Posted by Guest Reviewer

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/06/the-every-state-reading-challenge-with-verity/

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=140085

This guest post is from Verity, who lives in the UK, and reads a book set in every US state plus DC every year. I was super curious, so I asked her about it. Yes, I know, I’m nosy.

…

Hello, my name is Verity and I like writing cheques my reading brain doesn’t like cashing. Let me explain.

I like to read romance and cozy crime. I have a terrible habit of finding a series I like and then binging the lot. I have an even worse habit of re-listening to my favourite murder mysteries and Terry Pratchett books while I walk to and from the office instead of listening to something new. I have an entire skinny Ikea Billy bookcase double stacked with books waiting to be read (and an overflow pile in front of it) as well as a kindle account groaning with purchases and proofs (thanks NetGalley).

And every year I decide it’ll be a good idea to do a reading challenge.

It’ll help me get the backlog down, I tell myself.

It’ll give me direction and purpose in my reading.

Right? Right? Wrong. Oh, so wrong.

It started with Book Riot’s Read Harder challenge one year, but really I just want to read books that have resolutions (preferably happy ones) and not literary fiction or sad books. Hence the romance. And mystery.

So every year, for the last five years, I’ve challenged myself to read a book set in each state of the US plus Washington, DC. I think I started because I saw someone else doing it and did a rough count in my head of how many series I read already were in different states, got to about a dozen and thought “Oh that’ll be easy”.

Reader: it was not.

50 is a lot of states. (Ed. note: Yes, it is.)

I print out a map to stick in my journal and colour in, and I chose a colour to be the theme.

Two road atlas books open atop one another. One is a beige map with mostly red lines, while under it is a green and blue map showing northern South America and Central America

I have lofty goals like not using an author more than once, or counting rereads as long as I haven’t used them in the challenge before. Every year I think I’ll be better this year, that I only need to do four or five a month, that I’ll happen across most of the states naturally in the course of my reading and it won’t end up in a mad rush at the end of the year.

But every year those goals fall by the wayside and at the start of December I realise I have about a dozen states still to do. And it’s always the same few that cause me trouble.

They often have Ms and Is in their names.
Often they’re states which feature in a lot of Very Old School romances set in the Old West that I really don’t want to read (but I will if it’s a choice between completing the list and not, even though I’ll hate every moment of it).

There are a tonne of books set in New York, Chicago, and LA. There aren’t so many set in Louisville, Milwaukee and Albuquerque. Really the only rule I’ve ever stuck to is that it has to be 51 different books. Doesn’t matter if a book’s about a road trip from Minneapolis to Boise, I can only use it once.

And that’s why this December my reading included:

a middle grade adventure novel set in North Dakota (Codename Zero by Chris Rylander) ( A | BN | K | AB )
a novella length nonfiction pamphlet about Ernest Hemingway and Sun Valley (Hemingway and Sun Valley: The Making of an Icon) ( A )
and a memoir about evangelical Christianity in middle America in the immediate aftermath of the 2016 election. (God Land by Lyz Lenz) ( A | BN | K | AB )

Oh and about a dozen states this year come courtesy of one cozy crime novella series about a woman travelling around the country in an RV she bought after winning the lottery (The Rambling RV series by Patti Benning starting with Murder in Michigan – each book a different state! An ideal opportunity to binge!

And she has other series that are set in Kentucky (The Real Estate Rescue series, starting with Flippin’ Out) ( A ) and Michigan (Darling Deli series, starting with Pastrami Murder)! ( A | BN )

And cozy crime tends to do me better than romance no matter how hard I try – all those series about business owners finding bodies as they go about their business in small towns do lend themselves to what (as a Brit) I think of as “the states in the middle”.

There seems to be a sad dearth of romances set in small towns that aren’t in in-land California or upstate New York. Or the Pacific North West. Although each year there seems to be one state where a bunch of authors have decided to set their romances. One year it was South Carolina. Another it was Maine.

There’s also a big problem of romances set in generic towns – or a nonspecific spot in “New England”.

If this is my chance to get my message to romance authors – and it well might be. I know you’re out there, so here is my plea:

Please be specific – tell me which state you’re setting your book in. Just pick one. I’m a Brit, I won’t know if you’re missing some crucial detail for authenticity about daily life in Ohio. Maybe mention a buckeye, or the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. That’ll do. And if your state of choice can be named in the blurb – or at least somewhere in the kindle sample – I will love you for it. “Charlie has just moved back to the small town she grew up in to take over her family’s farm. But it means she’ll have to face her past with the town’s new mayor/sheriff/librarian/deli owner Bowen. He’s the reason she left Iowa/Wisconsin/ Indiana/Arkansas in the first place.”

And if it’s a state that not many other people are setting books within, I’m a loyal customer. I’ve got money and I’m willing to spend it (especially in the last quarter of the year) and so I’ll come back every year for the rest of the series.

Ashley Herring Blake’s Bright Falls series covered me for Oregon for three years.
Sarah Morgan’s O’Neil Brothers series did the same thing with Vermont.
Kansas is Beverly Jenkins’s any year she blesses us with a new Blessings book. And she’s saved my bacon on some of the Cowboy-y states more than once – this year it was Louisiana (Rebel).

A | BN | K | AB

I’m going to have to find a new Ohio option for 2025 because I’ve run out of books in the cozy crime series I have been using (Emilie Henry’s Ministry is Murder, starting with Blessed is the Busybody – the detective is the minister’s wife) and the same applies to Kentucky (Unless Patti Benning adds to the Real Estate Rescue series).

If you’re writing about a global pop sensation and her romance with an NFL star, don’t invent a team that plays in San Antonio or Sacramento, choose Louisville or Columbus.

If you’re writing a romance about a winter sports star, maybe base them in Park City not Lake Tahoe?

And even though it gets harder every year, I’ll be trying again 2025 – so if you’re currently scanning Taylor Swift songs for a title for your next romance, think of me and set “How You Get The Girl” in Concord or Wilmington. Help me make 2025 the year I get this reading challenge thing nailed…

Readers Note: Verity finished her 2024 reading challenge at 11.21pm on Sunday 29 December 2024, fully 40 hours earlier than she finished the challenge in 2023. As such she sees it as a triumph and has already printed her map out again for 2025.

What massive reading challenges have you undertaken? Have you read books set in all 50 states?

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/06/the-every-state-reading-challenge-with-verity/

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=140085

bookviewcafe_feed

Posted by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

https://bookviewcafe.com/bvc-presents-cover-stories-a-sea-of-stars-and-trouble/

https://bookviewcafe.com/?p=19017

Book View Café presents: Cover Stories

Greetings, genre fiction fans. Welcome to Cover Stories, in which an author shares a book, what’s on its cover, a hint of what’s inside and some insider info on their creation.

So, what’s the book of the day?

A SEA OF STARS and TROUBLE by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

What’s on the cover?

The cover of SEA OF STARS and TROUBLE contains both subjects of the title: a sea of stars and Trouble Matthews.

Also on the cover, a blurb from the one and only Kevin J. Anderson, author of the award winning Climbing Olympus and The Trinity Paradox … oh, right—and all those DUNE sequels.

What’s inside the book?

“Who am I?” For some people, this is a philosophical question. For “Trouble” Matthews, it’s an existential one. And knowing the answer could be just as deadly as not knowing.

Ridley “Trouble” Matthews is a blank slate when he walks into the city of Porphyry on the planet of Herron’s Hope. All he has are the clothes on his back; all he knows of himself is his name … and that he’s running from something … or someone.

Shanghaied aboard the good ship Moonraker by smugglers, Trouble is swept up in a lethal blur of intrigue, piracy, and betrayal, complicated by his emergent memories and an array of seriously amped up physical and mental assets of which strength, quickness, and enhanced senses are just the tip of the iceberg.

The good news is, Trouble escapes Herron’s Hope. The bad news? His growing list of augmentations raises an urgent question: Did he do this to himself, or was it done to him … and why?

As he tries to peer deeper into his own memories, Trouble is less and less sure that he wants to know what sort of man he is or why his dreams are haunted by a child’s laughter.

Where’d all that come from?

The seeds of the novel were sown in a media tie-in I was asked to complete by my late, beloved writing partner and Jedi Master, Michael Reaves. The tie-in was canceled when the media failed to thrive, but Michael told me to keep my work and do whatever I wanted with it. A SEA OF STARS AND TROUBLE is the result.

I went way beyond “filing the serial numbers off” of the story and completely turned the main character and his story inside out and upside down. I originally planned on a three book trilogy, but some sage advice from an editor I much respect suggested I put all the action into a single, longer novel. (Thanks, Steve!)

The series was going to be the Pilgrimage Trilogy for Reasons, and the first book was going to be Pilgrim’s Passage. But no one could say the title without stumbling into Pilgrim’s Progress. My youngest daughter, Amanda, titled it “A Sea of Stars and Trouble” in homage Shakespeare’s “To be or not to be” soliloquy from Hamlet.

What have reviewers/readers said about SEA OF STARS and TROUBLE?

“A Sea of Stars and Trouble is a colorful and swashbuckling space adventure with clear, fast-paced writing and a rogues’ gallery of interesting characters.”

—Kevin J. Anderson, New York Times bestselling coauthor of Dune: House Atreides

“In A Sea of Stars and Trouble, Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff takes us on a grand space opera ride, with a shanghaied hero who might or might not be a hero, who doesn’t know, himself—really doesn’t know himself—until he’s put to the test. Who is he? What’s he capable of? Can he be trusted? It’s a smashing good ride, with an irrepressible spirit and enough twists and surprises to carry you straight through to the end.”

— Jeffrey A. Carver, author of The Chaos Chronicles

What else should I know?

There is a song that goes with the novel. The lyrics are included in the book. It’s simply entitled “Trouble” and it is on the album I Remember the Rain which my husband produced in our recording studio (Mystic Fig Studios, by name) and which we released in February of 2016. And, yes, that is me singing.

Naturally, the book will be available from my author page in the BookViewCafe online bookstore.

**************************************

To see more books by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff,

click this link to go to her BVC book page!

https://bookviewcafe.com/bvc-presents-cover-stories-a-sea-of-stars-and-trouble/

https://bookviewcafe.com/?p=19017

ysabetwordsmith

Hippie Chicks: A Different Feminism

Gretchen Lemke-Santangelo’s Daughters of Aquarius: Women of the Sixties Counterculture (2009) is the only monograph to date that has given these women a place in the history of feminism. Instead of portraying them as stereotypical earth mothers, nymphs in peasant dresses, or strung-out domestic drudges—the antithesis of feminism—the author demonstrates how these women broke with both the middle-class housewife and the rising career woman to recover the value of women’s productive labor in rural America. They rejected both liberal feminism’s insistence on state-guaranteed rights and radical feminism’s rejection of gender binaries to forge their own version of female empowerment.

This is the feminism that I grew up with. I found it more impressive than the feminism I studied in college. it was a lot more diverse, too. There were the earth mothers, the free lovers, the farmers, the crafters, the musicians, the ball-busting bitches, the blythe spirits, the radical activists, the wanderers -- so many girls and women who didn't fit the mainstream mold and weren't interested in academic feminism.

Current Mood: busy

apod_feed

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap250603.html

Why would the sky glow like a giant repeating rainbow?

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap250603.html

ericcoleman posting in

filk

Thanks to the efforts of Bryan Baker, we have a live album!
We play songs!
We tell stories!
We digress!
Eric only plays THREE instruments the entire show!
So gather up your farm fresh produce and listen to us live at Demicon 36!
https://cheshiremoon.bandcamp.com/album/cheshire-moon-demicon-36

ericcoleman

ysabetwordsmith

A Rainbow of Queer Books for Pride 2025: Pink

HAPPY PRIDE 2025! For Pride this year, we’re changing up our usual rec lists. Instead of doing books with specific identities or themes, we’re focused this time on cover color! Throughout the month of June, we’ll be doing 8 rec lists, each with covers inspired by one of the colors of the original Gilbert Baker Pride Flag. We drew a little additional inspiration from the meaning behind the color and why it was included in the original LGBTQIA+ flag (in this case, hot pink = sex), but we prioritized color over meaning. That said, there are definitely a few steamy stories in this load of pink tales! In a few days, we’ll be back with our second post – red – but until then, check out this whole bunch of awesome pink-covered queer books.

Poke a bigot in the eye! Read and recommend queer books this month.

Current Mood: busy

ericcoleman posting in

filk

Josefin Berger, Brimstone Rhine, Moss Bliss, Joey Shoji, Julia Ecklar, February Sky, Technical Difficulties, Terence Chua, Cats Laughing, The Shake Ups, Vixy & Tony

Available on iTunes, Google Play and most other places you can get podcasts. We can be heard Wednesday at 6am and 9pm Central on scifi.radio.

filkcast.com

ysabetwordsmith

Today is mostly sunny, windy, and hot. :P A beautiful day to stay indoors and write! :D Today is the Poetry Fishbowl on "Gentleness Is Strength" if you want to drop by and join the fun.

I fed the birds. I've seen a mixed flock of sparrows and houses finches plus a grackle.

I put out water for the birds. Honeybees are mobbing the small metal birdbath again.

EDIT 6/3/25 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

EDIT 6/3/25 -- I watered the old picnic table, patio plants, new picnic table, and septic garden.

The temperature has cooled off considerably.

EDIT 6/3/25 -- I watered the septic garden and the notch in the prairie garden.

EDIT 6/3/25 -- I watered the savanna seedlings.

EDIT 6/3/25 -- I watered the new picnic table and the patio plants, which seemed most in need of water.

I've seen at least one fairly large bat flying around. :D

As it is getting dark, I am done for the night.

Current Mood: busy

rolanni

It just today occurred to me, as I was finishing with putting the remainder of the ten-days-away, err -- away, that I had failed to show y'all the reason for the trip, which was to receive this:

krisbiz_feed

Posted by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

https://kriswrites.com/2025/06/03/a-fun-book-trailer/

https://kriswrites.com/?p=36527

I’m having a blast working on book trailers when WMG does Kickstarters. I just completed this book trailer for Dean’s Kickstarter, which launched today. I hope you enjoy the video and I hope it inspires you to look at the Kickstarter! Lots of cool stuff there. (Click here for the Kickstarter)

https://kriswrites.com/2025/06/03/a-fun-book-trailer/

https://kriswrites.com/?p=36527

wwdn_feed

Posted by Wil

https://wilwheaton.net/2025/06/behind-his-eyes-he-says-i-still-exist/

https://wilwheaton.net/?p=9567

This thing has been happening to me since I built my first blog about 25 years ago, and you’d think that by now it would have stopped, but here we are.

The longer I go between posts, the more SUPER IMPORTANT the next post becomes. This is especially gross after I’ve been promoting something. I feel like I’ve bombarded the world with my promotional stuff, so I ought to give the world something to offset that.

…only when I sit down to do that, the part of me that creates those things is like, “Oh hell no. I’m on vacation.”

So I come in here, day after day, get to about this point in a post just like this one, and then I get frustrated, delete it, and go play video games.

I have to break that cycle, so here’s a little bit of a roundup to put something new here.

Yesterday, I finished building the LEGO Batmobile, which I started months ago. It has some adorable little details that were a lot of fun to discover, but holy shit was it tedious most of the time. It turns out that building vehicles, even one that I have been obsessed with since I was a little kid, is not something I enjoy.

I think I’m doing the Haunted House next.

If you’d told me a year ago that the Stanley Cup final in 2025 would be the same teams from 2024, I never would have believed you, and once again I am cheering for Florida because Edmonton is literally the only Canadian team I just can’t abide. Sorry, Oilers Nation, but fuck Corey Perry.¹

Remember Trek Side of the Moon? It’s back, in T-shirt form.

I loved the movie, but am very late to the What We Do In The Shadows series party, so I’m only now getting into its third season. A couple nights ago, I watched an episode that takes them to Atlantic City. Nandor gets completely hooked on a Big Bang Theory slot machine, and is delighted to discover that there is a television series that is “faithful to the slot machine.”²

The thing is … because The Big Bang Theory canonically exists inside the What We Do In The Shadowsverse, that means I exist inside that universe. This feels like an achievement that should come with a badge, and it makes me stupidly happy.³

Late last week,I saw that Loretta Swit passed away. We worked together when I was a kid, and I remembered some things about her.

A friend of mine observed that we are slowly becoming the Elders, and that’s just really weird. I have been thinking about that, and it turns out there is a lot about that I’m not really ready to embrace, like accepting that people I love, who mean so much to me, are getting older (and elderly) with all that implies. It’s just … it’s really weird. At the same time, it feels really good and … gentle? … to embrace a position in life that allows me to be a kind, patient, supportive, and encouraging person in the world for anyone who needs it.

I’m thinking a lot about how I can talk about things from a place of experience, in a way that younger me would have been able to hear and internalize. I want to be a Helper so much, y’all.

I had a meeting with my team to discuss next steps on It’s Storytime. The audience is small but passionate, and growing steadily. I think we’ve found a way to make it break even, or slightly better, while the audience continues to grow. Thank you to everyone who is supporting the show on Patreon, to everyone who has liked and subscribed and whatnot. It looks like the audience is right around 20,000 listeners which seems like a lot to me, and something I feel really good about! But you know what’s crazy? In the podcast world, it’s tiny. Isn’t that nuts?

When I was walking Marlowe, I came across this weirdly bent spoon in the street, so I posted it in my Instagram stories with the caption “If anyone sees Uri Gellar, tell him I found his spoon.”⁴

I think this is a pretty good joke.

I watched a fantastic film a couple nights ago, about the post-punk scene in West Berlin from 1979-1989, called B-Movie: Lust & Sound. It’s streaming all over the place, and if you like the same kind of music and aesthetics that I do, it’s probably worth your time.

I think that’s all for now. Have a good day, friends.

Also, Florida sent 9 players to Four Nations, and Four Nations was the most exciting and satisfying hockey tournament I have ever seen. So there’s that. ︎
I love how this show keeps surprising me like this. The first time, it was throwing the bone off the roof in the werewolf fight. I never saw it coming, and it just killed me. ︎
I also exist inside Tommy Westphal’s snow globe, but that doesn’t feel as exclusive. They’ll let anybody into that thing. They let me in there! ︎
If you get this reference, that means it’s time to schedule a colonoscopy, if you haven’t already. And make sure you’re getting enough vitamin D, because our aging bodies need it. ︎

https://wilwheaton.net/2025/06/behind-his-eyes-he-says-i-still-exist/

https://wilwheaton.net/?p=9567

ysabetwordsmith

The Poetry Fishbowl is now CLOSED. Thank you for your time and attention. Please keep an eye on this page as I am still writing.

Starting now, the Poetry Fishbowl is open! Today's theme is "Gentleness Is Strength." I will be checking this page periodically throughout the day. When people make suggestions, I'll pick some and weave them together into a poem ... and then another ... and so on. I'm hoping to get a lot of ideas and a lot of poems.

I'll be soliciting ideas for caregivers, first responders, clergy, outreach workers, philanthropists, an anonymous benefactor, activists, volunteers, teachers, parents, comares, strongmen, tough guys, superheroes, supervillains, other gentle and strong people, caregiving, feeding each other, babysitting, brushing or braiding hair, catching someone who's falling, lifting heavy things, volunteering, supporting people in hard times, offering crash space, helping someone move, creating intimacy, making friends, getting to know each other, cooking together, discovering things, improvising, adapting, cooperating, bartering, sharing, fixing what's broke, changing the world, accomplishing the impossible, Triton Teen Centers, the Peace Store, charities, homeless shelters, clothing banks, food pantries, soup kitchens, sobering centers, mentor circles, support groups, gyms, churches, sharehouses, intentional communities, other polyhomes, social justice departments in schools, clubs, quiet rooms, inclusive workplaces, Thalassia, the Maldives, community gardens, other helper hangouts, self-control, intentional neighboring, altruism, harm reduction, diversity, inclusivity, activist symbols, interfaith work, family dynamics, alternative family structures, partnerships not based on sex/romance, emotional closeness, first contact, rescue, interspecies relationships, trial and error, teamwork, found family, complementary strengths and weaknesses, personal growth, and poetic forms in particular.

Currently eligible bingo card(s) for donors wishing to sponsor a square:

Pride Fest Bingo Card 6-2-25

Among my more relevant series for the main theme:

The Blueshift Troupers travel the galaxy helping colonies solve problems.

Clay of Life depends on the friendship between a blacksmith and a golem.

Daughters of the Apocalypse relies a lot on kindness for survival.

Frankenstein's Family has diverse subgroups interacting, of which the vampires in particular are gentle with others.

The Moon Door features a women's chronic pain support group, which is all about being gentle with each other.

One God's Story of Mid-Life Crisis is about Shaeth learnng how to take care of his new followers.

Path of the Paladins balances gentleness and strength.

Peculiar Obligations is about Quakers and pirates learning to help each other.

Polychrome Heroics is largely about people helping people. Threads particularly focused on this include Antimatter and Stalwart Stan, Aquariana, the Big One, Iron Horses, Officer Pink, Rutledge, and Trichromatic Attachments.

Quixotic Ideas is fantasy with a gentle angle.

Schrodinger's Heroes save the world from alternate dimensions, and they take care of each other.

Or you can ask for something new.

Linkbacks reveal a verse of any open linkback poem.

( Read more... )

Current Mood: creative

smartbitches_feed

Posted by Amanda

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/06/naomi-novik-hockey-romance-more/

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=145829

House of Earth and Blood

House of Earth and Blood by Sarah J. Maas is $4.99! We did two podcast episodes with Sarah over the pandemic, if you missed them. Ellen wrote a fantastic review and gave it a B-:

When I started this book, I was expecting a jam-packed, over-the top fantasy with a lot of snark and heart. And House of Earth and Blood did deliver that, even if there were some missteps in execution. If you’ve enjoyed Maas’ other books, and if you can handle all the violence and slavery and slut-shaming, it’s worth it to push through the awkward beginning and the dragging bits in the middle for big payoff at the end.

#1 New York Times bestselling author Sarah J. Maas launches her brand-new CRESCENT CITY series with House of Earth and Blood: the story of half-Fae and half-human Bryce Quinlan as she seeks revenge in a contemporary fantasy world of magic, danger, and searing romance.

Half-Fae, half-human Bryce Quinlan loves her life. By day, she works for an antiquities dealer, selling barely legal magical artifacts, and by night, she parties with her friends, savoring every pleasure Lunathion—otherwise known as Crescent City— has to offer. But it all comes crumbling down when a ruthless murder shakes the very foundations of the city—and Bryce’s world.

Two years later, her job has become a dead end, and she now seeks only blissful oblivion in the city’s most notorious nightclubs. But when the murderer attacks again, Bryce finds herself dragged into the investigation and paired with an infamous Fallen angel whose own brutal past haunts his every step.

Hunt Athalar, personal assassin for the Archangels, wants nothing to do with Bryce Quinlan, despite being ordered to protect her. She stands for everything he once rebelled against and seems more interested in partying than solving the murder, no matter how close to home it might hit. But Hunt soon realizes there’s far more to Bryce than meets the eye—and that he’s going to have to find a way to work with her if they want to solve this case.

As Bryce and Hunt race to untangle the mystery, they have no way of knowing the threads they tug ripple through the underbelly of the city, across warring continents, and down to the darkest levels of Hel, where things that have been sleeping for millennia are beginning to stir…

With unforgettable characters and page-turning suspense, this richly inventive new fantasy series by #1 New York Times bestselling author Sarah J. Maas delves into the heartache of loss, the price of freedom—and the power of love.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

You can find ordering info for this book here.

The Hook Up

The Hook Up by Kristen Callihan is $1.99 or $2.99 depending on the vendor! This is a new adult romance with a one night stand/friends with benefits trope and a football-playing hero. This is the first book in the Game On series, which I’ve enjoyed. This has a cover redesign and a new ISBN, so double check if you have this on under its old info.

The rules: no kissing on the mouth, no staying the night, no telling anyone, and above all… No falling in love

Anna Jones just wants to finish college and figure out her life. Falling for star quarterback Drew Baylor is certainly not on her to do list. Confident and charming, he lives in the limelight and is way too gorgeous for his own good. If only she could ignore his heated stares and stop thinking about doing hot and dirty things with him. Easy right?

Too bad he’s committed to making her break every rule…

Football has been good to Drew. It’s given him recognition, two National Championships, and the Heisman. But what he really craves is sexy yet prickly Anna Jones. Her cutting humor and blatant disregard for his fame turns him on like nothing else. But there’s one problem: she’s shut him down. Completely.
That is until a chance encounter leads to the hottest sex of their lives, along with the possibility of something great. Unfortunately, Anna wants it to remain a hook up. Now it’s up to Drew to tempt her with more: more sex, more satisfaction, more time with him. Until she’s truly hooked. It’s a good thing Drew knows all about winning.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

You can find ordering info for this book here.

Uprooted

RECOMMENDED: Uprooted by Naomi Novik is $1.99! A lot of people have recommended this book and Novik’s writing, but some readers did mention on Goodreads that the book is a bit slow at times. Do you love Novik’s writing? What did you think of this one?

“Our Dragon doesn’t eat the girls he takes, no matter what stories they tell outside our valley. We hear them sometimes, from travelers passing through. They talk as though we were doing human sacrifice, and he were a real dragon. Of course that’s not true: he may be a wizard and immortal, but he’s still a man, and our fathers would band together and kill him if he wanted to eat one of us every ten years. He protects us against the Wood, and we’re grateful, but not that grateful.”

Agnieszka loves her valley home, her quiet village, the forests and the bright shining river. But the corrupted Wood stands on the border, full of malevolent power, and its shadow lies over her life.

Her people rely on the cold, driven wizard known only as the Dragon to keep its powers at bay. But he demands a terrible price for his help: one young woman handed over to serve him for ten years, a fate almost as terrible as falling to the Wood.

The next choosing is fast approaching, and Agnieszka is afraid. She knows—everyone knows—that the Dragon will take Kasia: beautiful, graceful, brave Kasia, all the things Agnieszka isn’t, and her dearest friend in the world. And there is no way to save her.

But Agnieszka fears the wrong things. For when the Dragon comes, it is not Kasia he will choose.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

You can find ordering info for this book here.

Fly with Me

Fly with Me by Andie Burke is $2.99! This is a f/f romance, which was mentioned in Dahlia’s monthly queer romance roundup. There’s some fake dating, if that’s your catnip.

A one-way ticket to love or a bumpy ride ahead?

Flying-phobic ER nurse Olive Murphy is still gripping the armrest from her first-ever take-off when the pilot announces an in-flight medical emergency. Olive leaps into action and saves a life, but ends up getting stuck in the airport hours away from the marathon she’s running in honor of her brother. Luckily for her, Stella Soriano, the stunning type A copilot, offers to give her a ride.

After the two spend a magical day together, Stella makes a surprising Will Olive be her fake girlfriend?

A video of Olive saving a life has gone viral and started generating big sales for Stella’s airline. Stella sees their union as the perfect opportunity to get to the boys’ club executives at her company who keep overlooking her for a long-deserved promotion. Realizing this arrangement could help her too, Olive dives into memorizing Stella’s comically comprehensive three-ring-binder guide to fake dating. As the two grow closer, what’s supposed to be a ruse feels more and more real. Could this be the romantic ride of their lives, or an epic crash and burn?

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

You can find ordering info for this book here.

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/06/naomi-novik-hockey-romance-more/

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=145829

smartbitches_feed

Posted by Amanda

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/06/habo-class-difference-romance-with-a-peach-farm/

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=145771

This HaBO is from Sandra, who is looking for this contemporary romance:

I’m looking for a book. I can’t remember if it was Harlequin Presents, but it is a category romance.

The hero used to be in military and owns some land. The heroine goes there, but I don’t remember why.

Fast forward: they are in a relationship and she takes him to a ritzy party where her father puts him down. Hero finds out she lied to him. In the end, she convinces him that he’s more important than her status and in the epilogue she’s pregnant and eating peaches from their farm.

Another detail I remember is she tells him she’s wearing stockings when they are at the party.

Let’s HaBO!

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/06/habo-class-difference-romance-with-a-peach-farm/

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=145771

rolanni

What went before One: Yanno? I'm finished for the day. No, I don't have a localer doctor. None of the doctors that are less than 50 miles away are taking new patients, which isn't surprising, really. I have my name on a "Hub" list, which I'm going to have to count as . . . a winnish sort of outcome.

Waiting for the plumber and will be going to Reny's and to Hannaford after that window closes.

What went before Two: I keep forgetting that if you want something today, you don't go to a store for it.

So the plumber came by and fixed the toilet situation. I gotta get me one of those air-harpoons. I went to Staples, because I wanted an SD card that cost less than the Earth today, then to Home Despot, which also did not have what I wanted. I will now be buying these items online.

I have newly washed clothes to put away and socks to dry, Coon Cat Happy Hour to serve up, and a glass of wine to find. Maybe two glasses of wine. Three? It could happen.

Everybody stay safe; I'll see you tomorrow.

Tuesday. Sunny and gonna be warm. Trash and recycling at the curb. Windows OPEN in my office.

Breakfast was rice crackers with cream cheese, strawberries on the side, putting the kettle on for my second cup of tea.

Laundry's almost done. I need to clear the dishwasher and change out at least one cat fountain, do my Greater Duty to the cats, and also do some banking/accounting. I should go to sewing circle this evening so I don't get out of the habit, and! going will force me to choose new project from those I have on-hoard. Oh, and I promised the guy at Houle's I'd stop by the showroom today.

Busy, busy.

One of the ... remarkable -- because I'm about to remark upon it -- aspects of coming home is how pleased I am to have My Own Stuff around me. And while I was Right to take a "studio" at Corning, and Corel dishes are perfectly reasonable, it was almost an active pleasure this morning to reach into the cabinet and pull out a proper purple-glazed dessert plate for my crackers, and the right little bowl for the strawberries.

So, that's what's going on around here -- I still have way too much Stuff to do, but I can kind of see a glimmer, looking forward, which might be what I like to call Normalcy.

Today's blog post title courtesy of Fleetwood Mac, "I don't wanna know"

Three cats in my office; one in the dining room, adjacent to my office, sitting in my chair. Of course.

smartbitches_feed

Posted by Amanda

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/06/hide-your-wallet-june-3rd-release-week/

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=145795

Happy Tuesday!

June is looking up to a pretty beefy month. Lots of sci-fi on our radar this month, plus a contemporary retelling, historical romance, and some mysteries.

Which releases are on your radar this week? Let us know in the comments!

Bald-Faced Liar

Author: Victoria Helen Stone
Released: June 1, 2025 by Lake Union Publishing
Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Living a lie becomes a matter of life and death for a woman hiding from her past in a novel of mounting psychological suspense by the bestselling author of Jane Doe and The Hook.

Traveling nurse Elizabeth May has a promising new home in Santa Cruz. And another new identity. It’s a pattern of reinvention for a woman escaping her traumatic childhood—and hiding from the decades of notoriety and destruction that followed. Invisibility has kept Elizabeth safe. Until now. After all these years, someone sees her for who she is.

Threat by threat, a vengeful stalker is dismantling Elizabeth’s carefully constructed lifetime of lies. And no one in her temporary circle can be trusted—not her fleeting new love interest, not the supportive friend she knows only from online forums, and certainly not the police. They’ve never been there for her.

As fear sharpens to terror, Elizabeth soon discovers something about her past that even she didn’t know. The revelation could finally set her on a path of healing and redemption. Or, now alone in the dark, it could be Elizabeth’s worst nightmare.

Victoria Helen Stone’s latest thriller!

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

Find buy links for this book here..

Homemaker

Author: Ruthie Knox
Released: June 1, 2025 by Thomas & Mercer
Genre: Mystery/Thriller
Series: Prairie Nightingale #1

When a former friend and devoted mother vanishes, a confident homemaker turned amateur sleuth follows an unexpected trail of scandals and secrets to find her.

Prairie Nightingale is both the midlife mother of two teenage girls and a canny entrepreneur who has turned homemaking into a salaried profession. She’s also fascinated with the gritty details of other people’s lives. So when seemingly perfect Lisa Radcliffe, a member of her former mom-friends circle, suddenly disappears, it’s in Prairie’s nature to find out why.

Given her innate talent for vital pattern recognition, Prairie is out to catch a few clues by taking a long, hard look at everyone in Lisa’s life—and uncovering their secrets. Including Lisa’s. Prairie’s dogged curiosity is especially irritating to FBI agent Foster Rosemare, the first interesting man Prairie has met since her divorce. His square jaw and sharp suits don’t hurt.

But even as the investigation begins to wreak havoc on Prairie’s carefully tended homelife, she’s resolved to use her multivalent homemaking skills to solve the mystery of a missing mom—and along the way discover the thrill of her new sleuthing ambitions.

Sarah: Ruthie Knox has written some romances I’ve loved, and now she’s writing a mystery with Annie Mare. Prairie Nightingale is a homemaker, and when one of the moms in her friend group disappears, she investigates.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

Want this book? Here are helpful buy links..

Cosmic Love at the Multiverse Hair Salon

Author: Annie Mare
Released: June 3, 2025 by Ace
Genre: LGBTQIA, Time Travel, Romance, Science Fiction/Fantasy

A multiverse novel about two women who fall in love despite living in worlds that are five months apart, as they try to find a timeline that doesn’t end in disaster, in this debut novel by Annie Mare.

Tressa Fay Robeson has never been shy, which is how she’s made a name for herself as an in-demand hairstylist and social media star. So she can admit that spending her days at her hair salon and her nights with her tight-knit group of friends (and one grumpy cat) is not the kind of exciting life she’d hoped for.

When a misdirected text from a stranger leads to a flirty exchange, she surprises herself by suggesting an impulsive meetup. But the woman, Meryl, never shows. Tressa Fay brushes it off—until Meryl’s sister and friend show up at the salon demanding to know what’s going on. Because, you see, there’s no way Meryl could have texted her. Meryl has been missing for a month.

Tressa Fay and her tight-knit group of friends soon discover they aren’t dealing with a catfish, but a temporal paradox. As they come to terms with the idea of parallel universes, they realize how many times their paths have crossed like this before. But even as they understand the multiverse more and more, nothing keeps Meryl from vanishing.

As it draws closer to the moment of Meryl’s disappearance, there’s only one question Have they done enough to change the outcome, or have they done so much that none of them will make it past that fateful day in September?

Tara: I’ve enjoyed some other multiverse stories, so I’m looking forward to checking out this take.

Elyse: The premise of this book sounds trippy and reminds me vaguely of Griffin and Sabine.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

Find buy links for this book here..

I’ll Pretend You’re Mine

Author: Tashie Bhuiyan
Released: June 3, 2025 by HarperCollins
Genre: Contemporary Romance, LGBTQIA, Romance, Young Adult

Summer Ali has been making a name for herself in the music industry for years, slowly but surely climbing the charts—but the world doesn’t know her stage parents are the ones who molded her entire public persona. Finally eighteen, Summer breaks free of their control and focuses on creating her own path.

Upon running into writer’s block, Summer grows eager to take any opportunity to shake things up—even if it means agreeing to a PR stunt with child-actor-turned-playboy, Jules Moradi, famous for his tabloid escapades.

At first, Jules keeps his distance, maintaining professional boundaries. But as time passes, his walls come down, and Summer uncovers who he is beyond his reputation, and it’s someone more like her than she ever realized. As the lines blur between fake and real, Summer begins questioning who she is and what she wants—and if her dreams are worth sacrificing her heart.

Elyse: I love a celebrity romance.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

Want this book? Here are helpful buy links..

Of Monsters and Mainframes

Author: Barbara Truelove
Released: June 3, 2025 by Bindery Books
Genre: Horror, LGBTQIA, Paranormal, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Spaceships aren’t programmed to seek revenge—but for Dracula, Demeter will make an exception.

Demeter just wants to do her job: shuttling humans between Earth and Alpha Centauri. Unfortunately, her passengers keep dying—and not from equipment failures, as her AI medical system, Steward, would have her believe. These are paranormal murders, and they began when one nasty, ancient vampire decided to board Demeter and kill all her humans.

To keep from getting decommissioned, Demeter must join forces with her own team: A werewolf. An engineer built from the dead. A pharaoh with otherworldly powers. A vampire with a grudge. A fleet of cheerful spider drones. Together, this motley crew will face down the ultimate evil—Dracula.

The queer love child of pulp horror and classic sci-fi, Of Monsters and Mainframes is a dazzling, heartfelt odyssey that probes what it means to be one of society’s monsters—and explores the many types of friendship that make us human.

Amanda: A sentient ship out to kill Dracula. What amazing fever dream is this?!

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

Want this book? Here are helpful buy links..

The Unmapping

Author: Denise Robbins
Released: June 3, 2025 by Bindery Books
Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy

Intimate and spellbinding, The Unmapping is a character-driven, literary speculative exploration of a city’s descent into chaos and confusion, perfect for fans of Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel and Exit West by Mohsin Hamid.

4 a.m., New York City. A silent disaster.

There is no flash of light, no crumbling, no quaking. Each person in New York wakes up on an unfamiliar block when the buildings all switch locations overnight. The power grid has snapped, thousands of residents are missing, and the Empire State Building is on Coney Island—for now. The next night, it happens again.

Esme Green and Arjun Varma work for the City of New York’s Emergency Management team and are tasked with disaster response for the Unmapping. As Esme tries to wade through the bureaucratic nightmare of an endlessly shuffling city, she’s distracted by the ongoing search for her missing fiancé. Meanwhile, Arjun focuses on the ground-level rescue of disoriented New Yorkers, hoping to become the hero the city needs.

While scientists scramble to find a solution—or at least a means to cope—and mysterious “red cloak” cults crop up in the disaster’s wake, New York begins to reckon with a new reality no one recognizes. For Esme and Arjun, the fight to hold the city together will mean tackling questions about themselves that they were too afraid to ask—and facing answers they never expected. With themes of climate change, political unrest, and life in a state of emergency, The Unmapping is a timely and captivating debut.

Amanda: This sounds trippy and really interesting.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

Want this book? Here are helpful buy links..

Worth Fighting For

Author: Jesse Sutanto
Released: June 3, 2025 by Hyperion Avenue
Genre: Contemporary Romance, Romance
Series: Meant to Be #5

Laugh and swoon with the next book in Disney’s Meant to Be collection by bestselling and award-winning author Jesse Q. Sutanto, whose novel Dial A For Aunties Emily Henry called “Utterly clever, deeply funny, and altogether charming.”

Mulan is reimagined as a contemporary romance about family expectations, mistaken identity, and high stakes mergers—of both business and the heart.

As the right hand of her father’s hedge fund company, Fa Mulan knows what it takes to succeed as a woman in a man’s work twice as hard, be twice as smart, and burp twice as loud as any of the other finance bros she works with. So when her father unexpectedly falls ill in the middle of a critical acquisition, she is determined to see it through. There’s just one the family company in question is known for its ultra masculine whiskey brand, and the brood of old-fashioned aunts, uncles, and cousins who run it—lead by the dedicated but overworked Shang—will only trust Mulan’s father, Fa Zhou, with the future of their business.

Rather than fail the deal and her father, Mulan pretends she’s Fa Zhou. Since they’ve only corresponded over email, how hard could it be to keep things moving in his absence?

But the email leads to a face-to-face meeting, which leads to an invitation to a week long retreat at Shang’s family ranch. One meeting she can handle, but a whole week of cattle wrangling, axe-throwing, and learning proper butchering techniques, all while trying to convince Shang’s dubious family that this young woman is the powerful hedge fund CEO they’ve been negotiating with? Not so much—especially as she finds it harder and harder to ignore the undeniable spark between her and Shang.

Can she keep her head in the game and make her father proud, all while trying not to fall into a trough, or in love with Shang?

Amanda: Mulan is my favorite Disney princess, so I’m stoked for this.

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

Want this book? We can help: buy links ahoy!.

A Most Unlikely Lady

Author: Darcy McGuire
Released: June 6, 2025 by Boldwood Books
Genre: Historical: European, Romance
Series: The Queen's Deadly Damsels #4

Preorder the BRAND NEW instalment in Darcy McGuire’s gorgeously funny, spicy romance series, featuring Queen Victoria’s Deadly Damsels! She may be innocent…but she’s also deadly!

When seemingly fragile Miss Ivy Cavendale takes the headmistress position in an orphanage, it is her chance to stay anonymous in society. But not all is what it seems with Miss Ivy. When an intruder breaks in one night, she’s quick to draw her weapon, and while fear – her constant companion – has mysteriously disappeared, one thing is very she and her charges are the next target of The Devil’s Sons.

Commissioner Edward Worthington owes the head of The Queen’s Deadly Damsels a debt. So, he must keep an eye on the Duchess’s new protégé. How much trouble can the shy Miss Cavendale be? Rather a lot, actually. The diminutive wallflower has been overlooked and forgotten by society’s elite, but Edward sees a woman full of fascinating contradictions he’s compelled to unravel.

Burdened by secrets and childhood trauma, Ivy is stunned as Edward ignites a breathless curiosity within her. And when he asks her to join forces to identify the dangerous intruder at The Widow’s Ball, she cannot refuse. She may not trust many, but something tells her she should trust Edward… with more than just this mission.

Lara: I’m intrigued…

Add to Goodreads To-Read List →

Want to order this one? We’ve got the links you need!.

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/06/hide-your-wallet-june-3rd-release-week/

https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=145795

bookviewcafe_feed

Posted by News Editor

https://bookviewcafe.com/bvc-announces-a-sea-of-stars-and-trouble-by-maya-kaathryn-bohnhoff/

https://bookviewcafe.com/?p=18792

A Sea of Stars and Trouble by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

A Sea of Stars and Trouble
by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

“Who am I?” For some people, this is a philosophical question. For “Trouble” Matthews, it’s an existential one. And knowing the answer could be just as deadly as not knowing.

Shanghaied onto a smuggler’s ship, Trouble is swept up in a blur of intrigue, piracy, and danger, complicated by his emergent memories … and an array of obviously augmented physical and mental skills of which strength, quickness, enhanced vision and hearing are merely the tip of the iceberg.

The good news is, Trouble does get off the planet. The bad news? His growing list of specialized skills raises an urgent question: Why? Why would he have had these particular mods done … or why were they done to him? As he tries to peer deeper into his own memories, Trouble is less and less sure that he wants to know the truth about them or discover why his dreams are haunted by a child’s laughter.

____

Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff is the New York Times Bestselling author of The Antiquities Hunter and Star Wars Legends: The Last Jedi (with Michael Reaves). She writes science fiction and fantasy as the result of a horrible childhood trauma involving a robot named Gort. Maya performs, and records original music with her husband, Jeff.

Buy A Sea of Stars and Trouble at the BVC bookstoreRead a Sample

1 / Birthday

He was born as he walked the road into Porphyry.

At least, that’s where he was when he remembered that his name was Ridley. Three steps later, he remembered that Ridley was his first name and that Matthews was the surname that went with it. Other than that, he knew of his newborn self only that he was wearing a once-blue shirt, gray breeks, and tall boots covered by a disreputable knee-length coat of indeterminate color that was vented at the sides and back.

He patted the vents over his thighs and had the vague sense that something was missing. A money pouch? A holster? A scabbard for a laz-blade? He glanced down at his hands. No rings. No tattoos. Nothing but a faint scar that ran along the inside of one wrist. He couldn’t remember how he’d gotten it.

The air roared with the distant lift-off of a starship. He stopped and watched it soar toward the clouds—through them—its keel gleaming blue. The port was straight ahead, behind the walls of a city that sat on and among a range of low, rolling hills. He estimated the distance to the wall at about 400 meters and change.

Ridley knew something else about himself then—he wanted to get to the spaceport and off this world.

Which was … what?

He did a 360 on the shoulder of the unnaturally smooth road. It had no potholes, cracks or blemishes and somehow he knew the surface was smooth to the millimeter, though he had no idea how he knew it. Beyond the road lay chaos; brackish fields and wetlands stretched out behind him; a forest of towering, crooked trees lay on one side of the road; a fen with waving reeds twice his height spread out on the other. Ahead of him, the dingy gray walls of the huge citadel rose in front of him and disappeared into the equally gray distance in both directions.

Ah. There was a sign over the gate this roadway led to: Welcome to Porphyry.

Right.

Porphyry. A port town on … he racked his brain.

Nothing.

His lack of coherent memory didn’t bother him too much. It would come to him eventually, he figured. He faced the city gate and began walking again, assiduously trying not to be mowed down by a variety of vehicles that were scurrying out of the twilight into the safety of the city.

He glanced back over his shoulder at the tall, waving grasses of the fen. Why was everybody in such a hurry? Did the gates—

He heard a siren go off ahead. Yellow lights flashed along the top of the gate that bracketed the roadway.

—close at dusk?

He ran, the tails of his coat flapping in the dank air. As he slipped through the pedestrian gate, barely saving the tails of his coat, he remembered something else about himself—he was running from something. Not whatever lived in the marshes beyond the city, but something else. Suddenly, his lack of coherent memory bothered him a great deal. He stepped into the shadow of the wall and searched his pockets. He found nothing. Not a credit tab, no ID, no weaponry.

The gate he’d entered through had been roughly three meters wide and constructed of aging stone with a newer metal insert. Clearly not a main access to the city. The section of Porphyry within it was a maze. This might be good, given his impression that he was on the run from … something. The streets were narrow, the buildings old, huddled together, and decrepit. Their layout was jumbled and confusing—like a random scatter of toy blocks.

He knew about toy blocks, he realized. Knew small children played with them. Knew the sound of a child’s laughter. He scrambled after the happy/sad thought, then let it go in favor of dealing with his immediate situation. He seemed to recall that he trusted his sense of direction, but as darkness fell, he found he’d gone around in a convoluted circle without having realized it. It was like being lost in another dimension where the normal rules of geography did not apply. Or maybe the problem was in his addled brain.

He had apparently wandered into a dead zone. There was a distinct lack of lighting. Only the full moon, hanging huge and bloated in the sky overhead, cast its pale green light here. It was enough light to inform him that there was no one around to ask for the quickest route to the spaceport. There was no traffic. The shops were shuttered. The streets were deserted, as if the denizens of Porphyry had as much to fear within its walls as beyond them. Yet, in the distance he could hear the hum of a main thoroughfare, far-off sirens, the thunder of starship launch engines.

He looked up, scanning the facades of the buildings nearest him. Standing on a balcony some yards down the street was a cluster of robed figures, several of whom were looking right at him. Well, at least their hooded heads were turned in his direction. He couldn’t see their faces. Unsettling. The ones that weren’t looking at him were speaking into communicators of some sort.

P-comms, said his piecemeal memory. Short for … something that started with a P.

The hair on the back of Ridley’s neck rose, tingling, and he knew with sudden certainty that someone was behind him. He turned just in time to catch the merest glance of a gray-robed figure gripping a static-spitting staff before a jolt of freezing energy took him down. He hit the roadway like a rock and curled into a ball, bracing himself against the chill, tingling shock. Oddly, after a moment, the shock morphed into something eerily pleasant. In fact, he felt better than he had in a long time … or at least for the past hour or so.

He’d had some expectation of the effects of the weapon based, he assumed, on prior experience—but the charge from this staff was causing his brain to explode, not with pain, but with a sense of contentment and well-being. He was suffused with a bliss so potent it was terrifying—or would have been if it didn’t feel so damn good. Even the fact that he was probably about to die failed to penetrate the (insane) conviction that Ridley Matthews was profoundly right with the Universe and was fulfilling a purpose that surely had been preordained since the beginning of his existence—perhaps even the beginning of time. Everything he had ever done or experienced, whether or not he could remember it, had led inexorably to this moment, had put him just where he belonged.

He no longer felt any need to escape.

Like hell I don’t, snarled a dissenting inner voice.

He ignored it. The thought of his imminent death cheered him; he wouldn’t have to run anymore. He simply had to be, to allow events to unfold as God or the Universe had planned. So what if he didn’t know who the hell he was? He was complete on every conceivable plane of existence.

Bull shit. Bull Shit. BULL. SHIT.

He wasn’t complete. He was in a dangerous position for anyone to be in, even if they weren’t a complete blank. His anger was as unexpected as the false joy, but at least it was an honest emotion, not forced on him by a neural weapon.

He was surrounded by robed figures now, all carrying similar meter-long staffs. They were swaying from side to side and chanting: “Burn, burn, burn away. Confusion, sorrow, doubt and pain. Burn away. Burn away.”

Ridley gasped. Suppressing the alien bliss with a will, he stood, shaking hair out of his eyes. “Who are you? What did you do to me?”

The tallest of the monkish men—the one who’d zapped him—stopped chanting and stepped forward, seemingly surprised that their victim was speaking to them. His robe was decorated with symbols: crosses, pentagrams, cups, swords, several different kinds of stars and moons—a mishmash of religious icons from a dozen worlds and ages. Ridley could see the glitter of the man’s eyes within the hood.

Good. He had a face … which Ridley was much inclined to punch.

“We are the Druud,” the monk told him gravely. “The Brothers of the Rapture. We have shared the Rapture with you. You are blessed.”

His companions—there were five, all dressed in similar attire—repeated the words, “Rapture. Blessed.”

“Feel the burn, brother,” the Druud told him. “Feel the layers of your soul sear away until your true self is revealed.”

His true self. Did he want to know who or what that was? Something told him he’d been running for a while now, and until he knew what he was running from he’d just as soon leave his true self out of it.

“Why?” he gasped, feeling the burn. “Why attack me?”

The monk made a gesture with his staff. “We do not attack. We mean only to help you, brother.” He sounded sincere.

Ridley understood. They just wanted him to join them—to be part of their cult. To belong. To them, this wasn’t an assault, it was a conversion, not by faith, but by technology. Belonging wasn’t bad. Belonging was good. It was necessary. He had belonged … somewhere. Hadn’t he?

Ridley locked his eyes on the glowing tip of the Druud’s staff. Carrot and stick—both at once. Had they all been converted this way?

He had to wonder what made the conversions “stick”—frequent and repeated applications to weaken the mind and make it susceptible to the irresistible lure of inclusion? Was it a manipulation of the obvious loner’s supposedly deep-seated desire to belong? Or was it addiction they were counting on—the mad urge to feel this overwhelming sense of wellbeing again and again?

Ridley eyed the staff, afraid the monk would use it on him—equally afraid he wouldn’t. “Your rapture is false,” he said through gritted teeth. He took a step, meaning to slip between two of the back-up monks, but the tall Druud cut him off, raising his staff menacingly.

“You must obey the law! Neither heathen nor holy may walk these streets at night without dispensation.”

“What dispensation? I don’t even live here, and I’m on my way off-world. For the love of God, just let me go!”

The tall monk looked him in the eye and lowered his staff slightly.

“I am not a cruel man. The Brothers of the Rapture is not a cruel order. We strive for justice and mercy—for harmony. Our streets are not to be walked by outsiders after the sun has set. This is the holy time, and our spiritual discipline is not to be disrupted by the presence of those who do not believe. This is the law. Therefore, you must believe.”

Ah, the logic of insanity. Still, Ridley was cheered by the fact that Rapture Monk had not ended the sentence with “you must die”. That was something.

“Let me see if I’ve got this right. You’re zapping me into a religious experience because of a zoning ordinance?”

“Zoning ordinance? No,” said the Druud. “These are the Proprieties of Herron’s Hope. Here, in this sector of Porphyry, they are law.”

Herron’s Hope. That was the name of the planet. Right. He’d known that, hadn’t he?

The Druud lifted his staff again and thrust it toward his would-be convert. This time Ridley grabbed it right behind the muzzle. Lightning crackled the length of his arm. He set his teeth against the overwhelming joy that came with it, wrenched the staff from the monk’s grasp, and aimed a roundhouse kick at his head. Ridley’s booted foot connected with a solid thud and the big man went down hard. A second monk leapt to his brother’s defense, but Ridley completed his spinning move with a fist to the defender’s face. He barely felt the blow on his knuckles.

When he finally stopped moving, he was outside the circle of monks, who stood and gaped as if they’d never seen anyone fight happiness with such determination. The man he had punched was warily pulling himself to his feet.

Ridley twirled the purloined staff as if it were a baton. “Go away,” he said quietly, his voice a low rumble in his throat. He waited a beat, then added, “Please.”

They went, scattering across the empty street, into the alleys and around the corners, three of them dragging their groaning leader to safety. The men on the balcony, who had been watching these events, withdrew to the shadowy recesses of the building.

Buy A Sea of Stars and Trouble at the BVC bookstore

https://bookviewcafe.com/bvc-announces-a-sea-of-stars-and-trouble-by-maya-kaathryn-bohnhoff/

https://bookviewcafe.com/?p=18792