A key part of her dream was a male British narrator, so Curtis contacted the agent for actor Nicholas Boulton, winner of an Audiofile Magazine award for his narration of David Copperfield. A deal was struck and a London studio engaged to produce the audios.

The first audio, Prince of Midnight, has been released and has already garnered rave reviews such as this one from audiogals.net: “I knew the combination of Laura Kinsale and Nicholas Boulton would prove to be a success but I still found myself a little stunned at the sheer perfection of the pair as I listened to The Prince of Midnight. And although I finished it several days ago, I remain in withdrawal.”

US fans can find the audio here, and UK residents here.

E-Reads is issuing many of Kinsale’s delicious novels in e-book and paperback. You can see them all here.

Acclaimed naval historian Ernle Bradford (COLUMBUS, DRAKE, NELSON, THE MIGHTY HOOD) is no stranger to the power and magnificence of battleships. In THE GREAT SHIP, he examines the bigger picture, tracing the evolution of these “men of war”.

Though the great ship no longer dominates the high seas, its impact on the struggle of world powers for hegemony cannot be overestimated. During its reign from the sixteenth century to the mid-twentieth it dominated every significant sea war. Both protector and destroyer, the great ship either kept peace or wreaked utter destruction. In World War II aircraft carriers demonstrated their new power and began to overshadow battleships. Ernle Bradford narrates the epic saga of these gone-but-not-forgotten war machines. From the building of the ships to the horrendous – and sometimes mortal – clashes with their foes, Bradford leads the reader through history, covering the noble ships that changed the face of history.

Another great book about men of war and the sea by Ernle Bradford. See all of his E-Reads titles here.

In Something Extra, Jolie Antoinette Smith wants to marry the man of her dreams. But when she meets that man in the form of brash and confident Louisiana native Steve Cameron, he quite clearly wants something different. Jolie’s sensitive soul and passionate heart are now at odds–and she wishes she had never found true love!

E-Reads publishes over fifty classic Janet Dailey Romances including the Americana Series, one novel set in every state in the union.

Did you know for instance that the metabolic rate of two people of the same age, sex, and body type may vary as much as 20 percent? That most of the weight loss from popular high-protein diets is water, not fat? that your addiction to sugar can make it impossible for you to lose weight – unless you know the simple steps (and dietary supplements) for breaking it; That certain “thermogenic” agents can trigger the burning of body fat? That an herbal form of phen-fen is available without the health risks of the prescription drug? That lemon water or apple cider vinegar can reduce cravings? That self-administered acupressure can boost your metabolism – and reduce bloating?

All this and more in Natural Medicine for Weight Loss.

Download Sensual Rejuvenation as an e-book, and watch amazon.com for the print edition.

In the first novel, Mother of Storms, we learn that only the Windmasters can summon the devastating power of rain, gale, thunder, and lightning and that the last surviving remnants of humankind have come, fleeing the destruction of their empire at the hands of the alien Csendook. And it is here the human race will be resurrected…or exterminated. The sorcerers of this barbaric, inhospitable world have vowed to cleanse Innasmorn of the uninvited “abomination.” And somewhere in the swirl of the dimensions–eons distant but as near as a word of power–the relentless Csendook destroyers scent human blood on the galactic wind.

“Adrian Cole as a magic touch.” –Roger Zelazny

Next up in the quartet: Thief of Dreams. Watch these pages for the final duo.

Here’s what Library Journal said about it:

In this, the first volume of a fantasy series, MacAvoy does not merely set the stage, hint at a plot to be unveiled later, or tease readers with suggested themes. Instead, she presents a fully developed novel that preserves interesting territory to be explored in the future. The plot crosses the classic quest fantasy with the bildungsroman, and the novel is composed in the epistolary style. Nazhuret, a child seemingly without family, is the ward of a military school for the sons of nobility. As an adolescent, he finds himself propelled into a weird relationship with the mysterious Powl. Their meeting is a memorable set-piece worthy of Poe. Nazhuret’s re-education under Powl involves trials to make the most hardworking student shudder. At the end of it, Powl sends Nazhuret into the world, a kind of beggar/philosopher, a lens-grinder on tour. It is here that MacAvoy’s intent becomes clear, because Nazhuret is indeed, for readers, the lens of the world, the optic through which they see the mysterious, shifting ambiguities that create a reality. This is a plot and a theme and a character so rich that revelations would be unforgivable. Add to these one of the most surprising supporting characters and plots in years and a fantasy setting that is always intriguing but never intrusive and you have a book that readers won’t want to end. –Cathy Chauvette, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

It will be hard for you to set the trilogy aside after the first book, so let me summarize the sequels.

King of the Dead follows the story of dwarf-like Nazhuret, a modest and fastidious lens grinder. Although he could have chosen an exalted and wealthy life as a noble member of the court, he wishes to live in humble and undisturbed poverty with his lady Arlin. But the ordinary life that Nazhuret wants is abruptly shattered when a vicious attack by paid assassins forces him to run. With possible enemies on all sides, the only place to go is the neighboring kingdom of Rezhmia, where Nazhuret has an ancient blood-tie. However, he finds that Rezhmia is no safe haven, for dark clouds are gathering there, intent on destruction of the homeland of Nazhuret’s heart. Evil tidings, treacherous family members and powerful sorcery threaten to overtake him, but Nazhuret must survive for the sake of those he loves.

In the climactic Belly of the Wolf, Nazhuret embarks on his final adventure. He must unwillingly end a long period of exile and once again take up the sword in defense of freedom. His old friend the King is suddenly and unexpectedly assassinated, leaving the kingdom in chaos. Nazhuret interrupts the peace of his old age to endure the horrors of war and the supernatural realm of the dead. Before his journey comes to an end, he must test his wisdom to its limit in the face of danger and treachery. He is accompanied by his beloved daughter Nahvah and, as Nazhuret’s final debt of honor is paid, he faces the darker side of human nature with both of their lives at stake.

R.A. MacAvoy is a highly acclaimed author of imaginative and original science fiction and fantasy novels. Her debut novel, TEA WITH THE BLACK DRAGON, won the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. She has also written the DAMIANO trilogy, the chronicles of a wizard’s young son, set during the Italian Renaissance; THE BOOK OF KELLS, and TWISTING THE ROPE, the highly acclaimed sequel to TEA WITH THE BLACK DRAGON. All of these books are available as E-Reads reprints .

The first novel in a popular Duncan fantasy quartet. Thirty-one Duncan works are offered by E-Reads.

E-Reads fantasy and science fiction star Dave Duncan has been elected a lifetime member of SFCanada, an association of writers, editors, and academics.

The Association’s election recognizes a lifetime of consistently brilliant work, of which more than thirty backlist titles are published by E-Reads. Duncan is not resting on his laurels, however. Look for a new duet by fantasies coming from Amazon’s 47North science fiction line, building on his prior 47North bestseller Against the Light.

“Recognition by one’s peers is the highest form of praise there is, and I am both honored and very grateful,” says Duncan.

We send Duncan our most heartfelt congratulations for a lifetime of distinguished achievement,

E-Reads is privileged to reprint Why I Wore Lipstick to My Mastectomy by Geralyn Lucas, which reminds us that women can stand up to cancer with courage and humor and pride.

Having recently graduated from Columbia Journalism School and landed her dream job at 20/20, the last thing twenty-seven-year-old Geralyn Lucas expected to hear was a breast cancer diagnosis. And there was one thing no one would discuss with her: what it means to be a young woman with cancer in a beauty-obsessed culture. Trying to find herself, while losing her vibrancy and her looks, Lucas embarked on a road of self-acceptance that will inspire all women. Although her book is explicitly about a period of time when she was driven by fear and uncertainty about the future, Lucas managed a transformation that will encourage all women under siege to discover their own courage and beauty. The important (and sometimes outrageous) lessons of Why I Wore Lipstick come fast and furious with the same gusto that Geralyn Lucas has learned to bring to every aspect of her life.

********************

“This is the first time that wearing lipstick is a metaphor for courage and hope…Geralyn’s energetic enthusiasm and fears are balanced beautifully and expressively. They rivet the reader on each page. (I hope the lipstick was the right brand.!)” – Evelyn Lauder, senior corporate vice president of the Estee Lauder Companies and founder and chairman of the Breast Cancer Research Foundation

Amazon reviewer “punkviper” says,

I can’t believe the bevy of 2-star reviews regarding this work! by people who claim to be H.E. fans, no less!! should i mention this is routinely cited as one of the best rock & roll stories EVER?! people, this novel was published in 1961, it’s one of Harlan’s early works & like many such pieces it has a very gritty & urban quality about it. the story may seem trite in this day & age, but remember that 1961 was far before the whole “debauched rock star” persona was etched into the collective American unconscious. and even though the story might be familiar, don’t forget that the protagonist of the tale ISN’T the rock star! and his story makes the book that much better (btw, it wasn’t Elvis that the rockstar character was based on, it was Jerry Lee Lewis.) i believe there are a cabal of “Harlan purists” who chafe at the idea of a young H.E. cranking out such hardboiled non-fantasy-oriented material, and as such seem to roll their eyes at anything this isn’t I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream, or Beast That Shouted Love At The Heart Of The World. possibly because Spider Kiss is one novel that you don’t have to be a rabid H.E. fan to enjoy. pick this one up and judge for yourself. not to mention, it’s always worthwhile picking up an Ellison book before it goes out of print, as they all-too-often do.

Thanks, punkviper, for reminding Harlan’s fans that his books all too often go out of print. E-Reads is remedying that by reissuing some thirty of them in both print and downloadable formats.

– Richard Curtis

In Heiress, two sisters meet at the funeral of one of the most prestigious men in the country, Dean Lawson, their father. Abbie Lawson, the dutiful genteel daughter bred in the lap of luxury and, Rachel Farr, a mistake born of a passionate love affair, are almost identical in appearance but are worlds apart. Only one daughter can be the heir to the endless oil fields and magnificent thoroughbreds. A fierce competition has arisen between the women, not only for the inheritance but also for the proof of a father’s love. They should have been devoted to each other as friends and sisters, but they have become the most embittered of enemies. The Texas men they love watch as the rivals tear themselves apart to become Dean Lawson’s heiress.

E-Reads publishes over fifty classic Janet Dailey Romances including the Americana Series, one novel set in every state in the union.

Braving the Flames is the real story of the men and women whose lives are dedicated to answering the calls for help. Intense and terrifying, Micheels’ book chronicles the experiences of those who give their blood and sweat to save lives, sometimes at the cost of their own. Some of those interviewed by Micheels for this book paid the ultimate price on September 11, 2001.

Perhaps a mooring cable might also be added as necessary equipment for reading these eight great stories. They not only knock you down, they raise you to the stars. Passion is the keynote as you encounter the Harlequin and his nemesis, the dreaded Tictockman, in one of the most reprinted and widely taught stories in the English language; a pyretic who creates fire merely by willing it; the last surgeon in a world of robot physicians; a spaceship filled with hideous mutants rejected by the world that gave them birth. Touching and gentle and shocking stories from an incomparable master of impossible dreams and troubling truths.

Paingod has been reunited with more than thirty Harlan Ellison masterpieces in E-Reads’ reissue program.

– Richard Curtis

If you want to escape the mundane, climb aboard Paul Di Filippo’s work and hang on for dear life. In the vein of George Saunders or Michael Chabon, Di Filippo uses the tools of science fiction and the surreal to take a deep, richly felt look at humanity. His brand of funny, quirky, thoughtful, fast-moving, heart-warming, brain-bending stories exist across the entire spectrum of the fantastic from hard science fiction to satire to fantasy and on to horror, delivering a riotously entertaining string of modern fables and stories from tomorrow, now and anytime. After you read Paul Di Filippo, you’ll no longer see everyday life quite the same.

Literary allusions abound in Emperor of Gondwanaland as Di Filippo recasts a classic Melville story of slave rebellion at sea—with aliens; “Ailoura” tells the Puss in Boots fairy tale as a space opera romp; “Observable Things,” has Cotton Mather encountering with Robert E. Howard’s Solomon Kane and “A Monument to After-Thought Unveiled” has poet Robert Frost starting his career writing horror fiction for Weird Tales magazine, edited by H.P. Lovecraft. Emperor of Gondwanaland contains 18 stories including one published only in this collection.

For a complete collection of Di Filippo works published by E-reads – with covers brilliantly conceived by our designer Andy Ross – click HERE.

Among the gems are “All The Sounds of Fear”, “The Sky is Burning”, “The Very Last Day of a Good Woman” and “In Lonely Lands”. Though they stand tall on their own merits they also point the way to the sublime stories that followed soon after and continue to come even now.

Reviewing Ellison Wonderland, K. C. Locke said,

Pay close attention now. I cannot sufficiently impress upon you my statement, here and now, that Mr. Ellison’s work, even at that early stage of his career and experience, is as tough, tight and ready to romp as any example provided for that time-frame; a period, Dear Friends, which includes terrific stories by such household names, tried and true, as Alfred Bester, Theodore Sturgeon, Cordwainer Smith, and Fritz Leiber. It is mature, insightful and aware.

Locke’s review is worth reading in its entirety, and so is Ellison Wonderland, which joins more than thirty Harlan Ellison classics being reissued by E-Reads. Harlan has refreshed a number of his titles to replace earlier editions.

Watch this space for news of new releases in print and downloadable formats.

– Richard Curtis

We asked the author to write something about our e-book edition and here’s what he had to say:

“I’m going to write a novel by the time I’m forty. Even if it isn’t any good, even if it doesn’t sell, even if it just sits in a drawer and rots! But at least I’ll finish one.” That’s what I told myself for more than fifteen years. But I woke up one day to discover that I was thirty-nine, and hadn’t written a single page yet!

Read the quartet and you’ll agree with the proverb Better Late Than Never.

For a a list of all Dietz’s work available on E-Reads, click HERE.

In its own quiet way, The Soong Sisters by Emily Hahn has become one of E-Reads’ bestselling nonfiction books, and even a cursory look at the story of these three extraordinary individuals will tell you why it compels us decades later. And though the release of this writeup is timed to tie to the Beijing Olympics and the soaring rise of China to a dominant place among the world’s superpowers, it’s not because China is in the news that we recommend this book to you.

Through inheritance or marriage the girls were among the wealthiest and most influential in China in the 1930s as the clouds of two wars — first between China and Japan, then the Second World War — roiled over Asia. Politically, the sisters had been divided between nationalism and Communism and for many years the two supporters of nationalism – Ai-ling and Mei-ling – did not speak to their Communist sympathizer sister Ching-ling. All that changed when the Japanese brutally invaded and occupied their country. It is worth a few moments of your time to read the Wikipedia entry summarizing their story. It’s worth a few hours of your time to read the inspiring The Soong Sisters.

The Soong Sisters is the second book by Emily Hahn published by E-Reads, the other being China to Me, about which I have written so enthusiastically elsewhere in these pages (see A Missouri Feminist Captures Shanghai). And there are more books to come by one of the most remarkable women of the Twentieth Century.

- Richard Curtis

Drawing on his vast command of ancient history and blending it with superb story-telling skills, Bradford weaves a tale that takes the reader from city to city as Paul spreads the teachings of Christ despite being beaten, stoned and shipwrecked. It’s a thrilling tale and stirring biography of a man whose devotion and rhetorical genius laid the groundwork for the religion that soon swept the civilized world.

Shmeegl prostrated himself before his ruler, who caressed his head with his proboscis in keeping with the strict protocol of the court. “Arise, Shmeegl,” the king murmured. Shmeegl raised himself on his hind pods but paused for one dramatic moment before lifting his face. “You smell well considering the distressing conditions I am told you endured during re-entry into our planet’s atmosphere.”

“It was nothing really, your majesty,” Shmeegl replied with unbecoming false modesty. “A few glitches in the hyperwarp. I’ve had bumpier rides.” He produced a small aromatic packet from his pouch and presented it to the king. “I am happy to present you with my formal report on my mission to the third planet in the Gnarpal sun system. By your leave, I will be happy to summarize my observations and conclusions for His Majesty’s court.”

“Proceed, lad.”

Shmeegl settled comfortably onto his hindquarters and addressed the throng. “As you know, the purpose of my mission was to confirm the presence of higher life forms on that world, and to ascertain the level of that intelligence with a view to establishing relations for the mutual benefit of our societies as we have done in so many other instances. As to my first purpose, the samples collected by my crew and me, which we hope to exhibit after our scientists have thoroughly analyzed them, testify that this world teems with every variety of plant, animal, bird, insect, and creature of the sea imaginable, much of it exhibiting a primitive form of intelligence. More important, it boasts of a specie of bipedal creatures whose intelligence, while woefully inferior to our own or even to that of our common domesticated flibling, did conform to the G-10 rating established by the Academy of Science and Exploration.”

The king raised a pod. “G-10 meaning . . .”

“Suitable for closer examination, Your Majesty.”

“Ah, of course. Go on.”

“I spent several days observing their civilization and altering my appearance and metabolism to conform to theirs, and acquiring their astonishing garb so that I might live among them. During that orientation I studied several subspecies of this race, which calls itself ‘human,’ and ultimately selected one which I hope exemplified the application of intelligence to what we all agree is a worthy endeavor for any civilized race, the dissemination of information. I told myself that if any segment of the human race would exhibit superior intellectual qualities, it would be the variety known as publishers.”

“How do publishers, er, broadcast information to other humans?”

“In a way which, by our own standards, will seem laughably crude, Your Majesty. Unlike our system of releasing information-laden molecules into the air for olfactory detection, the humans print works of information and entertainment on bound folios of paper called books.”

The king stared at Shmeegl blankly for a long moment before a glint of recognition entered his eyes. “And the books are then oxidized and the vapors released for olfactory detection by the public.”

Not wishing to embarrass the king, Shmeegl framed his reply diplomatically. “A splendid surmise, Your Majesty, and certainly logical by our own measure. However, the human publishers distribute these printed works in an entirely different manner.”

“The books have no odor?” the king exclaimed.“Not in the sense we commonly understand. In any event, the books are conveyed to smaller distribution centers around the world called stores, similar to our food markets, where they are acquired by individual humans interested in their contents.”

The king was still struggling with the concept. “But if they have no aroma . . .”

Shmeegl was the soul of patience. “Your Majesty, humans absorb the information not through their noses but through their eyes. Their eyes, er . . . ingest the contents of each leaf of the book and convey the information to learning centers located in their crania.”

“But that could take hours! Days! Weeks even!”

“I never said it was an efficient system, King, but the humans seem content enough with it.”

At this point, Dernif Ploor, the realm’s prime minister, identified himself with a pheromonic shpritz and stepped forward. “My dear Commander Shmeegl, might I trouble you to elaborate on the distribution of these . . . you called them ‘books’? What incentives are put forward to stimulate the humans to acquire them in the market centers?”

“In a few instances, printed materials are issued to inform the human populace of the availability of books, My Lord,” Shmeegl replied smartly, “and to proclaim their virtues. But for the overwhelming majority, there are no means for alerting the populace at large to the presence of books in the stores.”

The prime minister shook his head as if he had just been doused. “But if the humans are not made aware of the existence of the books, do not those books then go unpurchased?”

“Many, in fact most of them, do, My Lord.”

“And what becomes of the surplus of unpurchased books?”

“Many are returned to the depots whence they were originally distributed. Most, however, are destroyed.”A sibilant intake of breath echoed through the court. The king expressed the collective dismay. “Destroyed, you say?”

“Destroyed, Your Majesty.” Shmeegl felt a warm flash of embarrassment suffusing his body. “To be precise, they are shredded and dumped into a vat to make a sort of soup.”

The Great Hall reverberated with incredulous murmurs. “You are telling us,” said the king, “that the books are distributed among the populace, no one is apprised of their availability, and they are then returned for destruction?”

“That would appear to summarize it accurately, Sire.”

“But Commander, how is the information in the books transmitted to the populace?”

“I cannot answer that,” Shmeegl replied forlornly. “And what makes it all the more mystifying is that the publishers profess intense concern about what they term ‘illiteracy’ on the part of the populace at large.”

“Illiteracy meaning . . .?”

“Unfamiliarity with the contents of books.”

The king now began to sputter. “But . . . but . . . would not the populace acquire literacy if the books were made available to them instead of being issued in stealth, withdrawn, and thrown into a vat?”

“It would seem so to a reasonable being. But the humans who produce books do not seem to have grasped the connection between the supply and the demand.”

The prime minister raised his voice. “Would you not have done well, Commander, to befriend those humans who produce books and attempt to ascertain the reasons for their, ah, perverse behavior?”

“My Lord, I did that very thing. I actually materialized in the headquarters of a publisher, Labrea House, and briefly lived among those who produce books. I altered my shape to conform to theirs.”

“Clever, Shmeegl. But how did you disguise your odor?”

“I covered my skin with large amounts of cologne, My Lord. They mistook me for a literary agent.”

“And what did you learn at . . .”

“Labrea House. I learned that books are created by human specialists designated to organize information or compile myths. For their services they are paid in currency of the realm. The amount of currency is predicated on the number of units of any given book distributed to the populace.”

“How,” asked the king, “are the publishers able to calculate the proper currency to be awarded to the composers of books, when those books are being distributed one day and shredded for soup stock the next?”

“The authors, to use the accepted term, are awarded a small pittance to sustain their lives,” Shmeegl explained. “The balance is held by their publishers for several years until a determination can be made as to the number of units of each book acquired by the populace. If there is a positive balance at the final reckoning, it is disbursed to the authors. Seldom does it come to very much, I am told.”

“Why would anyone undertake to create books, then?” the king inquired.“They are tranquilized, Your Majesty.”

“Indeed!”

“That was my observation. They go about in a stupor cherishing the fantasy that the populace will find favor with their works and acquire them in large quantities.”

“Which is all but impossible, according to the system you have described,” said the king.“

Occasionally a book finds favor with a large segment of the populace,” Shmeegl pointed out.

“And are the authors of such books well rewarded, at least?”

“Handsomely, it seemed to me. In fact, those authors are often awarded more currency for creating the book than the publisher earns in profit for producing and distributing it.”

At this the prime minister seemed to go into a spasm of shock. “My dear Shmeegl,” he cried. “Are you asserting that these publishers deliberately create a negative balance of currency in order to acquire the work of authors who stimulate pleasure in a large segment of the populace?”

“That is correct, Prime Minister.”

“If such a thing occurred in a business enterprise on our world, it would surely collapse.”

“Oh, they collapse on the human world, too,” Shmeegl said. “Even in the short time I spent there, several did collapse and their assets were redistributed to other publishers.”

“But if the acquiring publishers conduct business on the same basis as the acquired ones, would they not collapse, too?”

“They do, My Lord. But as they are larger, their rate of collapse is less perceptible.”

“And the humans engaged in the enterprise of publishing — do they not recognize the . . . the futility of this process?”

“They are called editors, My Lord, and I was not able to ascertain their feelings about the process because they were always in meetings.”

The king waggled a pod. “These editors, Shmeegl. Their function is . . .?”

“To locate authors and stimulate the development of their creative faculties.”

“And they do this while they are in meetings?”

“No, Sire. I don’t know when they do it. In all the time I spent observing them, I never noted any actual contact with authors. I was told that some editors do actually devote attention to authors, but after a brief period of cultivation the editors then depart for employment at a competing publisher.”

“And that,” said the king, “is considered the most effective way to stimulate development of authors’ creative faculties? By departing for a competing publisher?”

“I am only reporting what I observed, Your Majesty.” Shmeegl’s words seemed to sink into a pool of sullen and hostile silence, compelling him to make his peroration. “Your Majesty, Prime Minister, good people of Slork, I am the most decorated and experienced explorer on our planet. My expeditions to the planetary systems along the rim of our galaxy have yielded a superb wealth of information that shall be absorbed by our scientists long after my molecules have been dispersed into the atmosphere. I have unerringly guided our society to those civilizations where highly intelligent races now furnish us with knowledge, material wealth, and military support. In short, I believe I know a smart species from a dumb one, and I would like to think my recommendations would be seriously considered. And I have to conclude that the human race, at least as personified by those engaged in disseminating information through publication of books, would produce nothing of benefit to our civilization, and our resources would be better allocated to more profitable enterprises. Judging from your bemusement, Your Majesty, I would guess I am safe in assuming you concur with my conclusion.”

The king’s chin had been buried thoughtfully in his forepods during Shmeegl’s speech, but when he looked up there was a definite scowl on his face, and he gave off a distinctly disagreeable odor, one that sent shivers through the assembly. It was the acrid odor of displeasure. And now he spoke.“

Commander Shmeegl, I am second to none in this realm in admiration for your achievements. It was I, after all, who selected you above all other candidates for the mission to the human world. But I have to say that I am most disappointed in the superficiality of your observations, your haphazard research techniques, and in particular the astonishingly unwarranted conclusions you have drawn from the information gathered by yourself and your crew.”

Shmeegl was all but rocked off his pods by the force of the king’s wrath. He abased himself before the throne, baring his neck in the traditional posture of a subject surrendering himself for execution.

The king now addressed himself to the rest of the court. “If we understand Commander Shmeegl’s report correctly, we have a species of tranquilized individuals — authors, he called them — creating works in a stuporous state for editors whose principal role appears to be that of leaving one publisher for another just as soon as the authors are producing anything of value. The publishers function on a deliberately unprofitable basis for the sole purpose of acquiring each other. The by-products of this process, books, are issued secretly, promptly withdrawn from the marketplace, and destroyed before the populace can benefit from them. Have I captured the essence of it, Shmeegl?”

The groveling officer muttered something into the tiled floor.

“The obvious, the easy conclusion, the conclusion that Commander Shmeegl would have us accept, is that humans have not yet achieved the level of intelligence that would enable them to realize the senselessness of their industry. After all, if we conducted our business on the same basis that the humans seem to, an alien observer might quite rightly conclude that we were completely out of our minds.”

The court rustled its agreement and leaned forward to hear what the king had to say next.

“But I reach quite a different conclusion. I believe there is a subtle and brilliant logic in the behavior of these publishing humans. Unfortunately, owing to the shortcomings of those mandated to observe them . . .” At this Commander Shmeegl pulled his head into his body as if in anticipation of the executioner’s blade. “. . . we are left with more questions than we began with. Did it ever occur to you, for instance, Commander, that the editors move from one publisher to another because that is the way that authors are fertilized?”

“No, Sire, it did not.”

“You did not think to bring a sample editor back with you, did you?”

“They were in meetings, Your Majesty.”

“Did you stop to think that the Labrea system of marketing books may be based on some underlying principle of negative profitability that might hold the key to anti-matter?”

“I must confess I did not, Sire,” Shmeegl admitted.

“Or that the soup into which shredded books are dumped is the source of informational pheromones dispersed into the atmosphere for the edification and entertainment of the populace?”

“Forgive me, Your Majesty, it never even crossed my mind.”

The king raised his head to address the court. “My people, it is clear to me that we may well have encountered an intelligence so sophisticated as to make our own seem puny by comparison. If we were to accept Commander Shmeegl’s recommendations, we would forgo one of the most exciting opportunities our civilization has ever encountered. I am therefore ordering the mounting of a new expedition to the third planet of the Gnarpal sun system for a thorough and systematic examination of human behavior. I shall lead it myself. You, Shmeegl, shall accompany the expedition as a guide.”

“A guide, Your Majesty!” Shmeegl whimpered.

“You can count yourself fortunate if I do not require you to scrub out the fuel tanks — Lieutenant Commander Shmeegl.”

And so it came to pass that some five Slorkian years later a flotilla of saucer-shaped deep-space ships gently lit on 54th Street off Lexington Avenue before the revolving doors of the Labrea House Building and disgorged a team of furry octopods smelling distinctly of cologne. A delegation of ministers, led by the king, escorted him to the eighteenth floor and waited respectfully in the anteroom while their leader conversed with the firm’s president about such wonders as author fertilization, anti-profit economics, and the dissemination of information by means of paper-pulp soup. After two hours the king emerged, radiating pheromones of intense satisfaction.

Prime Minister Ploor was the first to greet him. “I gather it went well, Your Majesty.”

“Well? Behold!” The king waved a document under the proboscis of his minister. “A three-book contract for my autobiography, a collection of my favorite recipes, and a work to be decided.”

“How gratifying,” Ploor said, sniffing the contract.

“Gratifying? Listen to this. A two hundred thousand dollar advance with a straight ten percent paperback royalty and a pass-through of my share of translation rights, plus ten thousand for every week my book is on the bestseller list. And Shmeegl said these people were crazy!”

“Shmeegl was clearly misguided,” said Ploor.

“And what now, Your Majesty?”

“Why, lunch at the Four Seasons, of course! They want me to meet their publicity person. They think they can get me onto Dancing with the Stars!”

Richard Curtis

This spoof is one of many in The Client from Hell and Other Publishing Satires, published by E-Reads.

Lawrence M. Bernabo’s five-star Amazon review says it all:

“Gentleman Junkie and Other Stories of the Hung-Up Generation” is the short story collection that got Harlan Ellison to Hollywood, which, in retrospect, may not have been a good move, but it was certainly an important move. The key factor is all of this was a book review in Esquire by the legendary Dorothy Parker whose description of “Daniel White for the Greater God,” far and away the best story in this collection, deserves repeating: “It is without exception the best presentation I have ever seen of present racial conditions in the South and of those who try to alleviate them.” When I was teaching “To Kill a Mockingbird” I had my students read Ellison’s story, to give them some idea of what things were like in the South before they were born. It is, simply put, a short story that makes the purchase of this entire volume well worth the money.

For the record, or more specifically for those of you trying to find Ellison stories you have not read in other collections, here are the short stories you will find within these pages: “Final Shtick,” “Gentleman Junkie,” “May We Also Speak?”, “Daniel White for the Greater Good,” Lady Bug, Lady Bug,” “Free With This Box!” (a personal favorite), “There’s One on Every Campus,” “At the Mountains of Blindness,” “This is Jackie Spining,” “No Game for Children,” “The Late, Great Arnie Draper,” “High Dice,” “Enter the Fanatic, Stage Center,” “Someone is Hungrier,” “Memory of a Muted Trumpet,” “Turnpike,” “Sally in Our Alley,” “The Silence of Infidelity,” “Have Coolth,” “RFD #2,” “No Fourth Commandment,” and “The Night of Delicate Terrors.”

Since we are talking Harlan Ellison there is really no reason to engage in any further advocacy. I am either preaching to the converted or spitting into the wind. There is no middle ground with Ellison. Consequently the point here is to be informative. “Gentleman Junkie” is a collection of dark stories dealing more with the real world than you usually find in Ellison’s more famous works of speculative fiction. These are stories about racial prejudice, drug addiction, juvenile delinquency, anti-Semitism, alienation, violence and other fun topics. Consequently, these are tales best consumed one at a time, because to sit down and read this book cover to cover would be a bit much for most souls.

Gentleman Junkie is one of some thirty Harlan Ellison masterpieces revived by E-Reads.

- Richard Curtis

Albano selected two protagonists who, though related by blood, could not be more opposite in temperament. Rodney lives a luxurious life on Fifth Avenue,but his brother Nathan has become a Marxist radical opposed to everything Rodney stands for. It all changes when war breaks out. Rodney goes to sea seeking revenge for Pearl Harbor. His brother ends up in the vicious North African campaign. Both must fight for their lives, their beliefs, and their nation’s glory.

E-Reads publishes another stirring novel of World War II, Waves of Glory.

E-Reads and Ellison’s company, Edgeworks Abbey, are proud to make his two collections, The Glass Teat and The Other Glass Teat, for the first time in e-book and and the first time in paperback in some forty years.

Here is his introduction to the first volume.  Do not ask at whom the sabre slashes – it slashes at thee.

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Welcome to the Gulag

This is my final communiqué to you prisoners of war. No more warnings. I’m done with all that. We’ve lost.

I began actively warning you how it was closing in, what the prison would look like, how they would try to fool you with new meanings to old words, how they would convince you that everyone was your enemy, and you were too stupid to know who the Bad Guys were. Told you they’d lie to you, but mostly they’d frighten you. Began writing the “Glass Teat” columns the week of 4-10 October in 1968, in the Los Angeles Free Press and kept going for 102 episodes.

One hundred and two installments, dozens of other essays and critiques, comments on our culture, as interpreted through the all-seeing eye of television.

And gardyloos! Many gardyloos along the way. Warnings. Sapient to my eye-teeth, smart guy who could read the future, I took what I saw coming across that screen daily, and as awful as it was, I treated it seriously. For laughs, of course, because such endless japery could not be considered Real, it was all a dumb show, but it portended much. And it was easy to make fun of. Every miserable little sitcom was a microcosm of what was going on in our country. And so, laughing heartily inside, I treated it seriously.

I wrote small essays that would have made de Toqueville smile. I was a Baedeker of my time, a field guide to what Rinso and Joy commercials really meant.

Oh, I thought I was the cultural Freud; much in love with myself, predicting woe if one embraced that whore, television, and having no idea that the internet was just around the corner. Warning that if you spent too much time each day staring into that screen, your life would be majorly fucked. Now we spend all day staring into one screen or another. Now we have no more friends, but have been given something utterly bogus, “FaceBook Friends,” total strangers to whom we pass along every last little boring jot of minutiae the instant it happens. We have destroyed genuine friendship, we have grown dumber and dumber the more information is put on that electronic back-fence-gossip, we have vanished civility and privacy and courtesy. The little hand-held horrors can take pictures, so take pictures, whether the object of your snap wants you to do it or not. Why, you’re a “public person” if you step out on a sidewalk! You have no say whether I can be permitted to make you look like a fool, and shove you out onto one of the millions of little blathering blogs that once were reserved for a locked diary in a drawer. Now, everything is free. Never mind that you’re stealing, that you’re destroying what was always a shaky economy. It’s free!

(Unless some really mean asshole like Ellison sics his flying blue monkey squad of attorneys on you for breaching my copyright, by stealing one of my stories, and throwing it up on that electronic highwayman’s dream.)

You are prisoners of the tube, and prisoners of the computer. They tell you how much freedom you have, how much wider and freer a world than those crude, olde time boys from just twenty years ago had…those who didn’t have the freedom of walking around all day hooked into a smaller version of the gulog, that imprisoning screen!

Yeah, freedom.

Trapped, is what you are. Trapped. And everything I’ve been fulminating about in these two books, well, it’s all come true. Millions of words…fifty years…it all made me seem so sapient, so puissant, so coaching-Team-Humanity-to-cover-its-ass…well, it meant nothing. I did my little tumble and high-wire act, my dog’n’pony, but I was an ass to think I could even slow it down an hour.
They bought you. The way they buy those fools who go to the Golden Globe Awards knowing they’re bogus, but going anyhow because the studios are paying for it. The self-congratulating little cadre of the entertainment industry, that has taken over our world. You got scammed: they bought you. And when something actually wonderful happened, like the rescue of the Chilean miners, when something like that comes along, it gets its mere fifteen minutes in the spotlight, one of the miners gets to sing at Elvis Presley’s Graceland, and the world forgets the men in the hole, the incredible miracle; it needs its idiot distractions, and turns away to babble about how its cat can play the oboe, and how outrageous are the thongs on the girls on “Glee.”

So, though the doom peal I’ve been sounding (first in these now “classic” books, thereafter, anywhere my mouth would be open, as if I had declared myself the Town Crier) about television and its syphilitic mate the internet, and all the octopoidal dark alleyways of this imprisoning electronic madhouse, has as much effect as a fart on the open sea, here are the books. Together at last, as are you with the gulag, Bedlam, the prison. It is no more that the barking of a clown at the night sky.

You are as trapped as I and everyone else, no more noble than consumers, the burros at the end of the pack-train.

And they tell you how free you are, because you can download Avatar into the palm of your hand while you walk while you text while you tweet while you get yo’ ass run over in a crosswalk by a 7 Santini Bros. moving van.
No, schmuck, that ain’t freedom.

(The only reason to see Avatar to begin with—apart from Cameron badly swiping all the planetary artwork from Roger Dean—is because the boring piece of crap was AS FUCKIN’ BIG AS LITHUANIA! But shrunk down to your hand, dullard, you might have, a lot less expensively, bought this year’s Roger Dean calendar, and gotten more truly transported.)

(But that might require you use your imagination, and we sure as hell don’t want that dried-up old peach-pit to be stressed, do we?)

I used to think that just my tone of voice could keep people above the ridgeline, safe from the lava…thus these two Glass Teat books. But what a fraud, what an ass full of himself. I can’t save you. No one can.

You gave yourself over happily. You let yourself be scammed. You looked around the poker game and couldn’t spot the mark, and you forgot what I kept warning you: if you can’t spot the sucker…

You’re it.

Enjoy the books. They’re my testament, and my piss-poor attempt to keep you all from becoming butts in the big gang-rape.

Harlan Ellison
26 January 2011

E-Reads has published many of Dietz’s early novels:  Freehold ,  Prison Planet,  Bodyguard, Mars Prime, Matrix Man, Steelheart and Where the Ships Die.

And if you’re ready to settle in to some great series you can pick up the Pik Lando (starting with Drifter) or McCade (starting with Galactic Bounty) series, all ready for purchase on Dietz’s author page.

Space war is explosively alive thanks to William C. Dietz!

In the 1980′s and 1990′s in the SF/Fantasy publishing business, one of the major flavors of the decades was humorous fantasy. Terry Pratchett may have started the whole thing with his still-very-popular Discworld series but he was not alone in his success. Craig Shaw Gardner wrote a series about a magically-challenged wizard whose spells were apt to produce unexpected, and often painful, results. Another series that was quite popular around about the same time was the Castle Perilous series of novels by John DeChancie. They were quite a bit different from his early novels about truckers in space (more to come on those in another entry sometime soon) but they caught the public imagination and he wrote eight of them before the reading public’s taste changed (as it always seem to do eventually) and the books fell out of publishing favor and out of print. Which, of course, provided exactly the sort of opportunity that E-Reads was conceived to exploit. All eight titles in the series are now available once again as ebooks and most are also available as print titles with the last couple just about to become available.

Castle Perilous is a world (or worlds, or possibly universe or universes) out of time. There are 40,000 rooms and each one is an entryway to a different place in space and time. Open a door and step from a stone corridor into a jungle, a desert, an island or, if you’re particularly unlucky, as so many of the visitors to the Castle seem to be, into a battlefield or someplace even more hostile and dangerous. Think Marx Brothers with really scary special effects and live ammunition. And sometimes it also resembles the famous Hotel California, where you can check out but you can never leave.

Maybe that last paragraph was a bit too scary itself. The essence of the Castle Perilous series, although it occasionally shows a darker edge, is hilarious contretemps and massive misunderstandings, spiced with wild and unpredictable adventure and, as the stage directions sometimes read, hilarity ensues.

Just because humor isn’t the current flavor of the decade, that doesn’t mean that we don’t all need a laugh now and then (In my opinion, we need laughs as often as possible, to help us deal with the way life keeps surprising us and not always in pleasant ways.) and John DeChancie delivers them consistently, entertainingly and with a style all his own. These books probably aren’t quite old enough to be referred to as classics yet but they are destined to be recognized as such as they age. In the meantime, give them a try, then help us figure out why some people didn’t find them as witty as anything in the genre. It beats us, since they still make us laugh a lot!

After traveling the country and listening to women’s most common health problems, Dr. Marianne Legato, one of the nation’s leading advocates for women’s health and founder and director of The Foundation for Gender-Specific Medicine, answers these common questions and more in What Women Need to Know. This revolutionary book teaches women how to ask their doctors the right questions and leave the office satisfied.

And take it from us, you don’t have to be female to benefit from Dr. Legato’s sage and practical advice.

E-Reads is also publisher of Dr. Legato’s Eve’s Rib, a groundbreaking medical work about gender-specific medical breakthroughs.

E-Reads has a solid block of Gunn’s work, and today we’re happy to feature two favorites at the top of everyone’s Gunn chart, The Dreamers and the The Listeners.

- Richard Curtis

The first novel, Tarnsman of Gor, was released by Ballantine in 1966, and over the next fifteen years or so another 24 were published by Ballantine and then DAW. The books were enormously popular and sales were tremendous – until, one day it all ground to a halt, mysteriously, like that scene at the end of War of the Worlds where a seemingly invincible alien catches cold and drops dead. What happened? Tastes in reading habits change but usually they evolve rather than fall off a cliff as Gor did.

The answer may lie not in what readers like to read but what editors like to edit. The Gorean Saga’s epic sales were fueled by the kind of red-blooded male readers that consumed cowboy books, Executioner and Destroyer action-adventure, Spillane-type thrillers and space operas by the carton. And many of the editors who acquired them were red-blooded males themselves (with notable exceptions like Judy-Lynn Del Rey, the diminutive titan who gave her name to Random House’s science fiction line).

Then came the Feminist movement, and with it a revolution in editorial viewpoint. And Feminists had a lot to say about the morality practiced by the masters of Gor on their female slave subjects. As Feminists occupied more and more significant editorial positions at major publishers including the science fiction and fantasy divisions, hard-line Feminist thinking influenced decisions on all kinds of books, especially the kind that guys cherished. A lot of Feminist ire focused on Gor – many female editors passionately hated Norman’s world and all the decadent male chauvinism it seemed to stand for. (Not surprisingly, the author takes a very different view of all of this!) In any event, yes, by the 1990′s you couldn’t give Gor away.

The books were all out of print when I started E-Reads around 2000, but I discovered something very interesting when I went online. Not only was there a huge cult revolving around Gor (some of his hard to get editions sell in the used book market for hundreds of dollars), but many of those involved in Gorean role-playing games were women who were into fantasy slavery or simply took the stories in with a large dose of good humor.

Gor is once again alive and thriving on E-Reads, I’m happy to report. And as for feminism in the publishing industry, I’m also happy to report that it’s here to stay. But it still unnerves me when female editors refer to the literature men like to read as “Boy-books.”

Readers and fans interested in learning more about John Norman and his Gorean world can visit John Norman’s Chronicles of Gor.

- Richard Curtis

From mountain climbing, freestyle motocross, to sky diving and snowboarding and beyond, in the past decade the world of extreme sports has exploded on the scene, with daredevils attempting daring acts of athleticism that leave spectators awed..and fearful. BEING EXTREME explores the motivations and society impulses behind these high-risk lifestyles through interviews with professional athletes and the recreational enthusiast, as well as with psychiatrists who seek to understand the motivation beyond these “Big T” personalities. Authors Gutman and Frederick also explore what heart-stopping sports are around the next curve, because in a world where the “rush” is everything, everyone is always upping their game.

On the basis of Shatterday The New York Times Book Review proclaimed, “The spellbinding quality of a great nonstop talker, with a cultural warehouse for a mind,” and the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction described Ellison as “the quintessential science fiction short story writer of his time.” And Science Fiction Review says, “You have to read Shatterday, feel it, experience it. It is an event.”

Shatterday is in the vanguard of a fleet of some thirty Harlan titles reissued by E-Reads.

“George Lucas missed a sure bet when he chose to film his own Big-Dumb-Object-filled script for The Phantom Menace (1999) rather than open up his precious project to outside sources. He could have turned, for instance, to Sean Williams and Shane Dix, adapting their new space opera Evergence: The Prodigal Sun . . . a book that is genre-savvy and capably written, full of adventure and Asimovian imperial vistas.”

“Asimovian” speaks volumes, but wait – it gets better:

“Dix and Williams . . . deliver tons of action in straightforward, economical prose noted for its clarity. And they offer wide-screen baroque plotting never out of control … With echoes of vintage Jack Williamson and Poul Anderson, as well as Niven, Asimov and Vinge, Williams and Dix proudly continue a vital tradition, proving SF as diverse a field as ever.”

There’s a long story behind the creation of EVERGENCE. Here’s the short version. Sean and Shane wanted to write a space opera that had the scale of Star Wars and the complex characterization of Blake’s 7. (So if you’re a fan of that show, you’ll love this too.) They were asked to write the lead novel in a franchise that, through no fault of the book, never really got off the ground (completists will know this as The Unknown Soldier: Book One of the Cogal). They took the story (which they owned), created an entirely new and better back-story, and kept on writing. They took out the aliens and put in wild mutant humans instead. They started with two warring intergalactic empires in book one and kept on building. They colonized the entire galaxy, created a back-story as old as humanity itself, hinged the entire plot on a single question (“Is Adoni Kane a good guy or what?”) and turned the color up at every possible opportunity.

EVERGENCE builds, and builds, and builds. And the ending . . . ? Well, let’s just say you’ll never forget it.

Sean and Shane have been talking about a sequel forever but the fact they’ve never got beyond the title (The Roche Limit) suggests that EVERGENCE is pretty much complete as it is, in their hearts, in their minds, and, you know, in the story. Every novel in the series was a bestseller of some form or another. Every novel was nominated for awards. They’ve been published in several different languages. You might not have heard of these books before–but that’s good news for you. You get to dive in right now, without any preconception or expectations, knowing that the series is (a) finished and (b) awesome.

EVERGENCE is the space opera that, in the eyes of at least one reviewer, made George Lucas look bad (some would say he did that all on his own, but whatever). It launched a twelve-book collaboration that helped one of the boys on to becoming a #1 New York Times bestseller. It’s just as fresh and exciting as it was back when it was published. And it’s available. Oh, and. And, well, you get the picture. Buy it and blow your mind.

“The Prodigal Sun is a close-knit personal story told on a galaxy-sized canvas. Filled with action as well as intriguing ideas.”
Kevin J Anderson

Drafted into learning the physical and mental skills of magic, Michael discovers of his role in a much larger history of magic and music in both the Sidhe’s world and ours. Can he survive the pitched battle? Will Michael be the answer to finally uniting the elder races?

A classic YA novel that blends the intricacies of complex SF with the wonder and danger of fantasy, THE INFINITY CONCERTO and its sequel THE SERPENT MAGE were re-written and expanded from its original version to form the series SONGS OF EARTH AND POWER. This E-Reads edition is based on those expanded works.

In  THE SERPENT MAGE  the sequel to THE INFINITY CONCERTO Michael Perrin, a teenage poet returns to contemporary Los Angeles hoping to lead a normal life. But his time trapped in the dangerous faerie land of the Sidhe has left him with magical skills and a mystery to solve. The “Song of Power” still hangs in the air, strange bodies have been discovered in a nearby hotel, and an ancient creature calls to Michael from the waters of Scotland.

Worlds are falling apart. An apprentice needs training. Could an unfinished symphony save the world and create a lasting piece between humans and the Sidhe?

Following a sequence of increasingly dire personal tragedies, culminating in the unexplained death of their four-year-old son, Josh, Jenna and David Kella plan to make a new start of their lives on the old family homestead they’ve inherited just outside Eureka, California with their surviving son Miles. What they discover, though, is a nightmare. Ghostly children play on the backyard swings and vanish abruptly. In a cruel and maddening irony, one of the child ghosts resembles their dead son Josh. The horrors pile up as psychics, Ouija boards and poltergeists drive the couple to the borders of madness and terror.

Ray Garton is the author of close to sixty books of which perhaps the best known is Bram Stoker nominee Live Girls. Some twenty reissues can be found on Garton’s author page on our website.
RC

Dead in the Water launched Ted Wood’s mystery career and the fictional adventures of Reid Bennett. But what brings readers back for book after book – E-Reads has all of them — is Sam, Reid’s German shepherd. Publisher’s Weekly described Sam thus: “…a multitalented utility infielder who can “keep,” “track,” “seek,” “fight,” “guard,” sniff out cocaine and corpses, save lives and generally pinch-hit for a dozen patrolmen.” Fans plead, “Whatever happens to Reid Bennett, don’t touch a hair of that dog’s head!”

– Richard Curtis

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Welcome to Riverside Mobile Home Park, where there’s plenty of shade but no escape from the heat. It’s a run-down little trailer park in northern California, but it could be anywhere in the United States. It is unassuming, unremarkable and looks like a million other trailer parks. But don’t let the sleepy appearance fool you. It’s a nest of dark secrets, boiling lusts and murder waiting to happen.

Meet the players:

Marcus Reznick watched the love of his life blow her brains out and then dove to the bottom of a bottle of vodka. Now he’s living in Riverside Mobile Home Park and trying to pull his life together…until a powerful temptation comes his way.

Steve Regent is an internet pornographer who has moved to Riverside Mobile Home Park to work on a new website-Trailer Park Girls. He’s looking for beautiful women…but instead finds something very ugly.

Sherry Manning is a drug addict living in the trailer park with her boyfriend, Andy Winchell, a dealer. When a friend of a friend ODs in their trailer and turns out to be the son of a powerful politician, the truth about his death is covered up in the media. But Sherry and Andy know that truth…and she fears what might be done to silence them.

Anna Dunfy is trying to make ends meet by doing temp jobs and stripping at night to support her mentally handicapped daughter, Kendra…an astonishingly beautiful girl with a woman’s body, a child’s mind, and a dangerous urge to do something naughty.

Little by little Ray Garton, a lifetime Grand Master of the horror genre, stirs these disparate ingredients into an exclusive formula that will blow you away. To understand what motivated him to write Trailer Park Noir, read Garton’s reminiscence.

Visit the little shop of horrors known as Ray Garton’s author page.

RC

Drawing on experiences from a lifetime at sea, Tristan Jones uses his acute powers of observation and his gift with for telling tales to transport us aboard boats struggling through savage gales, sweltering through parched calms, and sliding down the trade winds through beautiful, phosphorescent seas. With a special poignancy and his unique, wry sense of humor, Jones brings back to life people–like sailing adventurer Bill Tilman, long-distance voyager Bernard Moitessier, and pioneering woman sailor Clare Francis–as well as the places and boats lost to time. He recalls his favorite ports, his treasured cities, and his most memorable voyages.

Don’t Miss the entire collection of titles from Tristan Jones from E-Reads: ICE!; HEART OF OAK; SAGA OF A WAYWARD SAILOR, THE INCREDIBLE VOYAGE; THE IMPROBABLE VOYAGE; AKA; OUTWARD LEG; SOMEWHERES EAST OF SUEZ; SEAGULLS IN MY SOUP; YARNS; A STEADY TRADE

Beasts of Gor – one of 32 new covers created for John Norman’s Gorean Chronicles.

Is America Ready for John Norman?

America was ready for 50 Shades of Gray, but is it ready for John Norman’s Gor? With an ambitious promotional campaign revolving around bold new covers commissioned by Norman’s publisher E-Reads, it looks like readers are ready for Gor.

Since publication of the first volumes of John Norman’s Gorean fantasy epic, now numbering 32 volumes, the series has been an object of raging controversy. Though the first 25 volumes, commencing with Tarnsman of Gor (Del Rey), enjoyed huge sales, the themes of male dominance and female submission fell out of favor in the cultural shift of the late 20th century.

In time the books went out of print. Yet a cult – fueled as much by women as men – continued to prosper with role-playing games, fan fiction and a thriving market for used copies of the original books, which were gorgeously and erotically illustrated by such top artists as Frank Frazetta, Kelly Freas and Boris Vallejo.

Agent Richard Curtis had taken note of this underground activity and when in 2000 he launched digital reprint publisher E-Reads, he contacted the author, a philosophy teacher at Queens College CUNY, secured the rights and reissued the books with a bondage-theme cover. The series became E-Reads’ bestselling books and, to the delight of Gor fans, the author has continued to produce new volumes (Volume #33 is in production).

For some time, in response to fan feedback, the E-Reads team has been contemplating a brand-new cover treatment. After an extensive talent search, early in 2011 Curtis contacted Shefali Randeria, founder of Cirque-Studios in India. “Her studio’s work reflected the look and feel we were looking for,” Curtis says. Cirque was engaged to create a vivid cover image for each volume. The author personally suggested the scenes depicted on each cover and provided details of the Gorean world including flora and fauna, clothing, weapons, foods and customs. The result is a suite of colorful, dramatic and striking covers, some of which have been used to create posters and covers for iPads and Kindles.

Now that readers’ tastes have been expanded by E. L. James’s erotic fiction, will they embrace Gor? “I’m confident they will,” says Curtis.

When Emily Crane’s car breaks down on a dark, lonely road at night, she is attacked and raped by a man she kills in self defense. That night, the dead rapist walks out of the morgue. Later, Emily begins to experience strange cravings and her body undergoes terrifying changes.

When brutal killings leave victims partially eaten in the northern California coastal town of Big Rock, Sheriff Arlin Hurley scoffs at the talk of werewolves…until a tuft of wolf’s fur is found on a victim. It soon becomes clear that whatever is responsible for the killings, it’s not alone. There are more than one. And they are doing something much worse than killing and eating people.

Nearly 25 years ago, Ray Garton reinvented the vampire mythos with his erotic novel Live Girls. Now he has updated the curse of the werewolf in Ravenous.

Here’s what Publishers Weekly said about Ravenous:

“For Garton, lycanthropy is a sexually transmitted diseas, spread mostly through rape, that runs rampant through a small town fraught with affairs and intrigues. His werewolf is a terrifying creature: not a remorseful, helpless cursed human but a homicidal beast driven by a dual urge to breed and feed. Hurley is a sheriff to root for, and Garton’s well-paced horror novel reworks the werewolf myth to great effect.”

To learn what was on Ray Garton’s mind when he wrote Ravenous, and for an expert comparison of vampires to werewolves Click here.

And for a complete list of Garton thrillers published by E-Reads, visit his author page.

Queen of Angels: In a world of wonders, wealth, and “perfect” mental health, a famous poet commits gruesome murder . . .why? That crime, that question, leads a policewoman to a jungle of torture and forgotten gods; a writer to the bohemian shadows of a vast city; and a scientist directly into the mind-the nightmare soul-of the psychopath himself . . .
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Slant: In the second half of the twenty-first century, nanotechnology has transformed every aspect of society. Humans can now change their abilities, their appearance, their very bodies on microscopic level. Advanced psychotherapy seems to have wiped away violence and illness. The world is sane and in balance.

However, that balance teeters with the grisly murder of two prostitutes and a series of suicides. Soon, public defender Mary Cho’s investigation finds a dark danger lurking in the recesses of the “dataflow.” Entertainment, virtual pornography, neo-Luddite separatists, an unknown artificial intelligence—everything seems to be intertwined in a vast conspiracy. As technology fails so too does the society perched high atop it. Perfection is a high pedestal from which to fall.

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Slant, Greg Bear’s sequel to the popular Queen of Angels, “shows that Bear is one of our very best, most innovative, speculative writers.” —New York Daily News

“Tense and fast-paced, beautifully written with complex, engaging characters, and a story line that unfolds like an origami puzzle.” —San Francisco Chronicle and Examiner

For a complete list of Greg Bear works available at E-Reads, click here.

My protagonist, Kate Jasper, lives in Marin County, California, a very strange place. I like to call Kate, “Marin’s own, organically grown, amateur sleuth.”

Marin County, for those of you who haven’t been here, is filled with people who still think the New Age is really new. There’s a lot of money here too, not to mention an attitude of spiritual elitism. (In Berkeley across the Bay, people like to be politically correct. In Marin, they like to be spiritually correct.) So Kate Jasper tends to stumble over dead bodies against this particularly touch-feely Marin backdrop: a human potential discussion group in Murder Most Mellow; a chiropractor’s table in Adjusted To Death; a lethal health spa in The Last Resort; and a psychic seminar in Murder on the Astral Plane (just to name a few). Kate has a serious side too. She recognizes the dichotomy of spiritual correctness in collision with poverty, crime, injustice, and despair, collisions that often end in murder in Kate’s world.

Yet Kate Jasper is definitely a product of mellow Marin County. Kate’s a vegetarian. Since I was a vegan for fifteen years, it’s easy for me to write the semi-orgasmic food scenes. And of course, her vegetarianism gets her into trouble. There’s a lot more comic potential in vegetables than most people realize. In Fat-Free and Fatal, Kate attends a vegetarian cooking class along with her psychic friend, Barbara Chu. Unfortunately, Barbara isn’t psychic enough to avoid tripping over a murder victim on her way to the restroom. The murder weapon? A little hand-held electrical appliance used to grate vegetables, called a SaladShooter. But don’t worry, the victim wasn’t shredded to death. Now if you want to find out exactly how to murder someone with a SaladShooter, you might want to read Fat-Free and Fatal.

Kate Jasper also practices tai chi, a meditative martial art form that I’m certain no tough P.I. would deign to use. But believe me, it’s effective, especially for Kate. In tai chi, the person who is the most relaxed and centered wins. Not the big guys with all the muscles! I’ve practiced tai chi for over twenty years. And I’ve done a kind of tai chi sparring called “push hands” in which I was consistently pushed over by a woman twenty years older and much smaller than myself. And in turn, I was always able to push over this young muscular guy who was about six-foot-three. The poor guy kept trying, but he was just too big and tough. I love it. And it’s even more satisfying in fiction when Kate uses tai chi to protect herself. In one of the books, Kate uses a particularly elegant move which is meant to strike a person in the groin and the throat at the same time. Unfortunately, she misses the throat of the thug who has been terrorizing her, but what the hey? The man’s writhing on the floor, clutching his crotch. Fictional tai chi can be so much fun!

Kate owns her own small business, a gag-gift business called “Jest Gifts.” Jest Gifts sells specialty items to professionals, things like shark mugs for the attorneys and shrunken-head earrings for the psychotherapists. She’s easy for me to write. I once owned a company called “Jest Cards” which manufactured greeting cards featuring terrible puns. It’s also a great position for an amateur sleuth. It’s Kate’s own company. She can take time off to investigate murder, even though she does have to work late to make up for it. And like most people who own their own business, she’s both determined and a little crazy, crazy enough to follow up on her misguided investigations. So far I haven’t had a gag-gift murder. No one’s been strangled with a psychotherapist’s “Uh-Huh” tie or brained with a doctor’s quack cup, but you never know.

Kate is too busy with gag gifts to be a professional detective, so why does she keep sticking her nose into murder? Her friends tell her it’s her karma. But of course, they’re from Marin. The real truth is that Kate Jasper is a caretaker. Unlike the lone wolf detective, she has a lot of friends, and when her friends are in trouble, she tries to help them out. Kate even helps out her ex-husband, Craig, in The Last Resort. He and his new girlfriend, attorney Suzanne Sorenson, have taken a trip to a health spa. Suzanne is not only the woman who broke up their marriage, she’s the one who filed the divorce papers. She’s found dead, face down in a mud bath. And the police suspect Craig. Kate gets on a plane and flies down to help him. Now that’s a caretaker!

I know what makes Kate Jasper tick. Sometimes, she’s too close for comfort. She’s the kind of character who gets a phone call from a friend in need, say a friend who says her boyfriend’s going crazy on her. And Kate says, “Oh that’s terrible, why don’t you come stay with me?” So the friend does. Then the boyfriend comes over, and he really is crazy. And his friends come over and they’re Hell’s Angels. And his family members are from another planet entirely, and his dog’s a Doberman pinscher, and, well… you get the idea. That’s Kate Jasper.

At least, that’s how I think of Kate Jasper. Here’s what a few others have said:

“Kate is a heroine with backbone, heart, and a sweet sense of humor.”
—Pacific Sun

“She’s smart, funny, vulnerable, and unpretentious.”
—Marilyn Wallace, editor of the Sisters in Crime series

“Clever, smart, and resourceful, Kate is an ideal amateur detective.”
—Silk Stalkings, Nicholas and Thompson

“Kate is smart and funny and independent and all those other things we like our protagonist to be. But one of the things that makes her special to me… is that she is a kind and loving person.”
—Kathleen Swanholt, editor of Mysterious Women

We’ll be curious to find out what you think of Kate. And of course, Kate will be curious about you.

Night Life

Ray Garton’s Live Girls. published in 1987, changed the face of vampire fiction. The gritty, urban story of Davey Owen’s dark seduction and reluctant transformation into a creature of the undead has become a classic of the genre.

In Night Life, nearly two decades after battling the vampires of the Midnight Club in New York City, Davey is a marked man. He lives a quiet life in Los Angeles with the love of his life, Casey Thorne. The vampires he did not destroy back then have been hunting him ever since, eager to take their revenge–and now they have found him. For what he did to them, they are determined to make him pay with his last drop of blood. With the help of old friends and new allies, Davey and Casey must face the bloodthirsty nightmare of their past. This time, they may not have a future.

If you’re truly bloodthirsty,we urge you to read Live Girls and Night Life back to back. With the lights on.

For a complete list of Ray Garton thrillers published by E-Reads, visit his author page.

His body was never found. But his memory lives on, and so do his Major League records. He played in twelve All Star Games and won twelve Gold Gloves. He led the National League in batting average four time and was its Most Valuable Player in 1966. During the course of his career, Clemente was selected to participate in the league’s All Star Game on twelve occasions. He won twelve Gold Glove Awards and led the league in batting average four different seasons. And he was the first Latin American player to be recognized by the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Yet, none of this captures the charisma of the man. But Kal Wagenheim’s Clemente! does, and we commend it to you.

– Richard Curtis

Long before he made his fateful crossing of the Atlantic, Christopher Columbus learned his seamanship as a young man in the Mediterranean and then in the service of the King of Portugal. But soon his eyes turned to the ocean and what lay beyond. Opposition to his idea of finding the East by sailing west was based on differing ideas of the size–and shape–of the world. To the end of his days Columbus insisted that where his ship came aground was in the Indies, even when it became clear to his contemporaries that they were in fact in an area of the world previously unknown to Europeans.

Om Christopher Columbus Bradford portrays Columbus’s genius, stubbornness, greed and stupidity mixed with bravery and masterly navigation skills. A great book gives us a true and balanced portrait of a great explorer who forever changed the world.

In Nebula and Hugo Award winner Greg Bear’s Eon the arrival of a 300-kilometer long stone was the answer to humanity’s desperate plea to end the threat of nuclear war. Inside the deep recesses of the stone lay the remnants of a human society versed in English, Russian and Chinese. The artifacts of this familiar people foretell a great Death caused by the ravages of war. Deeper still within the stone is the Way. For some the Way meant salvation from death, for others it was a parallel world where loved ones live again. Here is some of the outpouring of acclaim for Eon:

“Eon may be the best constructed hard SF epic yet.”
—The Washington Post

“Sharing aspects of Clarke’s Rendezvous with Rama, its uniqueness arises from Bear’s bold imagination. Bear is a writer of passionate vision. Eon is his grandest work yet.”
—Locus

“A powerful, imaginative novel.”
—Library Journal

“The only word for it really is blockbuster. It is big and breathtaking; the story and the concepts are ambitious to the point of mind boggling.”
—Isaac Asimov’s SF Magazine

Now, in Eternity, Bear returns to the Earth of Eon and it’s clear that the first novel was a prequel to an even grander story. The crew of the asteroid-starship Thistledown has thwarted an attempt to sever the link to the Way, an endless corridor that spans universes. The asteroid had settled into orbit around Earth and discovered that the tunnel snaked away, forming a contained universe of its own. Forty years later, war breaks out to reopen The Way. And humankind is about to discover just how completely it has underestimated its ancient adversaries.

Eternity completes a trilogy that includes the prequel Legacy, and all three titles are now available for download at E-Reads as well as 19 other unforgettable works by the author rightfully described as the heir to the late Arthur C. Clarke’s mantle.

In this Julius Caesar: The Pursuit of Power, acclaimed historian Ernle Bradford steers away from the clichés and legends and cuts right to the heart of who Caesar really was – a man who based his entire existence on the pursuit of power.
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“Ernle Bradford’s new biography turns this ancient Roman from a face on old coins into an ambitious human being as lively–and at least as tricky–as any present-day Parliamentarian.” – Gerald Kaufman, Manchester Evening News

“…original and memorable…. This particular slant is rare, and has never to m knowledge been expressed wit such readability and such gusto…. The book is stunningly well written.” - Kenneth McLeish, Country Life

“Commendable work…interesting to the casual reader who merely wishes to be acquainted–for pleasure rather than study–with one of the most ambitious men who ever lived.” – Richard Gibbon, The Journal

“I almost couldn’t bear to continue; but the story was so gripping I knew I would have to….It is so frightening that it doesn’t seem there is any further way for the story to intensify….The finale is virtuosic, and the plot twists up more and more, exponentially so, to a climax which is nothing short of vertiginous.”
– Michael Edwards

“Read it if you can. But I warn you, you might not be able to. And that is the highest recommendation it is possible to give horror fiction.”
– Richard Wright

“There were several occasions when I had to put to the book down, take a deep breath and say, ‘I can’t believe that happened to that character!’ If you want to be shocked, if you have a strong stomach or if you just want to find out how terrible the world can be–highly recommend Shackled. Just don’t expect it to be a pleasant ride.”
– Eoghain O’Keefe

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Children disappear all the time. It’s in the news every day. Where do they go? What happens to them? Who has taken them?

While covering a story for his tabloid newspaper, reporter Bentley Noble accidentally stumbles onto something else entirely…a story about something so unspeakable, he doesn’t know if anyone will believe it…a story that pulls him down into the depths of evil and depravity and threatens his very life.

With the help of a bestselling true-crime writer, Noble descends into the dark world of human trafficking, where fear and pain are tools of control and innocence is sold to the highest bidder. As a handful of good and decent people try to combat a monstrously powerful and all too real evil, some lives will be shattered, others will be ended…but none will be the same.

Want to know what was on Ray Garton’s mind when he wrote Shackled? Read his blog here.

And for a complete list of E-Reads thrillers by Garton, visit his author page.

“Come in,” Mundis said with the warm smile of the benign host of dinner party. “And don’t mind Ahab. Just be sure not to let him smell your fear.”

That was far easier said than done. I’m sure you could smell my fear in Delaware as I edged along the opposite wall past the snapping jaws of Ahab.

The Mundises were thoughtful enough to put their dog under lock and key, but then they revealed the second denizen of their menagerie, Boris the baby chimp. Boris, clad in a diaper, was chained to a mahogany dining table easily weighing several hundred pounds but he was dragging it behind him like a pull-toy on wheels. The racket from Ahab in the other room was enough to wake the dead; it was clear that he was murderously jealous of his simian sibling.

This was my introduction to the world that Hester Mundis eventually wrote about in No He’s Not a Monkey, He’s an Ape and He’s My Son. It answers the question that’s on everybody’s mind: “What’s it like to raise a chimpanzee in Manhattan?” Hester’s hilarious memoir is the complete guide to raising a chimp in the heart of urban America. Join Hester, her husband, attack dog Ahab, and the funniest monkey — excuse me, APE — ever to occupy an apartment in New York or anywhere else in this true adventure of woman versus beast.

I asked Hester to give us an update on Boris, and here’s what she had to say, along with an award-winning charcoal rendering of the noble mature creature:

Dear Reader,

If you’ve already read No, He’s Not a Monkey, He’s an Ape and He’s My Son, you know it has a happy ending. (Happy endings don’t qualify as “spoilers” in my books.) So, as an update, I’m thrilled to report more good news. Boris continues to thrive in his colony at the Chester Zoo (www.chesterzoo.org), and now has the distinction of being the oldest—and most popular—chimpanzee there.

Recently, British artist Rob Symington won a National Exhibition of Wildlife Award for this charcoal portrait of Boris.

The portrait is on sale for an impressive 560 pounds (that’s more than a thousand dollars), but then Boris always was—and still is—one very impressive chimpanzee.

- Hester Mundis

- Richard Curtis

That’s the question Ray Garton asked himself that triggered Trade Secrets.

With Trade Secrets E-Reads continues its rerelease of Ray Garton’s thrillers, and this one displays as few others Garton’s ability to depict depravity in all its graphic horror.

One rainy night, Gerry Brady discovers a beautiful woman with heartbreaking eyes hiding in his garage. The moment he sees her, he is struck by an involuntary thought he does not understand: I’ve found you. She is a woman in danger. He does not understand why he feels so powerfully drawn to her, but he feels compelled to help her, even though doing so puts his life and the lives of his friends in jeopardy.

Gerry’s relationship with Kendra draws him into a conspiracy too horrifying to believe…a conspiracy rooted in his own past. As he falls in love with a woman he doesn’t know, he learns more about himself than he ever suspected.

Trade Secrets is a riveting, emotional thriller that features the most memorable and terrifying villain Ray Garton has ever created. And if you’d like to hear more about the process behind the creation of this book, read Garton’s fascinating posting here.

Hungry for more Garton?  Go to his author page.

Fire and Blood by T.R. Fehrenbach

Aside from the astonishing but completely valid scientific basis for transporting a planet from one locus to another, Greg Bear’s Moving Mars is a completely gripping work of fiction. A young colony yearns to free itself from the influence of the parent world’s exploitative government. The parent world happens to be Earth. And the government is not happy. Not happy at all. Its planning to punish the wayward colonists with a barrage of missiles, and there’s absolutely nothing the populace of the Red Planet can do.

Or is there? There’s this nerdy kid Charles who has a scheme so risky and preposterous that in all likelihood it will blow up in his face like some schoolboy chem lab experiment. Except its not a chem lab. It’s a planet.

Well, how many schoolboys have let that discourage them?

But Casseia, the novel’s beautiful and determined heroine, believes in him. She’s the rebellious daughter of a conservative family, and she sees Charles’s cockeyed idea as fuel for the student protests she’s leading. It’s hard to imagine a less likely love object than Charles, but maybe Casseia could learn to get attached to someone who thinks he knows how to save their world. Maybe this tender love story explains why it wasn’t just the science fiction reviewers that loved Moving Mars (“…an accomplished, thoroughly mature novel that should be placed at the top of anyone’s ‘to be read’ stack” – Science Fiction Age), but the romance reviewers too (“…a grand adventure in hard science fiction” – Romantic Times).

Besides Moving Mars, E-Reads carries a great list 22 to date – of Greg Bear’s backlist titles

We said there was a second novel about moving a planet.  In Donald Moffitt’s The Jupiter Theft an alien race schemes to capture the largest satellite and haul it out of the solar system (Psst. Want to Buy a Hot Planet?). About this book we gasped “Moffitt’s concepts dwarf our vocabulary for huge. Colossal, gigantic, immense, mammoth, good words one and all. But they still don’t touch his vision. Astronomical – yes, now we’re getting somewhere. That word seems consonant with the idea of capturing a gaseous planet to use as fuel. Astronomical. That’s Donald Moffitt and that’s The Jupiter Theft.”

T.R. Fehrenbach defines Texas as “a state of mind.” In The Seven Keys to Texas he provides us with a seven-part framework for understanding this unique state, its people, frontiers, land, economy, society, politics, and the change that has taken place and continues as Texas grows and develops. A must read for those who want to better understand Texas or understand its vision for its future.

There’s been talk lately of Texas seceding from the union. Though it’s not likely to happen, after you read The Seven Keys to Texas you will appreciate why citizens of the Lone Star State might seriously contemplate setting up an independent nation.

T. R. Fehrenbach’s Lone Star, is considered by many to be the definitive  single volume history of Texas. E-Reads also carries his colorful one volume history of Mexico,  Fire and Blood.