Indie authors
So Many Great Things to Read and So Little Time
image from https://www.artstation.com/stefankoidl
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From the UK, Australia, the US, and all over. Historians, gamers, writers, parents, and small business owners, and bloggers.
Indie fantasy takes all kinds of people to tell stories.
Indie authors are pictures of pure tenacity and multi-tasking. They are talented people who have to wear multiple hats. First, and most obviously author. They put their heart and soul on a page hoping to make a connection with their story. Secondly to be an author in today’s day and age you need to be a marketer. You have to get out their and tell people about your story. Thirdly, most indie author’s also have day jobs or families. They have to keep multiple plates spinning to keep their dreams going. They are amazing. I have some incredible author’s listed below who have put out amazing work in the last year. This is by no means all of them, but it is a good place to start if you are interested in reading gorgeous fantasy. Let me know what you think!
Angela Boord
Angela Boord published a handful of short stories in the early 2000s, then had a bunch of kids who are now all sleeping at night so she can write again. She lives in northwestern Mississippi with her husband and their nine kids, plus two dogs, one cat, and varying numbers of chickens.
FORTUNE’S FOOL, a twisty epic/historical fantasy set in a Renaissance-inspired world, is her debut novel. She is currently hard at work on more books in the Eterean Empire series and plans to release Book 1.5 in early 2020.
Check out my Indie Spotlight of Angela
Where to Find Them
Websitehttp://www.angelaboord.comTwitter@Angelaboord
Notable Work
A secret affair. A disfiguring punishment. A burning need for revenge.
Kyrra d’Aliente has a bad reputation and an arm made of metal.
Cast out of the safe and luxurious world of silk to which she was born, played as a pawn in a game of feuding Houses, Kyrra navigates a dangerous world of mercenaries, spies, and smugglers while disguising herself as a man…
M.L. Wang
The Theonite series is the product of over ten years of writing and research, combining all the things I love most about adventure, science fiction, and storytelling in general.
The Theonite Series:
– Theonite Book I: Planet Adyn
– Theonite Book II: Orbit
– Theonite Book III: City of Ghosts (coming 2020)
Standalone Companion Novels:
– The Sword of Kaigen
If you are curious about my work, you can read full chapters for free here or subscribe to my newsletter to receive news and short stories.
Where to Find Them
http://mlwangbooks.com/index.php
Notable Work
A mother struggling to repress her violent past,
A son struggling to grasp his violent future,
A father blind to the danger that threatens them all.
When the winds of war reach their peninsula, will the Matsuda family have the strength to defend their empire? Or will they tear each other apart before the true enemies even reach their shores?
A mother struggling to repress her violent past,
A son struggling to grasp his violent future,
A father blind to the danger that threatens them all.
When the winds of war reach their peninsula, will the Matsuda family have the strength to defend their empire? Or will they tear each other apart before the true enemies even reach their shores?
High on a mountainside at the edge of the Kaigenese Empire live the most powerful warriors in the world, superhumans capable of raising the sea and wielding blades of ice. For hundreds of years, the fighters of the Kusanagi Peninsula have held the Empire’s enemies at bay, earning their frozen spit of land the name ‘The Sword of Kaigen.’
Born into Kusanagi’s legendary Matsuda family, fourteen-year-old Mamoru has always known his purpose: to master his family’s fighting techniques and defend his homeland. But when an outsider arrives and pulls back the curtain on Kaigen’s alleged age of peace, Mamoru realizes that he might not have much time to become the fighter he was bred to be. Worse, the empire he was bred to defend may stand on a foundation of lies.
Misaki told herself that she left the passions of her youth behind when she married into the Matsuda house. Determined to be a good housewife and mother, she hid away her sword, along with everything from her days as a fighter in a faraway country. But with her growing son asking questions about the outside world, the threat of an impending invasion looming across the sea, and her frigid husband grating on her nerves, Misaki finds the fighter in her clawing its way back to the surface.
Deck Matthews
Deck Matthews is a pseudonym for one particular Matthew Ward. He is a life-long reader who fell in love with writing and fantasy in middle school. He remains an avid reader, a casual gamer and a dabbler in the visual arts. He has worked as a designer and currently spends his days neck-deep in code as a front-end web developer.
He also holds a Master’s degree in English Literature and currently resides in Ottawa, Canada with his wife, two daughters and one little fluff ball of a dog named Wicket.
Where to Find Them
Notable Work
How do you kill a shadow?
As a raging storm descends on the Blasted Coast, the crippled young rigger, Caleb Rusk, meets a stranger on the road. Little does he know that the encounter will pull him into a conflict that threatens everything he holds dear—and change the course of his life forever.
Meanwhile, in the Capital of Taralius, a string of inexplicable deaths have captured the attention of the Ember Throne. Second Corporal Avendor Tarcoth is tasked with uncovering the truth behind a danger that could threaten the very fabric of the Realm.
Alicia Wanstall-Burke
Living in Central Queensland, Australia, surrounded by coal mines, snakes, marsupials and a wide blue sky, Alicia is a writer, a mum and a cat-herder. There are rumours she may in fact be a quokka in disguise, but these are not to be believed.
She began writing in her teens and never grew out of the phase, working in her spare time until the birth of her son allowed her to focus on writing full time.
She has also dabbled in editing and blogging while completing a Bachelor of Education and studying a Post Graduate Certificate in Ancient History.
Where to Find Them
Notable Work
Lidan Tolak is the fiercest of her father’s daughters; more than capable of one day leading her clan. But caught between her warring parents, Lidan’s world begins to unravel when another of her father’s wives falls pregnant. Before she has time to consider the threat of a brother, a bloody swathe is cut through the heart of the clan and Lidan must fight, not only to prove her worth, but simply to survive.
Ranoth Olseta wants nothing more than to be a worthy successor to his father’s throne. When his home is threatened by the aggressive Woaden Empire, Ran becomes his city’s saviour, but powers within him are revealed by the enemy and he is condemned to death. Confused and betrayed, Ran is forced to flee his homeland, vowing to reclaim what he has lost, even if it kills him.
Facing an unknown future, and battling forces both familiar and foreign, can Lidan and Ran overcome the odds threatening to drag them into inescapable darkness?
Levi Jacobs
Levi Jacobs was born in North Dakota and grew up in Japan and Uganda, so he was bound to have a speculative take on modern life. Currently marketing his epic fantasy series The Resonant Saga and at work on three more, he runs a small fruit company to pay the bills.
Where to Find Them
Notable Work
The Councilate controls everything except the truth. I have nothing save my discovery—but with this shall I destroy an empire.
Tai Kulga lost the rebellion and his best friend on the same day, stripping him of his will to live even as a strange power flooded his bones. When the friend returns as a spirit guide, it feels like a second chance—but his friend is not who he was, and the Councilate is not done oppressing his people. When trouble with lawkeepers lands Tai’s surviving friends in a prison camp, he must go underground to find the last of the rebels and convince them to break his friends free.
Along the way he meets Ellumia Aygla, runaway Councilate daughter posing as an accountant to escape her family and the avarice of the capital. Curious about the link between spirit guides and magic, her insights earn her a place among the rebels, and along with Tai’s power help turn the tide against the colonialists.
But as the rebels begin to repeat the Councilate’s mistakes, Tai and Ellumia must confront their own pasts and prejudices, before the brewing war turns them into the monsters they fight.
Sarah Chorn
Sarah has been a compulsive reader her whole life. At a young age, she found her reading niche in the fantastic genre of Speculative Fiction. She blames her active imagination for the hobbies that threaten to consume her life. She is a freelance writer and editor, a semi-pro nature photographer, world traveler, three-time cancer survivor with hEDS, and mom to one seven-year-old, and one rambunctious toddler. In her ideal world, she’d do nothing but drink lots of tea and read from a never-ending pile of speculative fiction books. She has been running the speculative fiction review blog Bookworm Blues for eight years.
Where to Find Them
Notable Work
The world is dying.
The Sunset Lands are broken, torn apart by a war of ideology paid for with the lives of the peasants. Drought holds the east as famine ravages the farmlands. In the west, borders slam shut in the face of waves of refugees, dooming all of those trying to flee to slow starvation, or a future in forced labor camps. There is no salvation.
In the city of Lord’s Reach, Seraphina, a slave with unique talents, sets in motion a series of events that will change everything. In a fight for the soul of the nation, everyone is a player. But something ominous is calling people to Lord’s Reach and the very nature of magic itself is changing. Paths will converge, the battle for the Sunset Lands has shifted, and now humanity itself is at stake.
First, you must break before you can become.
Carol Park
Carol A. Park is a fantasy author who lives in the Lancaster, PA area with her husband and two young and active boys–which is another way of saying, “adorable vampires.”
When not writing or doing other author-y tasks, you can find Carol working at her day job (Support Lead/Docketing Assistant at a patent law firm), chasing her children, dreaming about playing video games again, or reading.
Her debut novel, Banebringer, released May 1st 2018, the sequel of which is targeted for release in Dec 2019. She has also released a stand-alone novel set within the same world about one of the main characters from Banebringer.
Where to Find Them
Websitehttps://carolapark.comTwitterparkcarola
Notable Work
Every decision she had thought was right had led her astray.
Perhaps it was time to make the wrong decision.
Lives are shaped by decisions, and Ivana’s decisions have destroyed her life.
She finds herself on the streets of Carradon, broken, destitute, and utterly alone. But perhaps not entirely without hope. A man named Elidor comes to her rescue and welcomes her into his home. But Elidor holds secrets of his own.
Lives may turn upon a single moment, and Ivana’s decision to accept the hospitality of this stranger will transform her in ways she never imagined…or feared.
Hûw Steer
I’m a historian, comedian and author from London. I have an MA in Ancient History, specialising in the study of ancient science-fiction (yes, there is some!). I’ve been writing for some years now, and have published several short stories and one novel, and am currently having several novels rejected by agents and publishers.
I also write and perform comedy! I directed the UCL Graters sketch comedy group for a few years, taking them to the Edinburgh Fringe in 2015, 2016 and 2017 to “exemplary” reviews. I’m currently performing improv comedy with a group that has yet to be named.
Where to Find Them
https://huwsteer.wordpress.com/
Notable Work
The Boiling Seas are the mariner’s bane – and the adventurer’s delight. The waters may be hot enough to warp wood and boil a hapless swimmer, but their scalding expanse is full of wonders. Strange islands lurk in the steamy mists, and stranger ruins hold ancient secrets, remnants of forgotten empires waiting for the bold… or lying in wait for the unwary.
On the Corpus Isles, gateway to the Boiling Seas, Tal Wenlock, the Blackbird, seeks a fortune of his own. The treasure he pursues could change the world – but he just wants to change a single life, and it’s not his own. To reach it, he’ll descend into the bowels of the earth and take ship on burning waters, brave dark streets and steal forbidden knowledge. He’ll lie, cheat, steal and fight – but he won’t get far alone. The ghosts of Tal’s past dog his every step – and one in particular keeps his knives sharp.
The Blackbird will need help to reach his goal… and he’ll need all his luck to get back home alive.
Liz Kerin
Liz Kerin is an author, screenwriter, and playwright currently living in sunny southern California. The Phantom Forest is her debut novel and was shortlisted for the 2016 Launchpad Manuscript Competition. A graduate of the Department of Dramatic Writing at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Liz is also developing a number of Film/TV projects, adapting a YA series to screen, and workshopping her award-winning play, “Stop-Motion.” She is represented by Verve for both books and Film/TV.
She is also the proud co-parent of two unruly small dogs, both of whom you can meet if you follow along on social media.
Where to Find Them
Twitterliz_kerin
Notable Work
Every tree in the sacred Forest of Laida houses a soul. Though each of those souls will return to the mortal world for many future lives, not all of them deserve to.
Seycia’s father told her this story as a child — a story of the most holy place in the Underworld, The Forest of Laida, where all souls go to rest before embarking on a new life. But Seycia’s father is dead now, and his killer has put a target on her back.
After being chosen for her village’s human sacrifice ritual, Seycia is transported to the Underworld and must join forces with Haben, the demon to whom she was sacrificed, to protect the family she left behind from beyond the grave. In this story of love, survival, and what it means to be human, Seycia and Haben discover that the Underworld is riddled with secrets that can only be unlocked through complete trust and devotion, not only to their mission, but also to one another.
Clayton Snyder
Born in Michigan and moved to North Dakota, he’s a full-time dabbler and part-time author, pursuing his dream of writing. He’s been published in several small magazines, and maintains a blog, Nod.
In his free time, he yells at clouds and accidentally gets nominated for awards.
Where to Find Them
On twitter @ClaytonSnyder2
Notable Work
We were the worst kind of people. For the best reasons.
After a robbery gone horribly wrong, cursed thief Cord broadens his horizons and plans to execute the heist of a lifetime. With fellow thief and knife connoisseur Nenn in tow, the two build their ragtag crew to target the heart of the kingdom – Midian, the seat of tyrant King Anaxos Mane. As treachery, horrifying creatures of nightmare, and opposition bar their path at every turn, the gang must depend on skill – intellectual, martial, and magical – to deliver them an endless summer and keep them free from the clutches of evil despotism. If they don’t sh*t the bed first.
This is by no means the only people to follow. I could easily get this list to fifty and barely scratch the surface. Be on the lookout for more lists like this. There is so many great books to read.
What a great post! Indie authors definitely do not get enough love and you’ve done a wonderful job of not only highlighting their books but the authors themselves.
Thank you! I am huge fan of indie books, there are some many amazing things to read.
These all sound absolutely fantastic! I love it. I also love the post’s structure and how you configured it! Thanks for sharing, Beth. 😀
Thank you! I love connecting people to cool things. I’m going to do this on a regular basis, there is to much good writing out there not to call it out.