Latest stories in - Indie Story Geek

Hell and High Water by Charlotte E. English

Excalibur Nights is just a book… Or is it? What is Ralph supposed to know about fantasy books meant for young adults anyways? He’s an electrician by trade, and he’s way too old to be reading about princesses, castles, and centaurs. Who has time for that kind of nonsense in their lives when you have a job, an ex-wife, and bills to worry about? But then Abby came along, and ruined Ralph’s blissful ignorance. She introduced him to the book and movie series that changed his life. Her obsession leaked into their budding relationship. To make matter a hell of a lot worse, Ralph found himself magically transported to the fantasy world of Mariella. You read that last sentence right. Now Ralph is trapped inside the world of Excalibur Nights with no idea why and no way to get home. Does he go along with the story and try to woo Princess Abbie, the literary counterpart to the girlfriend he left behind in the real world? And what does he do about the love triangle between himself, the princess, and the centaur named Poe? He doesn’t know enough about the genre to untangle the mess of crisscrossing mythos, magic, and royal drama. Excalibur Nights by Daniel Aegan is an unapologetic fantasy that spins the fantasy genre on its head. Come on… You know they had it coming!

Meet the baddest belles of London city. They were known as the fatales, once. Investigators and spies; killers and thieves; con artists and vigilantes — they fought fire with fire, did what had to be done, to make things right. Until the mission that broke them. Many decades later, the fatales have scattered to the winds. Fionn's the queen of London haute couture. Thetai's the star of the power metal scene. And Daix? Could be anything. Anywhere. It'll take a lot to bring them back together. When a model goes missing from a catwalk show, Fionn's frantic. The girl was a friend — and a fellow selkie. And she won't be the last to vanish. To catch the monster responsible, Fionn needs backup. It's time for the fatales to reunite, but can they get it together after eighty years apart? And will it be enough to face down an old enemy straight out of their murky, half-forgotten past? Three fabulous fae banter and brawl their way through a re-imagined, modern-day London — fighting crime, forging friendships and causing havoc. With style. Perfectly tailored for fans of urban fantasy and Charlie’s Angels!

The Lich of Thandorien by Zak Dragon

Old high school classmates and current drinking buddies, Phil and Don find themselves transported into a Crypts & Crusades role-playing adventure they had abandoned five years earlier. If that wasn't bad enough, it seems that some of the non-player characters, or Extra Dungeon Personalities (EDPs) as they now prefer to be called, have taken on a life of their own during the extended downtime and have veered away from the normal script. Fortunately for the daring duo, there is plenty of beer and they manage to get a little help along the way from an inquisitive but emotional ranger, a home-brewing, pub-owning dwarf and his ogre bartender, a grumpy old gardener and a host of other colorful characters. But will it be enough to defeat the crypt's antagonist, locate a powerful relic and get out alive?

Blazing Coffins by Jowsey Jones

Growth & Change Are Highly Overrated by Tom Starita

BLAZING COFFINS: A FANTASY FARCE Monster Twins Theda and Wolfie chase around a bizarro America trying to save their parents from a lunatic sorcerer with pharaonic delusions. They face an army of crackpot enemies: a vampire haberdasher and his toothy cohort, bumbling claymen, and a beautiful, insatiable nightmare from the ancient Steppes. Even Santa gets a cameo, and he isn’t very nice at all. Thankfully, they have some monsters of their own to help: an old-school Frankencouple and a Green Man with his snippety eco-warrior wife. Plus a trio of cheerful dead people, the world’s worst paranormal investigator, and a lovelorn bogman in dire need of moisturiser. Jowsey Jones is the newest comedy fantasy voice in town and he brings you a tumbling SFF farce with Blazing Coffins, the first in TheMonster Twins series. Welcome to a fearless frolic that sacrifices anything for a laugh. Get your giggles here with Blazing Coffins.

Growth and Change Are Highly Overrated is a twist on the classic coming-of-age story that takes a unique and comic look at what we all fear— having to grow up and abandon our dreams. For a charismatic man like Lucas James, life is a breeze because everyone else provides the wind. This adolescent front man for a mediocre cover band has been mooching off of his fiancée, Jackie, for years until she finally decides she's had enough. Faced with reality and having no income to support his carefree lifestyle, Lucas James abandons his principles and gets a job working in the stockroom at “That Store.” How does he cope with this newfound sense of responsibility? He casually steals... After a life spent bucking authority, how will Lucas James deal with his manager, 'Victor the Dictator'? How long can he tolerate Ralph, a starry-eyed coworker who desires nothing more than to be best friends? Will Lori, a twenty-something cashier, be like everyone else and fall for his charms? Will he ever find a place to live? And is “growing up” just another way of saying “selling out”?

The Universal Good Deal by Cleophas Foy

Alien white people from outer-space invade Earth armed with amazing deals and low, low prices. They're selling lava lamps, fanny packs, water beds, and more and everyone's buying it. Wouldn't you? It's from outer-space! Made by Aliens! And everything's on sale. It's a steal. But the Aliens only take cash. It's up to a marketing genius, a bosomy politician, and a genuinely nice guy to figure out what the Aliens want before we all become the product. Can humanity survive the most effective advertising campaign ever created or will the Aliens make a real killing? The Universal Good Deal is a satire about colonialism that explores all the horrible ways people fail to understand those who are different from them.

The Fantastically Underwhelming Epic by Kian N. Ardalan

SFFOasis SPFBO8

George is a legendary hero...wait, no. George is an incredibly powerful sorcerer...also no? Okay, fine. George is an unremarkable human bard who made a promise a long time ago. A promise that set him on a path to find the remains of Simantiar, the greatest wizard who ever lived. Though all that was left were bones, Simantiar was still very much alive and quite...underwhelming. This is their story: The Fantastically Underwhelming Epic of a dead wizard and an average bard.

Little Drummer Boy: A Darkly Humorous Paranormal Holiday Short (Hemlock Connal Book 2) by Joel Spriggs

Over a God's Dead Body: A Supernatural Comedy (Wrong Gods Book 1) by Joel Spriggs

A darkly humorous paranormal Christmas short! Boston’s strangest private investigator, Hemlock Connal, is back! Along with her longest surviving intern, Morgan Burns. When a demonic drummer boy walks down their road leading a small team of zombies, the detective duo take a much needed break from a boring financial case. As they follow the horned drummer from Boston to the middle of nowhere, they find the zombie squad has more secrets than just marching through the night. Hemlock and Morgan get led through a dark journey of black market organ theft, drug sorting undead, all leading up to meeting the big man himself. Confronted with the ultimate arbiter of the holiday season, will Hemlock and Morgan survive the test of naughty or nice? Find out, in Little Drummer Boy!

Untitled Spy Story: A Novel by Aaron C Cross

"It's an offbeat comedy in the vein of American Gods" In the same style of humor as Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett, you'll find the Norse gods and characters hilarious. If you are looking for a humorous adult version of the Magnus Chase series, you'll be laughing at how Esmy and Jake deal with Loki. Esmy is frustrated by a lack of pockets on women's pants. Living with her librarian brother Jake in a small Indiana town and working at a private college, Esmy feels like she is is stuck in a rut. Meeting Loki ignites their lives like a powder-keg. This simple, seemingly innocuous encounter leads Esmy and Jake to discover the campus's mysterious depths, involving sasquatches, vampires, and much more with the supernatural, magical and paranormal. In a crudely comedic high-stakes game of maneuvering, Loki's freedom and Esmy's survival come down to a fight over a God's dead body. Will Esmy become a reluctant hero? Is Jake a lucky novice necromancer? Will Loki actually become a half-decent mentor? If you like insane action, hilarious dialogue, and gods behaving badly, then you'll love the first installment in Joel Spriggs's series of magical realism and whimsical mythology.

Sometimes you're in the right place at the right time. Sometimes someone ends up getting shot and you're on the run with your brother, the girl you want to sleep with, the girl your brother wants to sleep with, and the guy that slept with your girlfriend. Sometimes that ends up with a whole lot of mescal being consumed and hallucinating dance sequences. Sometimes that ends up with the Secretary of State wanting you dead. For Will Texas, sometime is now.

Robocopter Ski Patrol by Aaron C Cross

Alice's Adventures under Water by Lenny de Rooy

The year is...some year. Let's say the present. Yellow cake uranium sits, waiting to be sold, in a foreign country. The leader hides himself away, fearing assassination - as he should, because that's how the country works. It's kind of a stupid country.And well he should worry, for skulking his way around Europe is an ambitious Baron just looking for the right opportunity to seize the throne and all the powers and chances that come with it. If only his pets would stop exploding...Across the ocean, Adam Bitchenstein attempts to win over Miss Girl from Ipanema for the nth time. However, a phone call from out of the blue will change everything in their lives forever. It's always a phone call, right?Join Adam, Miss Girl from Ipanema, and a cast of idiots and perverts as they seek to stop the balance of world power from changing before it's too late.Also, there's a Robocopter. Not sure if you picked that up but...it's kind of important.

If you enjoyed Lewis Carroll’s books “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” and “Through the Looking-Glass and what Alice found there”, this is the book for you! Finally, there is a third story in the ‘Alice’ series – written in Carroll’s familiar style, but packed with a great number of completely new puns, poems, and satire! This time, Alice explores an under-water world, in which she meets new characters who again make her wonder about their strange logic and behaviour. The story can be enjoyed by everyone, even those who have never read Carroll’s tales. However, the more familiar you are with them, the more references you will recognise in this exceptionally clever story…

Bit Flip by Mike Trigg

Fortysomething tech executive Sam Hughes came to Silicon Valley to "make the world a better place." He's just not sure he's doing that anymore--and when an onstage meltdown sends him into a professional tailspin, he suddenly sees the culture of the Bay Area's tech bubble in a new, far more cynical light. Just as he's wondering if his start-up career and marriage might both be over, an inadvertent discovery pulls Sam back into his former company, where he begins to unravel the insidious schemes of the founder and venture investors that led to his ouster. Driven by his desire for redemption, he discovers a conspiracy of fraud, blackmail, and manipulation that leads to tragic outcomes--threatening to destroy not only the company but Sam's moral compass as well. Entangled in a web of complicity, how far will he go to achieve his dreams of entrepreneurial success and personal wealth? Bit Flip is a corporate thriller that delivers an authentic insider's view of the corrupting influences of greed, entitlement, and vanity in technology start-ups.

I Am Not Brad Pitt and Other Stories by Ross Dreiblatt

I AM NOT BRAD PITT is the first of three riotously absurd tales in Ross Dreiblatt’s debut short-story collection sending up America’s sometimes-fatal celebrity obsessions. “I Am Not Brad Pitt” opens in a prison cell in which Mr. Pitt’s clone-like doppelganger, Tobey Crawford, remorsefully recounts the sequence of unlikely events that resulted in his wrongful conviction for murder. The second story, “Please Allow Me To Introduce Myself,” considers the possibility that Keith Richards (along with, for good measure, Dolly Parton) is, indeed, a vampire. Nobel-Prize laureate Bob Dylan, the story’s vampire-killer, is equipped with more than just a harmonica and tambourine. The final work in the collection, “Keeping Compliant With The Kardashians,” examines whether Kardashian family members are, in fact, aliens from another galaxy and what precisely is their interest on Earth. Each of the stories are told with engaging humor, and each pokes fun more at American culture than they do, generally, of the celebrities themselves.

The Ticket by Heather Grace Stewart

Now an optioned book! Fasten your seat belts for a journey filled with humor and adventure. Bachelor & newscaster Pete McCarney buys two plane tickets for a trip around the world with his girlfriend, but they split up shortly before the trip, and he can't get a refund. In a gutsy last minute move, Pete goes on social media asking for women with his girlfriend's exact name to apply to join him on the trip. Twenty-one women apply, and the ensuing interview process is both awkward and hilarious. When he finally chooses a feisty, headstrong, recently-divorced lawyer, he has no idea what to expect from their world wide adventures - and neither does Allie James. She has pretty much sworn off men since her divorce. Will either of them get the vacation they were so desperately hoping for?

If I Lie in a Combat Zone by Will Tinkham

Ordered to inspect a suspected Viet Cong tunnel in November of 1968, Private Walt Whitman von Funck crawls inside and falls in love. And rips a hole in his foot. IF I LIE IN A COMBAT ZONE finds Zow spending eight months nursing him back to health, while her brother and grandfather conduct midnight raids and accumulate prisoners, including a general. During his convalescence, Walt and Zow wed; theirs is a love story that defies race, religion and military red tape. Upon his return to Chu Lai Air Base with his pregnant wife and six prisoners, Stars and Stripes declares Walt a hero. Awards follow. And plans for a Medal of Honor ceremony with President Nixon. Till a U.S. Army doctor declares the foot wound to be self-inflicted. Hailed, then jailed—repeatedly—Walt becomes a favorite of the anti-war crowd and a thorn in Nixon's side. Walt accepts offers to speak on college campuses. Protests involving gunfire and bombings become routine. It's almost as if they are targeting him.

The FATOFF Conspiracy by Olga Werby

Transdimensional Industries gave the world a technical solution to the obesity epidemic—eat more than you want, and store all that you want in their fat storage tanks conveniently located outside of our set of dimensions. Complete gluttony without sacrificing beauty or health...for a price. You can be rich and buy a thin body. You can be poor and lucky enough to get government assistance with your personal fat storage—Federal Assistance with Transdimensional Offloading of Fat and Flab. Or you can win the tits lottery—a lifetime of free blubber storage in the Transdimensional Industries' tanks where all the humanity’s fat is stored. Thin people live well, have high paying jobs, and wield all of the social and political power and prestige while consuming unlimited quantities of food as mandated by the government. Fat people? They don't do so well. Cindy Rella is a low-level bureaucrat at the Civil Office of Fat Excision. And while her job is to tell people "no" when they apply for government assistance, Cindy has been secretly saving for a set of gray-market papers that would guarantee her a zero dress size and a healthy lifespan of over 30 years. Because being fat is not only a life-time of being a second-class citizen in a society that worships physical beauty, it is also a death sentence. Cindy's plan doesn't work spectacularly and her life spins out of control into a dangerous world of revolutionary fat freedom fighters. Sucking off fat into another dimension is not the only way to get thin. Cindy Rella is a coming of age story in the world that is a cross between dystopian Brazil and Fast Food Nation with a sprinkling of sci fi.

The Cary Grant Sanatorium and Playhouse by Will Tinkham

THE CARY GRANT SANATORIUM AND PLAYHOUSE is a screwball drama involving disgraced Hollywood starlet, Donna Darling, and two-time German Army deserter, Séamus von Funck. They meet in 1942 at an idyllic Ohio home for unwed mothers—or a Nazi abortion slaughterhouse, depending on whom you talk to. Their love endures despite the efforts of a power-hungry congressman, an overzealous religious tabloid, and Donna's Hollywood past—yes, including Cary Grant. They prevail despite Séamus being a suspected Nazi spy and America's first prisoner of the second World War—and also the first to escape. Donna returns to her chosen profession, nursing, and Séamus completes his medical training under an alias while still on the lam. Despite their early struggles, the couple raises three fine children: Frederick Douglass von Funck, Clara Barton von Funck and Walt Whitman von Funck. The family thrives until their bi-racial, eldest child runs smack into the civil rights turmoil of the 1960s.

The Little Punk Princess: A Fairy Tale by Sarah Karasek

A dystopian punk rock fairy tale. Princess is the heiress to the Presidency of America, but she has a dark secret - a deep love of metal, punk, and ska - all illegal contraband under the new ultra-conservative government. When her secret stash of music is discovered, she is faced with the harsh decision of fleeing her country or giving up her only pleasure forever. Bizarro fiction featuring a personal trainer magi, disco bandits, and Mad Max inspired green energy vehicles.

Jank by Fabrina Glitchlace

We all seek The Way. To maximize Expected Value. To burn as brightly and for as long as odds allow. To Go Infinite. Join M'Ycell MacGyver for Episode 389 of The Ωmega Phi Podcast. You have been summoned.

Shitlord In the Anus of Madness by Fabrina Glitchlace

Like all great artists do, Shia tried to become his art. He tried to be a force for good in the world. He tried to change minds. He tried his best to elevate consciousness; to help people realize their potential for self actualization. He tried to enable them to become like him: Master of their own destiny. To not let their dreams be dreams. But instead, he ended up exhausting his social capital, leaving sloppy personal messes in his wake which could not be cleaned. He became unemployable. Toxic. He was pushed out by those who had once accepted him. He was dumped. Now he hungers for the success that he once tasted.

The Only Wizard in Town by Heide Goody and Iain Grant

A city under siege by a barbarian horde… A band of ruthless mercenaries… A trap-filled dungeon… A situation like this calls for the best wizard in town. What they’ve got is the ONLY wizard in town: Newport Pagnell, oral hygiene specialist. More used to soothing fevered gums and extracting rotten teeth, this dental spellcaster has to perform an operation like never before: extracting a fabled treasure from the jaws of certain doom. This time, he might have bitten off more than he can chew…

Fool's Proof by Eva Sandor

A jobless jester and a misguided magpie venture into a land where technology is booming— but trouble is brewing. Dame Elsebet de Whellen has ruled her mildly magical, high-tech country for 50 prosperous years. Now it's facing a crisis three generations in the making, and the bold steps she's taken to save it have gone disastrously off the rails. She needs a hero who can calm her mind, cast a spell, and find a missing sorcerer. Instead she gets Malfred Murd, former Royal Fool, booted from his job and now scrounging a living around the corners of the Kingdom. What starts as Fred's quick attempt to con Dame Elsebet escalates until he—and his self-appointed magpie advisor Corvinalias— are hopelessly entangled in a desperate mission that might cost a Fool his life and a people their future.

This Quest is Bullshit! by JP Valentine

A Cat's Guide to Bonding with Dragons by Chris Behrsin

The Questing Stones have come to Nowherested, and Evelia Greene is finally ready to receive her life's quest. Perhaps she'll be a great warrior, or a wealthy merchant, or a brilliant mage. Perhaps her quest is simply to live a quiet life, constantly honing a craft to the heights of perfection. Or perhaps the Questing Stones will grant her the Legendary mission of popping over to the next village to pick up a loaf of bread. Wouldn’t that be ridiculous? Eve can’t even begin to guess how or why she’s come by such an absurd life goal, nor how a level 1 Messenger Girl is supposed to complete anything labeled as Legendary, but at least she can be sure of one thing. No matter how many wolves or goblins attack, no matter how many speeding tickets she racks up, no matter how many bakeries spontaneously combust as she steps into town, one way or another, Eve is going to get that gods-damned bread. There just might be a few Side Quests along the way. |This book contains game elements, good jokes, bad jokes, worse jokes, and language strong enough to lift weights. Please enjoy.|

The Conjuring of Zoth Averex by K.R.R. Lockhaven

The unlikely duo who might just save the world Ben must be the hungriest cat ever… One moment, he was enjoying a breakfast of salmon trimmings in his home in South Wales. The next, he was teleported across time and space onto the cold stone floor of an evil warlock. Locked in the warlock’s tower through day and night, Ben may have to serve him for a while. He'll hate this, especially having to hunt those infernal demon rats when the warlock doesn’t feed him well at all. Meanwhile, in a distant academy, a dragon is bored out of her mind. Unable to wear a saddle, no human dares mount her. Is there anyone in this land who can ride her into battle against the forces of the evil warlocks? Somehow, she doubts she’ll ever find a suitable bond. Unless there is another creature with enough dexterity to fulfil that role. One, perhaps, who is currently sprinting right out of a warlock’s front door…

Kept hidden by the United States government for decades, the Site is a place where magic is real. But that doesn't mean that everything happening there is sparkly. Soul-sucking policies and layers of stifling bureaucracy threaten to take all the fun out of magic. Harris, a newbie Conjurer, starts his first day of work at the Site bursting with excitement: he's been brought on for an extremely big project happening the very next day. In a triumph over its habitual inefficiency, the Site manages to carry out its plan and conjure an actual dragon to be used by the military. The dragon (Zoth-Avarex, the self-proclaimed greatest dragon in the multiverse) immediately eats the person next to him, snatches a "princess" from the ranks of the Conjuring Department, and flies away to the Space Needle. There he manipulates the media, outwits the Site's bumbling management, demands sixty-three billion dollars' worth of treasure (because Smaug was said to have had sixty-two billion in his hoard), threatens to destroy the city--and installs a couple of food trucks. While this book skewers the same fantasy genre it gleefully inhabits, it also pokes fun at corporate culture, today's obsession with wealth and celebrity, and our denial that life is anything more than meets the eye. Hapless Harris, believing in magic all along, learns to apply what he's picked up between the pages of fantasy literature.

War God Rising by Tim Marquitz

The Tribulations of August Barton by Jennifer LeBlanc

Monty Python meets Gladiator! Sand is destined for greatness. Or so a pair of two-bit criminals would have him believe. After rescuing him from certain doom, Bess and Kaede embark on a scheme to game the War God Tournament. It’d be easier if Sand wasn’t an alcohol-soaked twit with a disturbing interest in mutton. Pitted against monsters, magic swords, and murderers galore, they soon realize winning the tourney is the least of their worries.

Who Built The Humans? by Phillip Carter

SPSFC 2023

Who Built The Humans? is a fragmented novel, a multiverse of 47 stories that combine into 11 interconnected universes. These universes range from soaring science fiction to searing satire, and pose increasingly strange answers to that ancient question, Who Built The Humans? Concepts and theories explored thoughtfully in one story will be relentlessly parodied in the next, and characters and objects will hop between universes to knit the multiverse together in unexpected ways. In this way WBTH is both a short story collection and a novel, and can be read in almost any order. No two stories from the same reality touch across the pages, meaning WBTH can be read front to back as a novel, or universe by universe if you become sucked into one particular reality. If this happens, helpful signs will lead you across time and space into the next story in that universe. This concept is pushed to its limits with the On-Series universe, a darkly satirical universe of poetic short stories that requires reader participation to decide the ridiculous fate of humanity. Will we be destroyed by shame machines, or remembered in the nightmares of some future cyborg? Within the book you will discover shapeshifting televangelists, talking crystals who hate anyone called Susan, the physical manifestation of your inner self, time travel (again), artificial afterlives, intelligent planets, bottleneck spacetimes, collapsing universes, poets that turn into black holes, black holes that turn into poets, shame machines that use those black holes for fuel, time travel, reincarnation cults, parallel universes, deceptive aliens, new Earths, old Earths, sarcastic living metaphors, robots who struggle to learn jokes, intersecting realities and the occasional probing. It's a ridiculous multiverse. You should visit it. (and visit Goodreads for the reviews)

Each Little Universe by Chris Durston

If Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett had written an earnestly nerdy story in a setting running on the ridiculous logic of Scott Pilgrim, it might have come out something like this. For two oddball inventors, taking care of an unexpected new arrival - a girl from the stars - is hard enough. Dealing with the things that want her back may turn out to be harder. A story about love in all its forms (but not a love story), Each Little Universe wonders with wit and insight about what it means to be human in a vast, peculiar cosmos. A celebration of all that is wonderful and strange about people, each member of its cast of twenty-first century weirdos is both larger than life and peculiarly familiar. Fans of Neil Gaiman (Neverwhere, American Gods), Bryan Lee O'Malley (Scott Pilgrim, Seconds), and Haruki Murakami (The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Killing Commendatore) will love this story, set in a world very much like our own but a little more strange, and the unusual take it offers on life, the human experience, and cats.

To Be Honest by R. Tim Morris

Chester K. Eddy isn't completely honest. But he's trying to be. When the struggling New York stage actor decides being totally open and honest is exactly the change he needs in his life, Chester doesn't expect being so obnoxiously transparent will only make things worse. After his brother kicks him out, his favorite bar cuts him off, and his best pal Melissa tells him she needs a break from their friends-with-benefits relationship, Chester quickly has few people left who still want to listen to him and his self-professed Honesty Movement. Along his way to newfound self-discovery, Chester will finagle his way into the tenuous role of Director's Assistant for a small-time theatre's production of an unknown play; he'll accidentally attend Sex Addicts Anonymous meetings; he'll find himself in the company of suspected serial killers; he'll drink a bit too much. And he might even have an eye-opening encounter with a talking dinosaur. But there's one truth Chester realizes he hasn't been capable of admitting: he's in love with Melissa. And he can't be completely honest until he's ready to tell her as much.

August Barton could never have mentally prepared himself for his freshman year of college: not only has his anxiety increased, but his parents are divorcing, his new roommate thinks Augie is the biggest nerd in existence, and his grandma, a retired prostitute named Gertie, has taken to running away from her nursing home. Augie just wants to hole up in his dorm room with his Star Wars collectables and textbooks, but Gertie is not about to let that happen. What ensues is a crazy ride including naked trespassing, befriending a local biker gang, and maybe-just maybe-with Augie defeating his anxiety and actually getting the girl.

Bury The Lead by Cassondra Windwalker

Weekly newspaper editor Jeff Paine's mind is filled with the detritus of newspaper clippings, presidential tweets, crossword puzzles, and horoscopes. When his artist girlfriend Ada Grigori announces her intention to leave him, he becomes obsessed with finding—or manufacturing—connections between otherwise unrelated events. Driven by professional curiosity and unrelenting cynicism, Paine uses his newspaper to manipulate the people of his hometown of Brisby, Colorado into revealing the ugliness lurking beneath their placid exteriors. A series of gruesome dog mutilations already have the town on edge when Paine’s carefully worded and technically factual stories stir up vigilante justice against a harmless old homeless man. Spurred on by the unexpected ease of his success, Paine sets his sights on exploiting the town’s hidden prejudices for financial gain and his own amusement. Meanwhile, no-one but Paine notices that a young transient man has gone missing. Exasperated with the plasticity of public sentiment and consumed by his own search for truth, Paine creates a trail of evidence that will ultimately both convict him of murder and set him free on appeal. The public will never know the truth of what became of Ada or of the young transient Brett, but the reader will have all the answers…if she can decipher them. Bury The Lead draws readers into the mind of a brilliant but highly unreliable narrator, forcing them to question their own perceptions of objective truth and the existence of a free press in a world where an unsubstantiated tweet can carry more power than an investigative report.

May Your God Go With You by David Reynolds

“And may your god go with you,” the audience replied in unison to the Rev. Jeremiah Brown's blessing. With that last comment, Russell Richman had his view of reality twisted, tilted, twirled and transformed into a tiny flaming ball before being drop-kicked screaming into a toilet and flushed. In that tiny interval between fully opening and closing his eyes, Russ saw small beings stand up next to their humans. Trying to figure what he was seeing, Russ suddenly did a face plant onto hard rust-red rock after being kicked in the shin by a bearded man wearing the smallest pair of hiking boots he had ever seen. Find May Your God Go With You on Amazon.com

Oy Fey by David Reynolds

A change of jobs and locations required Trevor Wilson and his Chihuahua Tinkerbell to take a hike, one that became a lot longer and stranger than Trevor could imagine. Walking the Pacific Crest Trail, their adventures began with seeing a small bird drink whiskey from a cup. If that wasn't strange enough, Trevor and Tinkerbell's lives go bonkers when he's asked to rescue a cat stuck in a tall pine tree further down the trail. Attacked by thieves wanting to steal her car, Trevor fights them off. Changing out of his human form, Trevor barely has time to protect Bella from an onrushing car before the vehicle hits his now rock-hard form. “Who are you? What are you? Get away from me you monster,” Bella screamed, running back to where she had left Hunter in his carrier. Trevor responded, hurt far worse by her words than the bullet through his middle, though he doubted Bella heard him. Woodenly, he said, “I am gnome.” Find Oy Fey on Amazon.com

Mockingston Faire by Samuel Yaw Jian Fong

Three friends — Victoria Hughes, Jack Zhang, and Ludvig Gerald — attend Mockingston Faire, an annual convention where fans meet their friends and favourite characters, buy and sell art, play games, and have a good time. Victoria wants to see Gunfighter III, her anticipated game, and reconcile with Ludvig over what she did last year; Jack wants to get as many pictures of his dearest characters and personalities; and Ludvig just wants to keep away from annoying fans and events who constantly forced him to become an amateur actor. But the Faire itself has its own challenges. Everywhere they go, they seem to be unable to evade the malcontents of pop culture. From violent brawls between bitter fandoms, to nuisances who hound their every step, the whole Faire seems to descend into chaos. Can these three make it through this dysfunctional festival with their friends in one piece? Or will they succumb to the surrounding rage, losing their sanity and reputation in the process?

Orconomics (The Dark Profit Saga #1) by J. Zachary Pike

SPFBO Finalist SPFBO Winner

Brimming with swords, sorcery, and wit, Orconomics: A Satire introduces Arth, a world much like our own but with more magic and fewer vowels. For the licensed wizards and warriors of Arth, slaying and looting the forces of evil is just a job. The Heroes' Guild has turned adventuring into a career, selling the rights to monsters’ hoards of treasure as investment opportunities. Corporations spend immense sums sponsoring heroes to undertake quests, betting they’ll reap the profits in plunder funds when the loot is divvied up. Questing was all business for famous Dwarven berserker Gorm Ingerson, until a botched expedition wiped out his party, disgraced his name, and reduced him to a thieving vagabond. Twenty years later, a chance encounter sees Gorm forcibly recruited by a priest of a mad goddess to undertake a quest that has a reputation for getting heroes killed. But there’s more to Gorm’s new job than an insane prophecy; powerful corporations and governments have shown an unusual interest in the job. Gorm might be able to turn a bad deal into a golden opportunity and win back the fame and fortune he lost so long ago. Promising fun, fantasy, and financial calamity, Orconomics: A Satire is the first book in The Dark Profit Saga, an economically epic trilogy. Winner of the 4th Self Published Fantasy Blog Off -- (SPFBO 2018)

The Origin of Birds in the Footprints of Writing by Raymond St. Elmo

Clarence St. Claire is a programmer who cherishes an orderly life. His motto: ‘work is important; people, not so much’. His determination to be The Most Serious Person on the Planet is threatened when he becomes haunted by a mysterious manuscript from his past: 300 pages of possibly random bird tracks. Risking his career and self-possession, St. Claire dares to pursue the manuscript against the opposition of hackers, the NSA, the ghosts of famous writers and doubts of his own sanity. Lost in a maze of bird-prints and their possible meanings, St. Claire determines to summon the late writer Jorge Louis Borges to help with the translation. He will dream Borges into existence, exactly as Borges wrote of doing. But this act stirs the opposition of a secret order of past writers, who may, possibly, have their own agenda. The duel between St. Claire’s reality and theirs leads to a final encounter in The Dark Library, before the dread conclave known as The Tribunal of Dreams. ‘Origins’ is a book about books, about magic realism and artificial intelligence, virtual reality and languages, and how sensible people wind up in strange situations by strangely sensible steps. It is built of the words books whisper to each other alone after the library has closed. It ends as it must: with the hero tossed into a pit by Edgar Alan Poe. Kidding. I mean, that last does happen but the final ending is the hero finding the answer and getting the girl, as well as his sanity back. Mostly back.

Mid-Lich Crisis by Steve Thomas

The Hammer Of The Gods: So You Want To Be A Star (The Druid Trilogy #1) by Andrew Marc Rowe

Is trying to sacrifice your estranged wife to a bloodthirsty demon an irredeemable act of evil? This is the sort of question the Dread Wizard Darruk Darkbringer struggles with. After being called evil one too many times, Darruk sets off to find a new purpose in his life and become a beloved celebrity. Can a dark wizard come to terms with himself and prove to the world that a few atrocities don’t define who he is? You’ll feel guilty for laughing at his twisted tale of self-discovery.

Few Are Chosen (K'Barthan #1) by M.T. McGuire

It’s Hammer Time! Pitted against a perverse pantheon of warring deities, Gudleik Sigbjornsson and Rosmerta O’Ceallaigh are two dreamers living worlds apart, hoping to create a better life for themselves by following their dreams. It won’t be easy: Gudleik’s soul is the battleground between two gods of Asgard. And Rosmerta is supposed to do as her parents have done: offer her life to the service of an ancient Celtic fertility god. But the gods are only half of it… the biggest foes the two will face are to be found within their own minds. Can Gudleik overcome the ugly blessing of a trickster god and prevent Ragnarok? Will Rosmerta find the courage to forge a new path? Will there be a whole load of dirty jokes and comments on the human condition? Yes, yes, there will be… to that one, the third question. Also, check dis out: there is a bunch about Merlyn and King Arthur of Camelot, a Goblin King, an ancient fell jellyfish god, encroaching Christian zealots, characters whose proclivities are too crude to mention here, because, well, gotta make the advertising copy pop, you know? An epic fantasy comedy as blue as the cover art, get your copy of The Hammer Of The Gods today!

Charming outlaw with own transport and limited social skills seeks lucrative, employment at minimal risk. When you're running from a murderous government and work for an equally murderous gangster, accidentally torching his apartment is a bad move. The Pan of Hamgee just wants a quiet life but destiny has other plans.

Duckett & Dyer: Dicks For Hire by G.M. Nair

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Michael Duckett is fed up with his life. His job is a drag, and his roommate and best friend of fifteen years, Stephanie Dyer, is only making him more anxious with her lazy irresponsibility. Things continue to escalate when they face the threat of imminent eviction from their palatial 5th floor walk-up and find that someone has been plastering ads all over the city for their Detective Agency. The only problem is: He and Stephanie don’t have one of those. Despite their baffling levels of incompetence, Stephanie eagerly pursues this crazy scheme and drags Michael, kicking and screaming, into the fray only to find that they are way out of their depth. They stumble upon a web of missing people that are curiously linked to a sexually audacious theoretical physicist and his experiments with the fabric of space-time. And unless Michael and Stephanie can put their personal issues aside and fix the multi-verse, the concept of existence itself may, ironically, no longer exist.

The One-Hundred Percent Solution by G.M. Nair

The Bear Cavalry: The True (Not!) History of the Icelandic Bears by D.G. Valdron

The Future Group is the city’s biggest and most lucrative company even though no one really knows what it is they do. Michael Duckett has worked there for four years and he still has no clue. All he knows is that he hates his meaningless job and all the people in it. But it pays the bills. Bills that have been stacking up since his roommate and best friend Stephanie Dyer decided to open a detective agency – despite her chronic inability to commit to anything. When Michael is suddenly fired, he and Stephanie are forced to return to the world of private investigation against his better judgment. A mysterious woman wants to enlist the services of Duckett & Dyer: Dicks For Hire to track down an assassin who has a bone to pick with Michael’s former employer. Apparently, The Future Group has been harboring a deadly secret for decades. One that could put the world in the grip of an indescribable horror. It turns out Michael was lucky to get out of that job alive. Too bad he and Stephanie are being dragged back to work.

Flames Over Frosthelm (Inquisitors' Guild Book 1) by Dave Dobson

A quirky, inventive alternate history written in the style of a fun, funky, pop culture television documentary, The Bear Cavalry, features host, Robin Prufrock, as he travels the world, telling the story of how the Vikings in Iceland domesticated bears for meat and as draft animals, and how the Scandinavian Bear Cavalry eventually evolved to become the most fearsome fighting unit in the Medieval world, along the way are entertaining detours into biology, evolutionary history, the Viking era, Medieval monarchs behaving badly, and the role of Bears in movies, art and culture in this world. BONUS STORY: The Sharebear Apocalypse, they're cute, they're cuddly, all they want to do is hug you, and they may be the end of civilisation.

Another Dead Intern by Joel Spriggs

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A typical internship: coffee & copies. Morgan Burns's new internship with PI Hemlock Connal: fairies, magic, drugs, & dying. Hemlock Connal can't keep interns alive. Morgan Burns is trying to break that trend, but finds survival to be an uphill battle. Faced with mobsters, drug rings, covens, and even fantastical beasts, will Morgan find a paycheck... or a grave? Another Dead Intern is the first book in a humorous supernatural mystery series! If you like edge-of-your-seat action, witty dialogue, and paranormal investigations, then you'll love the first installment in Joel Spriggs's hilarious magical thrill ride.

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An Investigation Gone Awry Sometimes, your case takes a left turn. Or three or four. Marten Mingenstern and Boog Eggstrom are provisional inspectors, fresh out of Inquisitor’s Guild training and eager to prove themselves. Assigned the mundane task of tracking down stolen jewels, they instead uncover a mysterious cult set on destroying the city. After a thief explodes, they earn the enmity of a vicious noble, the Chief Inquisitor gets bought off and goes rogue, they are seized by barbarians, and they are sentenced to death at least a couple of times. In a final, frantic race with prophecy, they face ruthless fanatics, a city turned against them, and terrible forces long buried. Flames Over Frosthelm is the first novel about the Inquisitor's Guild, the investigative arm of the government of Frosthelm, a medieval city-state where criminals thrive, nobles scheme, and dark secrets lurk. Expect intrigue, mystery, swordplay, adventure, politics, romance, and the strong bonds of friendship. And a little magic along the way. Described as Princess Bride meets CSI, this new novel is a tale of classic adventure with a healthy dose of humor. If the description above was too much, you might prefer this TLDR Summary Haiku Young inspectors flail Against a rising darkness. Fighting, jokes, and more.

Harpyness is Only Skin Deep by D. H. Willison