Science Fiction Novels

Will You Buy These Books Based on the First Lines?

Lynette M Burrows

Buying books is a personal thing. What one person loves the next one hates. Why you buy this book instead of that one isn’t the same reason I buy those books. Covers, descriptions, reviews, word of mouth are all used to make buying decisions. But will you buy these books based on the first lines? First Lines The alley was dark and stank of piss and vomit. It was home for quick-footed rats and the bony, hungry-eyed felines who hunted them. J.D. Robb, Rapture in Death He, or very possibly she, was known as The Rose Thief.   Claire Buss, The Rose Thief  Gramp Stevens sat in a lawn chair, watching the mower at work, feeling the warm, soft sunshine seep into his bones. Clifford Simak, City I was loving this. First day on the job and I was off to a possible location of the vamp killers. Rose Montague, Jade I’ll make my report as if I told a story, for I was taught as a child on my homeworld that Truth is a matter of the imagination. Ursula K. Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness. Kamakzi. The word looped in my head, and I tasted it. Kamakzi. Elin […]

Book Cover Reveal: My Soul to Keep

Lynette M Burrows

I’m delighted to present the book cover reveal for my debut novel, My Soul to Keep. On sale: August 2018 Artist/Illustrator/Designer: Elizabeth Leggett Publisher: Rocket Dog Publishing ABOUT MY SOUL TO KEEP Miranda Clarke lived a charmed life…until she broke the rules. It is 1961 and America’s a theocracy controlled by the Fellowship and its tyrannical council of eleven men. Miranda Clarke’s family is part of the ruling elite, wealthy and privileged. Miranda wants nothing more than to stay out of the public eye, but her power-hungry mother has different plans. She forces Miranda into an engagement to an up-and-coming Fellowship member and schemes to get Miranda’s father elected President of the United States. To escape the arranged marriage and the repressive Fellowship, Miranda makes a break for freedom. But lurid family secrets and a dead man lands her in prison. She not only must escape prison and outwit her mother’s ruthless ambitions but avoid the deadly Azrael, the Fellowship’s enforcers who Take unbelievers. Will Miranda survive ‘outing’ the family secrets? Told from four different perspectives, My Soul to Keep is a spine-tingling science-fiction thriller and will be available in all your favorite online bookstores. My Soul to Keep is the […]

It’s Reading Season!

Lynette M Burrows

Mea Culpa! I’ve been nose to the grindstone and completely forgot to double-check that Thursday’s post went out as scheduled. And I was caught! It wasn’t scheduled. Totally my fault, but I did meet my deadline for completing my final revision. Yay! And I’ve been preparing for Reading Season.  It’s time to start practicing. A new season of readings approaches rapidly. That means I need to find scenes or chapters from my work that are relatively self-contained and appropriate lengths (usually 20-30 minutes), then start practicing, so I can read smoothly and clearly, and also build up my voice so it will last 20-30 minutes. In addition to the conventions I’ll attend (I already know I’ll be scheduled for a full hour of reading at DemiCon 29, and I’ve requested to do readings at other conventions through the summer), I’ll also be participating in a panel discussion about writers’ groups, and doing a short reading at a meeting of the Kansas City Science Fiction and Fantasy Society (KaCSFFS), April 21. That’s Saturday, April 21, 7:00 p.m., at The Writers Place, 3607 Pennsylvania Ave., Kansas City, MO 64111. At the KaCSFFS meeting, I’ll share the “reading chair” in the Library at The Writers Place with two friends who also are writers. Holly Messinger Holly Messinger One is Holly […]