Showing results by author "Patty Jansen" in All Categories

You intend to self-publish or have published a book or two. You’re not selling very well and wonder why not. You feel you should be doing something, but the thought of “marketing” gives you nightmares. You don’t want to become one of these people shouting “buy my book” on Twitter. But you would still love to start selling some books and pay some or even all of your bills with your writing income.

After having escaped from Kelso Station, Tina and her crew run low on supplies. Both stations they can visit are in pirate hands. They have to make a toss-up decision on which would be the safest. They choose the bigger station. But while they’re in the dock, trying very hard not to be noticed until they can negotiate the ridiculous supply wait times before they leave again, Tina finds out that her daughter, Evelle, is a prisoner at the station.

Jonathan Bartell is a young man, just out of university, when he signs up for the position of Quarantine Officer at the Orbital Launch Station. He is part of a crop of students who flocked to study exo-biology when bacteria were discovered on Mars and who are now all making their living flipping burgers because the jobs are few and hard to get. He is lucky to get a job in space, no matter how mundane. Or so he thinks.... Gaby Larsen is a doctor at the tiny hospital at the space station, and she keeps secrets.

Nellie Dreessen is a kitchen maid in the palace of Regent Bernard of Saardam. She has worked for two kings and two regents, has seen two royal families murdered through magic, has seen ghosts and demons, and kept her head down like a good girl. On her 50th birthday, she receives her late father’s diary, which describes a magical item that is so evil it needs to be kept in the church crypt: a box that contains dragon. Problem is someone has stolen the box.

Veronica arrives with her class in the spellcraft tower of the Oakhurst School of Magic to teach the bunch of young—and not particularly well-behaved—teenagers about the school's ancient spellbook. But the book has gone missing from the cabinet!

When Fabio Velazquez arrives on the secretive military base on Jupiter's moon Io, he knows two things: one, that he's had his memories erased and two, that he has a secret. Except because of point one, he can't remember what point two is. The portents aren't good: he's hated by his fellow soldiers, responsible for "the greatest f***-up in military history", traitor, and human guinea pig. Yet, he managed to be trusted with a secret so big that the military has almost killed him and still haven't gotten their hands on it. Where is it, and who does it belong to?

The royal family is in deep trouble: ever since the crown princess died of illness, the king has attempted to educate his son to become king. However, the prince is "not good in the head" and quite unsuited to the task. In his grief for his daughter, the king has run the coffers dry: He hired dubious magicians for even more dubious tasks. Those magicians circle like vultures waiting for the kingdom to fail. The king must get his son on the throne, preferably supported by a smart and well-off wife.

A fisherwoman finds a dead man on a tiny offshore island, with no clue about how the man got there. A camel driver deep in the northern desert rescues a man who speaks no known language, but is clearly well-educated. An ancient sect that was considered close to extinct sucks in all the land's young people and creates tension that may well lead to a civil war.

After many years in space, Jonathan receives the message he's been dreading: his father has taken a fall. He can no longer live by himself and Jonathan's cousin has managed to get him into a care home. Jonathan is an only child, he is no longer in contact with his mother, and a deep sense of guilt forces him to return to Earth to look after his father's wellbeing.

Of all the things 10-year-old Cory Wilson expects to do when he moves to Midway Space Station, saving aliens from humans isn't one. An important conference is about to start at the station, not usually the sort of thing kids care about, not even when the conference is between humans and aliens, and half your family is alien.

Lana han Chevonian is one of the world’s brightest minds on the brink of making a huge discovery. There is only one problem: she is stuck as prisoner in the harem of the Aranian king. She could try to escape and run the risk of getting re-captured or getting killed on the very long and difficult road back home to Chevakia, or she could win the favour of the king, beg to be allowed to use the famed library and promise Arania credit for her work.

The world is under increasing threat from as-yet undiscovered sources of icefire, but all the people who have answers are cut off from the authorities, kings, or councils with the power to mobilize the scientists and armies to keep the world safe. Young meteorology student Javes is stuck in the remote desert of the north. The area bristles with technology of an ancient past, but he cannot tell anyone about it because roads and telegraph lines have been cut by bad weather and invading bandits. No one is watching the skies. No one is tallying up the disasters.

Tina and her crew finally arrive on Olympus, the world that holds the Federacy Assembly. Her initial plan was to go there to present the data left in a locker on Kelso Station 15 years earlier, but many things have changed. For one, rather than wait for someone else to do it, she and the scientists collected at Aurora Station have been working on a cure for the infection that turns people into gray-skinned mutant pirates. Secondly, they're bringing a stricken war ship and a few of its remaining crew members who were rescued from pirate captivity. Little has gone to plan.

An ancient machine that produced icefire was destroyed 20 years ago, but the deadly magic is again on the increase. No one understands why or where it’s coming from. King Isandor sends his Eagle Knights to investigate a concentration of icefire in the mountains at the border. It appears that the neighbouring country Arania wants revenge for a defeat in a war forty years ago, and is using icefire as weapon. The evil power source must be eradicated.

Melati escaped New Jakarta Space Station when it fell into Allion's hands. Her family was left behind the enemy lines. She signed up for active duty with the International Space Force in the hope they would liberate the station. Instead, they chose to maintain a crippling siege that has lasted for 10 months.

Tina had no choice but to escape Aurora Station on board the Starfighter Manila: The ship was about to blow up and would have killed the entire station. But they're in deep trouble. They have less than half the crew number necessary to fly the ship safely, the engines are damaged and Tina's travel companions are on a different ship. Aurora Station fell into pirate hands, so returning is not an option and the ship isn't safe to fly long distances. On top of that, several crew members may have been exposed to genetic treatment by the pirates.

They came from the poorest cities on Earth. They were promised free food and housing. They didn't know that they, or their children, would never see Earth again. A few years ago, a military doctor walking the corridors of New Jakarta Space Station saved Melati's life. She signed up for the International Space Force to pay back her moral debt to him.

On the backwater world of Cayelle, Tina Freeman runs a shop with her son Rex, 15 years old, half-human, half-android with a massive chip on his shoulder about having been born without arms or legs. The shop makes a modest profit, but when a creditor turns up wanting his money back, everything goes pear-shaped. She needs money, and needs it fast.

Verona Rupes, on the ice moon Miranda, is the tallest cliff in the solar system. If you jump off the top, it takes 700 seconds to reach the bottom. What can you do in the most important 700 seconds of your life? Jonathan and Gaby arrive at the ice moon Miranda to work with a local researcher and find that adventurists have snuck into an area infected with alien bacteria and have gotten themselves in trouble. Do these people have to be stopped because they're about to spread a bacterial infection to the human settlements or are there other factors at play?

Far in the future, Bianca is the only planet where people have ever found any form of intelligent life. The planet has two species that look remotely humanoid, but none of the human scientists have been able to make much sense out of them. The creatures have nothing to trade, so human interest has waned, and the care of the planet's human outpost has been left in the hands of a religious order.