Great Review for Charlie Runs Rings!

My SF adventure Charlie Runs Rings Around the Earth received a 4/5 rating from Bitten By Books. Smashing news! I may join Charlie for a few victory laps later.

http://bittenbybooks.com/?p=23783

If you've yet to experience orbital running, head on over to Lyrical Press for a serious imagination workout.

Also available in e-book format from Fictionwise, Amazon Kindle, Diesel Ebooks, Mobipocket.

Godiva in the Firing Line - OUT NOW!

For those of you who like science fiction with an edge, Godiva in the Firing Line, my short futuristic novella, is available now at Damnation Books, priced $4.50. The story starts on the eve of deployment for Lupine Corps, a paratrooper unit set to patrol a human mining facility on a hostile alien moon. But if you're expecting a standard shoot 'em up sci-fi adventure, think again. Godiva Randall and Dash Collingwood are friends (and potential lovers) unwittingly headed for the most controversial military scenario of their time...

Here's the blurb:

The strength of the pack is the wolf, and the strength of the wolf is the pack! Join Godiva Randall, the beautiful daughter of a powerful politician, as she puts her paratrooper unit’s motto to the test. A delicate truce on Hoarfrost’s icy moon is about to explode, and blood will be spilled. This is the moment Lupine Corps has trained for—combat against a nightmarish alien foe, light-years from home.

But Godiva and her best friend, Dash Collingwood, are secretly in love. All mixed-gender combat units must take Celiba-C—a pill that suppresses sexuality—under threat of court-martial. Its performance record is amazing. The military swears by it. But it’s a lonely war so far from home. What if they skipped a dose, just this once? One night for themselves. What’s the worst that could happen?

Check out the official book page at Damnation, where there's also a very unique pricing plan in effect for all new releases. Each ebook will start off at 25 cents each. That's TWENTY-FIVE CENTS! Then with each subsequent purchase, the price will increase in 25 cent increments until the full list price is reached. You'd best be quick, though--there are some great-looking titles this quarter!

I'll finish with a choice excerpt from Godiva's journey (warning: strong language)

“Listen up.” Major General Horowitz, a grey-haired, tanned, sturdy man in his mid-fifties, slurped down the remainder of his mug of coffee as he turned to face the head of the shuttle gangway, to observe over a hundred greenhorn Lupines clinging to their seatbelts with white knuckles.

“Ah, that’s what I call coffee. Nicaraguan can’t be beat. All right, you horrible lot, seeing as we’re T-minus, and the next time you get to hear my dulcets will be in orbit around Scimitar, now’s the time to tell you about a delightful little thing called Celiba-C. Okay, you’ve all heard of it before. Whoopee for you. But as you’re no doubt aware by now, girls and boys fighting side by side pose a very real and very dangerous practical problem. A biological phenomenon of the utmost import. A profound physiological conundrum. Namely, the hard-on.”

Desperate laughter shook the aging, discoloured metal cabin. Godiva and Dash resisted making eye contact.

“All right, all right. Simmer down. We’ll be administering Celiba-C shortly, in the shape of these.” He shook a plastic medicine bottle full of half-inch capsules. “Take two now and one just before we land, and then one each morning all the while you’re on Scimitar. Don’t fuck with us on this. Sex is the biggest killer in warfare. You’ve got the hots for someone, or you’re secretly a bit of a Don Quixote, your first priority will invariably be to that person’s welfare ahead of the mission. I tell you, I’ve lost more troops to hurdy-gurdy in the loins than any other human factor. I’m dead serious. Celiba-C neutralizes all sexual or gender-oriented urges while you’re in the field. No more hard-ons, no more getting wet. Same for any same-sex scenarios. You won’t see men and women out there. You’ll see comrades who’ll follow fucking orders to whatever end! Trust me, it’s the only way this works. Four years and counting…and the upturn in performance has been amazing. Basically, you all end up androgynous for the duration. But that’s it. No side effects, no long-term deterioration. You can fuck each other senseless when you’re on leave, but for now it’s monks and nuns and you’re married to God and the fucking corps. Any questions?”

“Yeah, where are all the stewardesses before I take that shit?”

More laughter.

Horowitz smiled and nodded at the clown near the front. “Still trying to figure out why you’re not in the cargo hold with the rest of the fucking tools.”

Scattered applause accompanied a deafening cheer.

“Why take two now if we’re taking one when we get there?” asked Godiva, immediately embarrassed by her serious question.

“Aha, a sensible one,” replied Horowitz. “What’s your name, Sergeant?”

“Randall, sir.”

A male voice from the back added, “Lady Godiva’s asking about hard-ons? Tell her to get her tits out and we’ll demonstrate.”

Dash replied right away, “That guy can skip his pills. He was born dick-less.” This retort even prompted a chuckle from the Major General, but Dash himself wished the words had been fists instead. He caught Godiva blushing, and he hated that Horowitz had been made privy to her sex object status.

“All right, that’s enough,” Horowitz insisted, noticing how red Godiva’s cheeks had become. “Save it for the return trip. In answer to your very sensible question, Sergeant Randall, the body has to acclimate to Celiba-C, and during the time you’re unconscious, about two days, those first two capsules will be doing their work. After that, it’s one per day. And don’t any of you think about skipping a dose. Your C.O. will always have a spare supply, so if you happen to mislay your quotient, it’s your duty to let him know. And remember, he can test you for Celiba-C at any time. The punishment for not taking it is a mandatory court-martial, so like I said, don’t fuck with us on this.”

A male junior officer with red hair and freckles wheeled a trolley filled with hundreds of Celiba-C bottles up the gangway. The wheels clattered across the gridiron. Every member of Twelfth Lupine swallowed the two capsules, some having to use water from conical containers retrieved from inside the armrests. There was no discernible effect right away, and Godiva tried not to think about the imminent banishment of Dash Collingwood from her thoughts. Or could the drug really neutralise those instincts? The sexual kind, yes, but what about close friendship, a bond not governed by the loins? What would he be to her in the grip of Celiba-C? A stranger? A brother? Déjà vu? She winced. How would he treat her? As a comrade? A sister? A piece of equipment?

She bowed her head and felt bitterly alone. When the drug kicked in, he wouldn’t go out of his way to protect her any more, and she would no longer care. But there was a downside to Celiba-C that only someone in love could perceive. It wasn’t a question of sex, it was a question of love. How does one isolate and suppress love? And how much of a person is lost when that passion is denied? Would it not filter into the camaraderie of the corps? Godiva realised she wanted a man to look out for her, she wanted to look out for him, and without that protective instinct, Lupine Corps would be a well-trained unit without a heart.

Maybe it was better that way. Maybe.

A loose gridiron hatch rattled like a supermarket trolley across cobblestone as the engines heaved the shuttle upward, and after a long, teeth-chattering ascent, punched it beyond the earth’s magnetic pull.

“That had better be the worst of it,” whispered Dash, pale as guano. “I never did like roller-coasters.”

Godiva leapt on the opportunity. “Are you kidding me? That was nothing. Just wait until we ride the bullet into deep space. Now that’s a roller-coaster.”

He closed his eyes, shook his head, and mouthed a few expletives. Pleased with herself, Godiva patted his shoulder, whispering, “And that’s something they don’t have a pill for. Best to think of it as therapy: what doesn’t kill you…makes you even more shit-scared of dying.”

“Thanks, Di,” he replied sarcastically. “I guess Celiba-C works after all.”

The quip dove straight to the ringing part of her brain. She knew what she ought to be feeling—mild regret at having treated his suffering with contempt, however playful—but the impulses were incomplete. They lingered off-key., Vague xylophonic notes that meant nothing, but which she knew had dampened that part of her compassion. What else did Celiba-C have in store? She swallowed, conscious of the stubborn phlegm clinging to her throat.

“Only kidding,” she said, not quite recognising her own voice. “Light speed is a piece of cake. And hey, I’m not going anywhere.”

He looked at her strangely, and she knew why. What a thing to say to a death-defying paratrooper! What next, holding hands!? This was going to be a long trip, and a lonely one.
By the time the shuttle had fully charged its photonic cells inside the giant, elliptical wormhole gateway, the soldiers of Twelfth Lupine were fully indifferent to one another. And in the split second between drifting through space and being yanked into an interstellar corkscrew, every man and woman lost consciousness. The only sound on board was the hatch rattling over the stairwell to the upper deck. Merely overlooked, it was of no consequence. But even so, it had not been designed for that.

http://www.damnationbooks.com/book.php?isbn=9781615720439

First Look at THE MYTHMAKERS!

As you can see, Samhain Publishing are pulling out all the stops for Impulse Power, their space opera anthology due for release in February 2010. The cover artist is Kanaxa, and she went truly stellar for this amazing tapestry of book covers. The three novellas are Hearts and Minds (by J.C. Hay), Metal Reign (by Nathalie Gray), and my own outer space adventure, The Mythmakers.

I've had great book covers before but these are just extraordinary! If the rest of the project turns out this well, Impulse Power will be the space opera book of next year, no question. Each novella is to be released as a separate eBook in Feb, before the paperback anthology later in 2010.

Here's an early blurb for The Mythmakers:

The last will and testament of a forgotten Earth...

For Captain Steffi Savannah and her crew of deep space smugglers, life has become little more than a dogged exercise in mere survival. Their latest disastrous heist ended with another dead crew member—and no place left to hide. She’s even finding it hard to dredge up any excitement over the giant, crippled ship that appears on their radar, even though it’s the salvage opportunity of a lifetime.

They find that it’s no ordinary alien vessel. It’s a ship of dreams, populated with the last remnants of Earth’s mythical creatures. Including the blond, built, mysterious Arne, one of a race blessed with extraordinary beauty—and few inhibitions. Though he won’t tell her exactly what he is, in his arms Steffi rediscovers something she thought she’d never feel again. Wonder, love…and hope.

It isn’t long, though, before the Royal guard tracks them down, and Steffi and her crew are faced with a terrible decision. Cut and run. Or risk everything to tow the ship and her precious cargo to safety.

Editing on The Mythmakers begins soon, and I have the lovely Sasha Knight overseeing this one. Can't wait!

http://www.samhainpublishing.com/

Cover Art for Godiva in the Firing Line!

Artist (and author) Julie D'Arcy just sent me the finished cover for my upcoming sci-fi war novella, Godiva in the Firing Line. This was one of the most interesting collaborations I've had with an artist. We had such different initial takes on what the image should look like, and I think we both got a little frustrated with that incompatibility. For my part, I was perhaps too specific in what I asked for; it didn't give Julie much leeway in finding suitable digital elements. One has to remember our graphic artists can only use images already available to them, and the more specific you are, the tougher it becomes for them to exactly reproduce your idea.

On the other hand, there has to be good communication throughout the process in case those ideas aren't reproducable. With Godiva, I asked for a blonde, beautiful female soldier dressed a certain way. Poor Julie spent ages trying to find the right girl, without luck. Instead, she went in a new direction and chose a sci-fi woman that, while blonde and sexy, didn't, for me, fit the story I'd written. Better communication at both ends might have saved her a lot of time and effort. We'll both be wiser next time.

In the end, we chanced upon a nice middle ground that more or less fulfilled all the criteria of my initial suggestions, while also being practical enough for Julie to work her magic. We're both very pleased with the finished cover. In fact, it's one of my new faves. I *love* the alien landscape. And that girl is definitely Godiva.

Thanks, Julie!

Godiva in the Firing Line is due for release on December 1st at Damnation Books. Here's an unofficial blurb and excerpt:

The strength of the pack is the wolf, and the strength of the wolf is the pack! Join Godiva Randall, the beautiful daughter of a powerful politician, as she puts her paratrooper unit’s motto to the test. A delicate truce on Hoarfrost’s icy moon is about to explode, and blood will be spilled.

This is the moment Lupine Corps has trained for—combat against a nightmarish alien foe, light-years from home. But Godiva and her best friend, Dash Collingwood, are secretly in love. All mixed-gender combat units must take Celiba-C—a pill that suppresses sexuality—under threat of court-martial. Its performance record is amazing. The military swears by it. But it’s a lonely war so far from home. What if they skipped a dose, just this once? One night for themselves. What’s the worst that could happen?

Excerpt:

So this was it.

There was an un-showy yet deliberate mobilisation, half-dressed figures she recognised trying their best to appear aloof while making their beds. No way were they so composed inside. Her abdominals tightened and she repeatedly unclenched her fists while straightening her sports bra, buttoning up her beige jacket, clipping her panties to the waist of her trousers and fastening the tungsten belt, tucking the trouser legs into her latex stockings, winding herself into the supple but impenetrable, thigh-length performance boots, and finally, combing her hair with damaged fingernails.

So this is it…

She closed her eyes.

No place to hide now.

Boys had always been wary of Godiva Randall. The beautiful daughter of a powerful politician, she was the gemstone lying in the middle of the pavement that every pedestrian would covet but think twice about picking up, fearful of the catch. But in Godiva there was no catch, no deviousness, no treachery, and that no boy had ever lasted longer than four dates was, it was rumoured, the thing that had ultimately driven her to a platonic career in the world of men—a paratrooper par excellence. It might have been the one place where, if you were brave enough to put your life on the line, politics had no dominion.

She was five-seven, golden blonde, with a very pale complexion and a lithe, athletic physique. Men in her various squads quite rightly nicknamed her Lady Godiva. It had become the object of contentious betting that she would one day agree to pose naked for the Lupine Corps’ female calendar and that if she did, she would outshine all those gone before. Sooner or later, everyone knew who she was—rich, super-educated, the daughter of presidential candidate Rupert Randall. Corporals and colonels alike had taken on the conquest, until she’d dropped Daddy’s name and seen that same gulp of the eyes, that silent “Oh, shit! Where the hell are my car keys?” glance.

But now, no one else seemed to notice her, and she liked that nervous throb of anonymity.

http://www.damnationbooks.com/

Robert Appleton on The Basingstoke Chronicles

My newly released book, the time travel adventure The Basingstoke Chronicles is actually the first novel I wrote, back in 2005. I’d already written a few short stories and my debut poetry anthology, Mercurial Verse, but epic storytelling is what I’d always wanted to explore. The scope of grand adventure, mixed with intimate character moments, fired my imagination in my teens, when I spent rainy afternoons delving into the worlds of Victorian genre authors Wells, Verne, Burroughs, and H Rider Haggard.

Time travel in particular, fascinates me. The ideas are constantly in our faces, the opportunities tantalisingly out of reach. Time is such an intricate part of our everyday lives, yet we have absolutely no control over it.

What science fiction does so well is boil the universe down to two words: WHAT IF?

What if a dead body found floating off the coast of Cuba wore a strange garment? And what if the wool of that garment, while only twenty years old, came from an animal extinct for over nine thousands years?

A group of professional scuba divers, including Lord Henry Basingstoke and his friend, Rodrigo Quintas, eagerly search the ocean bed for clues. But when they find the secret of time travel in the deep, a fun vacation becomes an obsessive quest to be the first to solve the mystery. This involves a daring journey back through time, to a hidden land of rainforests, deadly creatures, and a doomed civilization. And the longer they stay, the more their adventure becomes, quite literally, a race against time.

In the early chapters, I wanted to introduce a very particular lifestyle, namely that of rich, bored pleasure-seekers whose pursuit of archaeological relics is less a burning passion, more a rite of privilege. For Lord Basingstoke, these treasure-seeking adventures around the globe are a fun hobby. Any true value in archaeology or history eludes him. A rebellious English aristocrat, he feels he has no real place in the late twentieth century, a time without magic, in which discovery is obsolete.

But finding the mysterious vehicle in the deep gives him a sense of purpose. For the first time in his life, he is in possession of something extraordinary. Discussing it with his closest friends only invigorates him further. Those exchanges are some of my favourite in the book—speculative, naïve, yet so passionate. He guards his discovery jealously, which leads to a fateful decision one night, when other interested parties are loitering nearby…

I won’t spoil anything of his adventure, but I will say that it was truly a vicarious thrill for me to write this journey of exploration. I could happily spend years wandering the hidden land of Apterona, learning its secrets. All I’d need is a very big rifle, Quatermain as a guide, and Jennifer Love Hewitt…for moral support.

Robert Appleton

The Basingstoke Chronicles is available now as an eBook at Uncial Press, priced $5.99

http://www.uncialpress.com/books/basingst/basingst.html

And at the following online booksellers:

Fictionwise: http://www.fictionwise.com/ebooks/b94736/The-Basingstoke-Chronicles/Robert-B-Appleton/?si=0

Mobipocket: http://www.mobipocket.com/en/eBooks/eBookDetails.asp?BookID=220635

Books on Board: http://www.booksonboard.com/index.php?BODY=viewbook&BOOK=510905

Don’t forget to drop by in the coming weeks for a Basingstoke Chronicles contest or two, and your chance to win a free copy.

In the meantime, happy adventuring!

Amazing new artwork for Kate of Kratos!

Check out Amanda Kelsey's incredible artwork for my upcoming sci-fi release at Eternal Press. Kate of Kratos is the final installment in my Eleven-Hour Fall survival trilogy, and this new cover exceeded all my expectations. Thank you, Amanda!

Get ready for May 7th, when all hell breaks loose on planet Kratos!

Charlie Runs Rings Around the Earth

The highly regarded eBook and paperback publisher Lyrical Press, Inc. has offered me a contract for my brand new science fiction adventure, Charlie Runs Rings Around the Earth. I'm ecstatic about this one, as it's the kind of deep space odyssey I used to love reading as a teenager.

A descendant of British speed legends Malcolm and Donald Campbell, Charlie Thorpe-Campbell is the world's premier orbital runner. Tonight is the biggest race of his life--the Tonne Run, a hundred laps of the earth. In his futuristic racing vehicle Bluebird, he must outrun the spectre of his father's crash on Europa, while maintaining his eight-year unbeaten streak. At thirty-three, his legs might be tiring, but there'll be no retiring for Charlie just yet.

When a mysterious wormhole appears mid-race, whisking him to the far side of the galaxy, Charlie's adventure begins on a barren, isolated planet where nothing is what it seems. Countless other spacecraft have been abducted, but why? Then there's the small matter of a continent-sized tree, and an elusive civilization with mind-boggling technology. Charlie might have run rings around the earth, but what will he find on his personal odyssey a billion light years from home?


I can't wait to release this short novel. Lyrical Press is really going places in the e-publishing world, so Charlie's in good company. Let's see how far he can go!

http://www.lyricalpress.com/

New Review For Grandiloquence

Whitney at FAR gave Grandiloquence FOUR Fallen Angels! Here's the link:

http://www.fallenangelreviews.com/2008/December/Whitney-Grandiloquence.htm

and here's the buy link for the eBook at Eternal Press:

http://www.eternalpress.ca/grandiloquence.html

'Cafe' nominated in P&E Awards

Cool way to start the New Year. Eternal Press nominated my sci-fi short Cafe at the Edge of Outer Space in the Predators & Editors Readers' Poll 2008. It's in the sci-fi/fantasy short fiction category, which you can reach (and vote in) at the following link:

http://www.critters.org/predpoll/

Add this to the great sales figures I recently saw for Cafe, and it's a stellar showing for the little coming-of-age tale set in Earth orbit.

Eleven-Hour Fall Nominated for Red Roses Award

Great news! My debut science-fiction novella The Eleven-Hour Fall has been nominated in the best short fiction category in the Red Roses for Authors Christmas Awards. The nominees were chosen by readers as the best books reviewed there during the year.

Red Roses is primarily a review site for romance books, but they did accept my sci-fi tale back in June, as it was a love story of sorts, with a strong heroine. It received five red roses.

To vote for the winners in both categories, here's the place to visit:

http://redrosesforauthors.blogspot.com/2008/11/christmas-awards.html

And as an added bonus, a few of my fellow Eternal Press authors are nominees as well. Fantastic!

The Elemental Crossing Released Today!

Today marks the one year anniversary of Eternal Press. Happy birthday EP! It also see the release of my new novella. Check it out...

Blurb:

One woman. One man. A daring voyage across an alien ocean. The Elemental Crossing is the exciting sequel to Robert Appleton’s science-fiction adventure, The Eleven-Hour Fall.

After their hard-won escape from the perils of the desert, Kate and Jason are faced with their most difficult challenge yet on Kratos - crossing a vast ocean on just an improvised raft. Their relationship grows as hope dwindles. Procuring food, water, and a safe course across stretches their survival expertise to its limits. Despite help from an unexpected ally, what lurks beneath the surface of this alien sea?

Intimate character reflections weave through the epic scale of this second installment in the thrilling romantic survival series.


Excerpt #1

The occasional coarse gust stung Kate’s ears and tried to unstitch a wound on Jason’s chin; by the time the winds eased, both were red raw. The sky, too, bled reddish purple between blue clouds.
Bruised in the aftermath, thought Kate.
Jason suddenly scooped her off her feet from behind and, holding her close, pressed his cheek against hers.
“We’ve made it,” he said softly. “The only sand from now on is beachfront property.”
Kate closed her eyes and sighed. Swept up by the man of her dreams, her lift was physical, spiritual, vital. A week ago, in the desert, she had started a survival cycle for two; here, on the mysterious shore of a green-blue ocean, the cycle had come full circle. Jason Remington…Jason and I. Though fate had raised its skull and crossbones more than once on Kratos—most tragically to sink the Fair Monique—Kate had in fact won everything she’d wanted: her man, her life, and a chance to explore a hidden world. But in the bargain, just as many questions, if not more. Their journey to the ocean was now complete…
But in a survival cycle, she knew nothing was ever complete.
The seascape was an elemental brew, a dark green wilderness settling after a hurricane upheaval. It tossed columns of spray from the crests of its swells. These danced and merged like feverish loners in an icy rave. Two miles to the north, the giant precipice curtailed the ocean for as far as the eye could see. This straight line amid the chaos haunted Kate. The idea of an entire ocean being little more than a puddle on the surface of a giant craft made her swallow self-consciously.
“If you had to guess, how far would you say it stretches?” Jason asked.
“Well, how far can we see to the horizon?”
“Hmm…” He shrugged. “Say about five times farther than on Earth.”
“That’s conservative,” she replied. “Kratos is proportionally a lot bigger than that.”
“Yes, but our eyes can’t see infinitely through this atmosphere,” added Jason.
“I know—the electromagnetic anomaly we were told about. Something to do with gravitational distortion.”
“Let’s just say if there wasn’t an anomaly, we’d never have made it through the E.M. shield. The biggest planet ever explored, in terms of circumference; I can’t even imagine the gravitational forces we should be experiencing right now.”
“We’re miraculous survivors on a miraculous world,” she said vacantly. “And you can make a note of that for our epitaph.”
Jason chuckled and kissed her on the cheek before setting her down on the sand.
He resumed his walk. “So what’s the plan?”
“I thought this was the plan,” she replied.
“I mean what now? Saying we can make a go of it here for a while—if there’s a permanent food supply—what next, Mrs. Miraculous Survivor on a miraculous world? Where do we go from here?”
Kate smiled. “Haven’t the foggiest.”


Excerpt #2

Spectacular! The underwater visibility improved dramatically. Jason felt as if they’d crossed a purifying meridian. The partition between pale, murky green and glassy emerald stood out a mile, as clearly defined as night and day. Kate dipped her hand in the new water.
“It’s balmy,” she said, wide-eyed.
“Shall we try it out?” asked Jason.
“Immediately!”
Kate hung from the starboard side, Jason from the port. They submerged to view the secrets of the transparent ocean. From between clouds, capes of sunlight wavered across the deep, highlighting minute formations of sea life no bigger than fingernails and introducing enormous, roving shapes that spread and contracted like bloating submarines. Slender white shoots stretched up to within a hundred feet of the surface; these were identical to the spaghetti slime-line Jason had snagged during his fishing debacle. Quite where they originated from he still couldn’t fathom.
The farther they drifted across this new ocean realm, the more it teemed with life. Jason and Kate lifted their heads to breathe every couple of minutes. The sunlight intensified over the next hour, penetrating deeper into the aquatic. Enormous mandibles clasped shut far below, sending whirligigs of plankton up toward them. Kate even spied a dolphin, identical to those they’d befriended back at the reef. It dodged between a school of tiny lights and a spinning starfish.
Amazing, she thought, what evolution, unchecked, can produce!


Excerpt #3

A chevron formation of birds streaked across the sky. Kate counted twenty-six. She shuddered at the memory of being clamped in the huge beak during her eleven-hour fall, awaiting the crunch, with no way to defend herself or the man in her arms. How quickly horror had turned to hope.
Clouds parted overhead like a stratospheric Rorschach, morphing the heavens into a shape she’d only ever seen rendered by computer-generated imagery. She lost her bearings for a moment, forgetting the direction of the Elemental’s drift.
Yeah, east to west, but which is which?
Kate couldn’t find the impetus to get up and check. Though bone-dry bodily, her resolve was damp. Two days of lying on her back in a floating limbo had atrophied her every motivation. Eating, exercising, planning ahead, making even the tiniest decision now felt beyond her. At the nadir of existence, it was theoretically the peak test of a survivalist’s aptitude. But she couldn’t get over how cruelly fate had played its hand against her. Remorseless. Sadistic. From the bottom of the deck.
Just before midday, the Elemental turned slowly through forty-five degrees. The sensation wasn’t severe, but Kate felt it.
There’s no wind. Some kind of current?
She instantly forgot her maudlin marathon and shot across to the port side. The water was on the move; as she dipped her hand, it rushed through her fingers.
“Strong current, too!”
No signs of life below the surface, submarine-sized or otherwise, only a full-depth, concerted gush toward the northwest. Toward the precipice!
The entire ocean?


Excerpt #4

Two hours later, the rumble was as loud as a Harley Davidson’s engine ticking over. The throttle hadn’t yet been turned, but her ears felt the grip. White mist boasted a full rainbow and reached high over the precipice. Kate tested the lines securing her belt one more time. One fastened to each of the four cleats—more than enough.
“It might be for nothing,” she whispered, “but nothing could mean anything…”
She shook her head.
“A bit late for optimism, Katie girl.”
Her heartbeat quickened as the noise increased. The sea’s current now seemed rapid, incontestable. Still no view of the precipice through the mist. Only the nonstop fall of thunder. Billions of tonnes of water pouring into oblivion.
The depth of the ocean did not appear to lessen. She could still see a fair way down. The whole thing’s moving this way! On Earth and other planets, she’d seen waterfalls fed by either a river or a lake; here, a sea at least the size of a continent overflowed. Kate could barely hold her hand steady enough to scratch an itch on her neck. As the first specks of spray peppered the Elemental, the cascade roared with the power of a rocket launch.
She screamed at the top of her voice, but no sound escaped.
Oh, Christ, this is it!
The veil of no return. A film of cool moisture covered her hair, face, and neck. Visibility was now that of a white, backward balaclava. She felt the boat glide more rapidly and quickly through the water, and the dread welled up like hot oil in her gut. Her eardrums rang. She fought giant panic breaths with all of her pride.
The Elemental now hurtled faster than it had ever surfed as a sand yacht. Kate’s hair flapped wildly, and the spray drenched her eyes shut. Still louder, still faster, then…


To read the rest of Kate's adventure, you can buy The Elemental Crossing as an eBook at:

www.eternalpress.ca/theelementalcrossing.html

It's quite a ride!