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Introducing ‘Maria and the space-dragons investigations’ – a draft novella

Hello all,

I’ve been thinking about this for a while. I don’t like to make people pay for my work, but at the same time, I’m disabled, I can only work a few hours a week and the exhaustion is interfering with my ability to write. I want to give myself an incentive to write when I feel well enough. If I have paying subscribers, I have to write!

I may have mentioned the Space Dragon story I’ve been working on for a couple of years. The plan is to share a chapter a month for paying subscribers until I’ve written it all. You won’t be getting the first draft, since I write that by hand, but you’ll get the edited version. There will probably be further edits in future before I release it as a book. I might also share some of my short stories as paid subscriber posts.

What do you think?

Let me share a few paragraphs with you and if you want the rest, please feel free to join the paid subscription.

Update 22/03/2025

No one wanted paid subscriptions, so I’ve unlocked this chapter and any others that I’ve posted.

Audiobook Review: Wayward Souls, by Susan J. Morris, Narrated by Amelie Roch

Description

In the cities and untamed wilds of Ireland, monsters are rising up against Unionists. Luckily, Sam and Hel aren’t English.

Samantha Harker and Dr. Helena Moriarty might have solved the Paris case, but that doesn’t mean the Royal Society for the Study of Abnormal Phenomena trusts them. Sam’s power to see into the minds of monsters is a slippery slope to corruption. Worse, Hel’s uncanny habit of turning up wherever her notorious father’s hand is felt has the Society questioning whether he exists at all . . . or whether it’s been Hel all along.

So when Special Branch requests aid in Ireland, the heart of Professor Moriarty’s hidden empire, they send another agent to monitor them: Van Helsing, who is perpetually suspicious of Sam and a bit of an arse.

Their investigation takes them from ancient ruins to the clandestine clubs of the rich and powerful, untangling the mysteries of magic, monsters, and men. But even as Sam and Hel fall deeper into each other’s orbit, the secrets between them multiply. Things Hel can’t bear to confess; things Sam doesn’t dare confide. Things which not only put Sam in terrible danger from Van Helsing, but leave her haunted by death omens, mysterious black feathers, and a song no one else can seem to hear. And, as ever, Professor Moriarty lurks in the shadows, waiting to make his next move

My Review

Hel and Sam are back! And Van Helsing is hanging around being a pain in the arse.

The trio head to Ireland to investigate strange deaths and phenomena. Moriarty is thought to be behind it, but there are other possible causes, including a strange society of rich men interested in the occult. And a goddess. It’s a mystery that the three must solve. Hel and Sam just need Van Helsing to get out of the way and let them do their jobs.

Hel and Sam’s relationship makes tentative steps forward once they’re in Ireland but the appearance of a ghost and death omens, plus their individual secrets, really get in the way. That and Van Helsing hanging around.

The mystery is well structured and the development of their personal stories is integrated into the plot.

I liked the story and the narration was good. If you enjoyed Susan Morris’ first Harker and Moriarty novel, I think you’ll enjoy this book.

Review: Platform Decay, by Martha Wells

Format: 244 pages, Hardcover
Published: May 5, 2026 by Tor Books
ISBN: 9781250827005

Description

Having someone else support your bad decision feels kind of good.

After volunteering to run a rescue mission, Murderbot realizes that it will have to spend significant time with a bunch of humans it doesn’t know.

Including human children. Ugh.

This may well call for… eye contact!

(Emotion check: Oh, for f—)

My Review

Now I’m settled in to my new home, I’m working through my currently reading pile and this was the first one I’ve finished. I still have an entire library to unpack, but there are a few books that I’ve fished out and I’m working through them and the books I was sent over the summer.

I enjoy The Murderbot Diaries a lot and have all of them. I find Murderbot’s cynical response to events entertaining. The development of its relationships with the humans in its orbit and the continuing development and expansion of the world really gives depth to the story. Martha Wells is a skilled writer and every development is well paced.

The plot is gripping, packed with action and emotion as Murderbot tries to deal with its own emotions, understand the emotions of people around it, and keep everyone alive. It actually makes decisions based on whether or not the humans will be traumatised and barely kills anyone in this instalment.

If you’ve not read the other Murderbot Diaries, this book might be a bit confusing, so I’d recommend definitely reading the other 7 books before this one.

Now, I need to go and dig out the other books so that I can shelve them.

Blog Tour Calendar: Knit One, Heist One, by Donna Moore

Grimdark Magazine Novella Cover Reveal: The Anguished Earth, by Richard Swan

Another prequal from the Empire of the Wolf! I’m very much looking forward to this novella and adding a hardback edition to my collection, eventually. Waiting on the ARC at the moment.

Book Description

It is winter in the Empire of the Wolf, and the town of Eisbrück burns with plague.

Whilst physicians struggle to contain the pox, the atmosphere thickens with recrimination and rumour: talk of inauspicious constellations, and a demonic witch filling the streets with bodies and black magick. Amongst the chaos, Sir Konrad Vonvalt must recover a dangerous fugitive—a child murderer who has escaped from Blackmarsh Insane Asylum.

But with winter’s bite closing and plague spreading like wildfire, finding the killer may be the least of his problems…

And now, the cover…

Review: The Driftborn, by Simon Bullock

Genre: Space Opera
Age Category: Adult
Number of Pages: 480 Pages
Publication Date: July 28, 2026 (digital edition) May 26, 2026 (hardcover edition)

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/252725186-the-driftborn
Storygraph: https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/ff1dc076-433f-409f-9cbb-b3857e9998c8
Amazon: https://a.co/d/0aZs34GH (Canada) https://a.co/d/0iyRG1df (USA) https://amzn.eu/d/04mwepeF (UK)

Blurb

A forgotten wreck. A forbidden map. A gate that should never have been opened. On the salvage moon of Veyra’s Fall, Kade Renn only wants one thing: a working air filter for his sick sister, Lira.

Instead, he finds a buried courier ship older than the official history books. Inside it is a dying Driftborn pilot, a forbidden star map, and a message from Kade’s mother, Elian, who supposedly died nine years ago.
The Directorate says the gates saved civilisation. It says the Driftborn are criminals, free-route smugglers and a threat to every recognised human world.

The Directorate is lying.

Forced to flee with Lira, their strange scrap-mech Nix, and a half-illegal ship called The Moth, Kade is pulled into a hidden war over the true origin of the gates. The deeper they travel beyond authorised space, the more dangerous the truth becomes.

The first crossing was not what humanity was taught.

The gates were not built by us.

And something has been waiting for us to understand what we woke.
For readers who enjoy grounded space opera, ancient alien mysteries, damaged ships, found family, dry humour and human stakes beneath the scale of the stars.

The Driftborn is a tense, character-driven science fiction novel about control, memory, survival and the danger of mistaking every door for an invitation.

Review: Thorns, by Gregory Bastianelli

Description

A deadly contagion spreads throughout the world, while scientists grapple to find a cure before it’s too late…

Dr. Monica Cucinotta works on the front lines of a hospital in Cassino, Italy,
dealing with a deadly contagion that causes thorns to erupt along the surface of the body. When Monica becomes infected with the virus and must leave the hospital, she begins ajourney across the dark landscape of a pandemic world where she meets the best and worst of humanity that tests her belief in science and faith as she struggles to return home to her loved ones.

Review: A Fugitive’s History of the Known Universe, by Nadia Afifi

Price: £20.00
Fiction: FICTION / Science Fiction /
Genetic Engineering
Product format: Hardback
iSBN: 978-1-78758-948-3
Pages: 288 pp

Description

Hardcover with sprayed edges. In the sequel to A Rebel’s History of Mars, Azad and his fellow time-traveling historians must contend with the consequences of the dark secrets they’ve exposed…

After exposing the dark origins of his world on the distant planet of Nabatea, Azad is a fugitive, hunted across the galaxy by the fearsome Vitruvian Authorities. But to lead a passive society into revolution, Azad and his crew must enlist the unlikely help of a space pirate with an agenda all her own. Their adventures once again draw them into the past, into the early days of settlement on Nabatea, where a death continues to haunt the fledgling community and a mother must contend with her son’s monstrous vision for their new home.

Review: First Mage on the Moon, by Cameron Johnston

Description

Book Review: Artificial Wisdom, by Thomas R. Weaver

Book Description

The year is 2050. In the teeth of a climate catastrophe, the world is left with a drastic solution: one global leader to steer it through the coming apocalypse.

The final two candidates are ex-US President Lockwood, and Solomon, the world’s first political artificial intelligence. As whispers of a global conspiracy emerge, investigative journalist Marcus Tully find himself at the centre of it – when Solomon’s creator turns up murdered.

Overnight, one investigation becomes two, and it’s not just the result of the election that’s at stake but the future of the species. Suddenly humanity must make an impossible choice – between salvation, or freedom.