Prescot. This edition contains a glossary to the Lohvian Cycle.

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Child of the Dark Star by Moyra Caldecott is now available for free from WOWIO. Get it while you can.

This is Moyra Caldecott’s only science fiction novel, and concerns the earthly legend of the crystal skulls (which you may have come across recently in a film starring Harrison Ford) but set on another planet.

Here is the blurb:

There was a planet once called Earth. Its people, scattered like seeds before the wind, came to rest on Agaron…

The Star Law of the planet Agaron had never been questioned – until Bardek arrived in the city of Bar-Geda. His premature birth under the dreaded Dark Star had doomed him to be banished to the marshlands, but he found himself drawn like a magnet to the glittering Temple of the White Star. There he found a girl trapped in crystal. Who was she? Could he release her? And could they, together, outwit the harsh lords of Agaron?

This is the gripping story of one man’s fight to free his mind from the conditioning of a restrictive and powerful system… It is the story of a love that would not accept the Law… It is a story of the last days and the first…

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Scorpio Triumph imminent

Just a short post to let you know that Scorpio Triumph, volume 43 of the Dray Prescot series, will be available on Monday 23rd June 2008 (all being well) and volumes 44 and 45 will follow at fortnightly intervals. There is no news on subsequent titles at the moment.

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Read an interview with Suzanne Francis, author of Heart of Hythea and Ketha’s Daughter, the first two books of the “Song of the Arkafina” series, over at The Long and the Short of It.

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I am pleased to announce that Mushroom has signed up with WOWIO to offer some of our titles for free. The books are advertising supported, which involves two or three ads placed at the beginning and end of the book — there are no adverts placed to interrupt the reading experience at all. Mushroom receives a small remuneration from Wowio for each download, which we split with the author. Unfortunately, Wowio is only available in North America at the moment, but is hoping to make the service available internationally in the future. The books are available in PDF format, which can be read on desktops and laptops with Adobe Reader or other PDF viewers, and on some portable devices, such as the Sony Reader and Palm, using appropriate software.

We currently have titles by Roger Taylor, Moyra Caldecott and Dennis Radha-Rose available, and they provide an opportunity to sample these authors with something more substantial than the usual two or three chapters.

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