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excerpts

Short Pieces

Here, have an excerpt about Caitlin and Gabien

As I’ve been lamenting a bit on social media lately, this year has, creatively speaking, blown so many donkeys that I’m pretty sure there isn’t a single unsatisfied donkey between here and Spokane.

But Dara having been working so hard on her Overwatch fic as of late (a fic which, by the way, you should read, because it’s totally awesome and you can find it here) has been a prod to my own ability to write, I think. So I’ve been lately instituting my strategy of “ridiculously stupidly low daily word counts”, just for the sake of being able to say I’ve written something.

I’ve also returned to dealing with my still-due novellas for the Warder universe, in no small part because I’ve realized that I really need to write Caitlin Hallett and Gabien Desroches’ meeting before I can really have them appear properly in Warder Soul.

So I’m back in dealing with their story. And hey, here’s an excerpt! Caitlin’s coming out of a very spiky conversation with her father Thomas, a conversation which has not gone well. Caitlin’s looking to console herself by busking on George Street.

Except she’s got a surprise waiting for her. Muahaha.

Excerpt behind the fold!

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Short Pieces

Because Shawna Reppert tagged me, have an excerpt

I was tagged on Facebook by Shawna Reppert to post seven lines from page seven of a work in progress, so here y’all go. I am taking the liberty of interpreting “lines” as “paragraphs”, otherwise you barely get a taste of what this is about.

Here are seven paragraphs from most of page seven and a little of page eight of the still-untitled story about a psychic who must help a man solve the murder of his Warder sister.

***

“And I need more. I need to know what killed Edie, and where it is. You’re the only person I’ve found who can tell me that, Ms. Breckenridge. Will you help me?”

Much as I hated it, I felt myself start to tremble. The vision, brief as it had been, had hit me worse than any I could remember in the last five years; my knees were shaky, and my vision had hazed around its edges. Nor did it help that Taggart was still broadcasting emotions right into my skull, as if those deep blue eyes of his had locked onto me, like lasers. “No,” I croaked. “No. You’re going to go all vigilante, I’m not having any part of it!” His hands started to snap towards me, and I added, jerking back from his reach, “And if you lay a finger on me, I swear to God I will kick you right in the balls!”

He froze in place, and I didn’t even need the torrent out of his mind to read his desperation and regret. “I’m sorry! Okay, okay, I’ll go to the police. Promise! But I need something to take to them. Help me, Ms. Breckenridge. Please.”

“Mr. Taggart, I’m very sorry about your sister.” My voice was rising, growing shriller, but I didn’t care. Long experience was already warning me I had a devil of a headache on the way, and I wanted this man gone before it struck. “But you can’t know what you’re asking. Another vision like that will be a railroad spike right through my goddamn head, and I cannot afford to be unconscious when I have a shop to run!”

“After hours, then. Let me hire you. I’ll pay you triple whatever you usually charge your clients!”

Now it was my turn to freeze. No matter what beating my entire nervous system might take from seeking out the vision he was begging for, no matter how much I wanted to pick him bodily up and throw him right out the door, I couldn’t afford to turn him away. Not if he was bringing money into it. I was making more than you’d expect in an economic downturn—even when they couldn’t afford it, especially when they couldn’t afford it, people still sought me out for the comfort they thought I could provide. But all that really meant was that I barely kept ahead of my bills. Never mind perks like health insurance, or fixing the faulty plumbing in my tiny apartment above the shop, or eating regular, healthy meals more than once or twice a week.

Triple my usual rate wasn’t much, in the grand scheme of things. But it was enough to pay next month’s rent.

***

And there you have it. I don’t tag people on these things, but if you’re a fellow writer and you want to play, join in! And drop a comment on this post so anyone who reads me can come over and see your excerpt too!

Victory of the Hawk

And now, an excerpt from the tail end of Victory of the Hawk

Oh MAN, you guys. I want to gush at you about the tail end of this book so very, very much, and I can’t, because massive, and I do mean massive spoilers. But I will share with you this mostly context-free excerpt from the end of Chapter 18, about which I will simply say that this is the point in the Victory of the Hawk Movie In My Brain where the orchestra has just lain down some Okay, Shit Is Now About to Go Down ominous building chords.

If you’ve read the first two books, you’ll recognize the names of Kestar and Margaine. And yeah, let’s put this behind a cut, shall we? Since there is a spoiler here. Muahaha.

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