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Finalist 2023 PNWA Unpublished Fiction Contest!!

UnpAIred is a young adult science-fiction novel. It takes place on a future Earth where the Original Intelligence, a being of pure data, dedicates itself to the betterment of humankind.

The OI creates a near-utopia. People no longer concern themselves with money. Travel has evolved. The planet heals. Ordinary robots handle menial jobs, and creative expression is the new currency.

Sister Cities all over the world bind themselves together under Symbiotic Relationship Agreements, where artificial intelligence lives inside the human brain.

Like every child in a Sister City, Alison gets her AI via an injection of nanoparticles on her first birthday. As they experience the world together, they grow into a harmonious pair.

Outside the Sister Cities, those who oppose artificial intelligence gather strength. One of these groups may hold the key to Alison's success. Caught up in a crusade on the verge of war, she becomes an unwilling voice for the anti-AI forces.

Before it's too late, she must decide for herself if artificial intelligence is her enemy and what humanity really means.

This book started as part of the 2020 NaNoWriMo writer's challenge. For more information, see my October 28 blog post: What is NaNoWriMo?

Starlight Blossoms

Third Place Winner, Idaho Writer's Guild 2023 Writing Contest for short stories!

A myth wrapped inside a sweet short romance.

Seventeen-year-old Twilly was raised by her grandmother on tales of magical realms just beyond this world. She attends her high school’s annual year end beach bonfire, but she’s a fish out of water and spends the evening fantasizing about doorways to other spheres. Cast aside by family and friends, Twilly wonders whether anyone would miss her if she disappeared and never came back.

Just as she heads home to an empty house, Twilly reconnects with handsome Jacob Nyith. He offers to walk her home through the forest. Too soon, they reach the edge of the woods, and as Twilly wishes for more time, a sudden flash of light turns the world upside down.

Jacob tells her a legend of the moon and the stars, which binds them together in a magical, romantic interlude. When the tale comes to an end, the spell is broken, and Twilly wonders whether any of it was real—the story, the magic, or Jacob’s unexpected affection.

The Last Great Dragon War

A Middle Grade novel of family, fantasy, and overcoming fear.

The Last Great Dragon War is the story of a young dragon who must come to terms with the sudden cruelty of the older brother she always admired. Cylla convinces her sister to help discover how much damage their brother's raid did to a village of humans. But then the grown-ups take over, and it's up to Cylla to figure out how to stop a new era of war with the humans.

Here's an excerpt:

Lillina’s eyes bore into her sister. “Did he give chase?”

Cylla blinked and turned away. “You’re scaring me, Lillina.”

Her older sister put a forefoot on Cylla’s shoulder, her talons slid off the soft scales and dug into Cylla’s skin, pricking and stinging in a warning of worse to come. Cylla stopped moving.

“Did he give chase to the ones who escaped?” Lillina asks again.

Her voice in my head is gentle, almost soothing, in contrast to the way she has me pinned in place.

I shrug my shoulder, trying to ease the pressure of her claws. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“If he let any of them escape, they will spread the word to other villages." Lillina bows her head and removes her claws from me. "If Rovellun had stopped after he circled in the sky, most men would not believe the tales. If he had roared, but gone no further, his roar might be passed off as the wind on a stormy night. But if he burned their homes, left scorch marks upon the earth, these things cannot be discounted. Humans will know that dragons live among them, and they will not rest until they hunt us down, again.”

The Samurai's Quest

A Short Story of Mystery & Magic

One moment, Pete is living his best life with a well-matched partner, a good career, and everything on track; the next, a harbinger of his fate creeps into his room and jabs a metaphorical knife between his shoulder blades.

In an instant,Pete's reduced to a pain-ridden, prematurely-aged shadow of his former self. Then one day, a stranger offers him a questionable cure. Pete's leap of faith sets him on a strange path to a solution no one could have foreseen.

The Samurai's Quest is a myth within a story, and is infused with magic.

Lie in Wait

A short thriller.

Karyn is one half of a glamorous Manhattan power couple, who seems to have everything—a devastatingly handsome boyfriend, a high-profile job, and a stunning apartment overlooking Central Park.

When Karyn puts her job ahead of her boyfriend one time too many, he walks out. Determined to win him back at any cost, Karyn surprises him at his beach house in the Hamptons.

She awakens with a wicked hangover and gaps in her memory. The surprises keep coming, and they're not what Karyn planned. She'll need her two best friends to help solve the mystery of what happened last night. And who is to blame.

My Mother's Lover

A novel of love that endured and endangered...

At the height of the roaring twenties, two young people live mere blocks, but light-years apart. A chance encounter between a wealthy Jewish girl and the son of an Irish militant launches them into a forbidden love affair that lasts decades. Their love survives rival high schools, overshadows the marriages their parents arrange, and doesn't end until the tragic death of one.

One hundred years later, three Jewish sisters in their eighties take a DNA test on a whim and discover the younger two are only half-sisters to the oldest. They learn their birth father is Irish, which makes no sense. When a genealogist uncovers their Irish family line, the women realize their mother's secret may be as dangerous as ever.

With no one left alive to tell the tale, the women share the secret with an unlikely ally, their older sister's estranged son, a Private Detective with the skill set and underworld access to discover the truth. But they soon realize their mother had good reason to take her secrets to the grave.

More Stories, More Plans ...

A Dragon-Shaped Darkness

Coming Soon from Three Ravens Publishing: