Tag Archives: space opera

Become the Thing they Fear

Posted by Ross Harrison on

Cover Reveal and Pre-Order!

She’s coming back. Forge of the Assassin will release on July 15, and is available for pre-order now (currently only Amazon and Google, but the rest will come soon)!

arianneelliott.artstation.com

Codename Ares. A legend. A ghost story. They say that seven years ago, she rained down hell from the stars, cutting through everyone in her path: cops, intelligence officers, assassins. All for a baby girl. They say that if she really was just one person, she died under a thousand tonnes of rubble.

They’re wrong.

Alexiares has kept Baby safe for seven years, staying one step ahead of assassins and hunters. But one step isn’t enough. Not when their new enemy reveals himself. Her worst nightmare becomes reality: Baby is ripped from her. Taken to be made into the perfect assassin – something Alexiares promised she wouldn’t allow.

The clock’s ticking and her failure is almost complete. She must work out why she’s still alive while staying ahead of the assassins, a government task force, and the malevolent whispers of her own broken mind. She must find a way to rescue Baby. And she must remind them all of one thing…

She is the only thing they fear.

It probably goes without saying that this is a sequel to Church of the Assassin, so if you haven’t read that yet, now would be a good time to catch up! I have something weird and new coming soon to go with the pre-orders, and in the meantime, because it seems to have become a thing I do now, here’s a soundtrack thing:

Google’s Auto-Narrated Audiobooks

Posted by Ross Harrison on

Finally, after years and years of not trying, I have got my books onto Google Books.

After doing so, I had an interesting offer: be a part of their beta for auto-narrated audiobooks. Auto-narration means that a modern day Microsoft Sam reads to you, entirely failing to understand nuance and emotion, but randomly being pitch perfect when you least expect it. Usually when he has to swear.

Given the number of people who have recently asked me if I have audiobooks available because they can’t read for various reasons, such as dyslexia (it’s three – three people asked), and the currently-prohibitive expense of flesh and blood narrators, I thought I might as well give it a go with book one, Shadow of the Wraith. The result isn’t terrible, bar for the inability of the platform to let me control the length of pauses or use any kind of emphasis. I quite enjoyed listening to it, even if the content itself did make me acutely aware that I wrote most of it when I was twelve and thirteen.

The partially robotic delivery certainly won’t be for some people, and I obviously intend to eventually make real audiobooks – probably after Hollywood gives me an advance for the Avengers-style film series it wants me to write and direct – but hopefully this will allow some people who are interested in the book, but can’t read it, to enjoy it.

Listen to a sample here.

Meanwhile, Shadow of the Wraith is currently free as a clever/crafty way to try to get more sales for the better other books. Find your version of choice here.

Spark

Posted by Ross Harrison on

I tried another one. Technically this is the third one, but I gave up the second as a lost cause learning opportunity.

Instead, I tried a photomanipulation more on topic, about reading and imagination. And I shoved my characters in it. This was also a simpler one, with only four images, other than my character/ship concept art (mostly from Arianne), and a couple of custom brushes.

Here, again because I don’t know what else to do with, is a photomanipulation I’ve cleverly named ‘Reading’, and even more cleverly thought of as ‘learning’ so I don’t have to address all the issues with it:

Perhaps next time, I’ll…write a book.

Fear of the Dark

Posted by Ross Harrison on

Fear of the Dark is out now for Kindle and in paperback and hardback! This space opera is standalone, and you do not need to have read the previous books in the series (although it helps).

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B4GPSF18

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0B4GPSF18

Do you fear the long dark?

– A dark planet on the galaxy’s edge. A primordial predator. A desperate hunt for a dangerous secret.

When the medical frigate Ruby Rose picks up an SOS from the planet’s lightning-ravaged surface, the medics do not hesitate to drop into the raging storm. But the innocuous little planet is home to something sinister. Something desperate. Something that will stop at nothing to find what it’s looking for.

Across the galaxy, the crew of the Star Wraith receives a call for help. The captain of a medical frigate has lost his medics, and one of their names is all too familiar. But how could the Wraith’s crew know that a simple rescue mission will lead to a string of murders and a waking nightmare that will leave them forever changed? –

Read about the main characters, Archer and Juni here:

Fear: Cover Reveal and Pre-Order

Posted by Ross Harrison on

Fear of the Dark will release in just 20 days, on 9 July, and is now available for pre-order!

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B4GPSF18

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0B4GPSF18

Here, at last, is the cover:

Do you fear the long dark?

– A dark planet on the galaxy’s edge. A primordial predator. A desperate hunt for a dangerous secret.

When the medical frigate Ruby Rose picks up an SOS from the planet’s lightning-ravaged surface, the medics do not hesitate to drop into the raging storm. But the innocuous little planet is home to something sinister. Something desperate. Something that will stop at nothing to find what it’s looking for.

Across the galaxy, the crew of the Star Wraith receives a call for help. The captain of a medical frigate has lost his medics, and one of their names is all too familiar. But how could the Wraith’s crew know that a simple rescue mission will lead to a string of murders and a waking nightmare that will leave them forever changed? –

Fear of the Dark is the sixth book in the NEXUS series but, like most of them, it is standalone. If you happen to know book one and two, though, that will help, because this is finally the return of Archer and Juni!

Character Spotlight: The Assassin

Posted by Ross Harrison on

Juni Lien was supposed to be a woman, not a killing machine. But perhaps for the daughter of three assassins, there was never anything else in the cards.

Juni is second-in-command of the Star Wraith, but sitting in one place is not something she’s used to, and the sense of confinement is growing when we meet her again nearly a year on from books 1 and 2. Working in a team, coming to terms with the fact that she’s in possession of feelings, having to confront herself as a person rather than drifting through life as a weapon…it may be too much. Perhaps she made a mistake in not pulling the trigger when she had Archer in her sights.

For the rest of the team, Juni is an unknown entity – a predator carefully placed among her prey, yet choosing instead to fight alongside them. She could be a valuable and fearsome ally…if she can be trusted.

The assassin will slip out of the shadows soon, in Fear of the Dark…

Arianne has done all of the art for my books since book 3, and you can find more of her work here: arianneelliott.artstation.com

Character Spotlight: The Freelancer

Posted by Ross Harrison on

One of the two main characters of the NEXUS series, I technically haven’t written a book about him for 10 years! Travis Archer is a freelance bounty hunter with just a little obsession with the idea of being a space cowboy.

Archer is half human and half Necurian, an ancient race with psionic abilities. Although Archer can use these abilities, his lacking knowledge of how to do so safely may have caused some problems, just beginning to manifest when we meet him again, a year after the events of books 1 and 2.

He is the de facto captain of the Star Wraith, having uncovered the ship’s ugly truth almost a year earlier. Plagued by nightmares about the things he has been a part of since then, he knows that it isn’t a position he deserves.

The freelancer will drift into town soon, in Fear of the Dark…

Arianne has done all of the art for my books since book 3, and you can find more of her work here: arianneelliott.artstation.com

Obligatory Update

Posted by Ross Harrison on

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a useless blog-writer must still update their blog at least once every year. As it is approaching the one-year anniversary of Church of the Assassin releasing (already), and I’ve written nothing here since…here is that update.

Ahem. Let’s see… What’s in the news… Well, never mind.

Although this was never supposed to be any kind of review blog, I have babbled about films and even games here and there, and yet I haven’t even returned to talk about the dreaded/fawned-over Snyder Cut. I do have a half-finished review of it written, but I couldn’t be bothered to finish. The gist is that I grudgingly like it a lot more than Whedon’s nonsense, but it’s still terrible.

More importantly, I am currently just over 90,000 words into my next book, which will see the return of Archer and Juni, the two who are supposed to be the overall main protagonists of my series, and yet haven’t been seen for 9 years. I’m glad no one was around to take a picture of the stupid smile on my face while I was writing their first scene together since 2012. It will be the first of a trilogy of sorts, alternating with the trilogy that Church of the Assassin kicked off.

In the meantime, I’m working on hardbacks of all the books, which will be available soon! And because I wanted it, the artist who has done the last three covers is doing some art for both Archer and Juni, so I should have that to share soon too.

I’m also considering writing some more of the Writer’s Guides, as they seem to be the most popular thing on this site. But you can see how infrequently I write anything here, and judge for yourself how likely that is to happen.

So there’s my annual update.

Bye.

Pre-order Ghosts of the Fallen

Posted by Ross Harrison on

Ghosts of the Fallen is now up for pre-order (ebook version only) on Amazon, Smashwords, Apple iBooks, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo. It will be sent to you the moment it is published on November 24.

This is a direct sequel to Blades of the Fallen, so if you haven’t read that, you can use this code to get it for 75% off ($1): TU36E.

Pre-ordering goes a long way to helping the book’s visibility on launch, so any pre-orders would be appreciated.

Kindle-GhostsCover-Med

Four inquisitors, four paths. The path of justice. The path of vengeance. The path of love. The path of fear.

The Vanguard is still reeling from Bane and his master. There are still scattered remnants of the Fallen to hunt down. But so too are there unknown elements moving in the shadows. A cult whose path to their god of war is through the death of inquisitors. An empire on the path to something terrible. And meanwhile, a familiar darkness rises anew.

The little girl with accelerated ageing asked only one thing before she died: don’t let them do this again. It was a promise they could not keep.

Ghosts of the Fallen, coming November 24, 2019

Blades of the Fallen – Out Now

Posted by Ross Harrison on

One last update: Blades of the Fallen is now available for Kindle, in all other e-formats, and in paperback.

Blades of the Fallen is a standalone novel in the NEXUS space opera series.

Blades of the Fallen Cover

The murder changes everything. The Vanguard is supposed to protect against such violence, not fall victim to it. But even the so-called ‘Fallen’ wouldn’t kill without reason. Would they?

The murderer changes everything. The Fallen keep to themselves, living comfortably separate to other Necurians. But he is dragging them towards war. Why is he so convinced that it’s the Vanguard’s fault?

The inquisitors have changed. As teenagers, they witnessed the murder in front of their eyes. Five years later, they wield the authority of the Vanguard, and they will hunt down the killer. The motives must be uncovered. Because even the Fallen would not kill without reason.

Meet a handful of the characters:

Solan | Rialen | Ailan | Mara