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	When handsome TV archaeologist Faladan Pala disappears while taping an episode of “I Dig the Past,” it’s up to Petchy Maligula, grrl detective, to bring him back alive. Petchy is big and tough, and more than a match for any man, but she does have one weakness: She’s madly in love with Faladan Pala. When she hears an evil cult called the Sisters of Inner Beauty may have abducted Faladan so they can sacrifice him to the ancient serpent goddess Quatakexel, Petchy vows to save him at all costs. As she contends with ghost gangs, demon wannabes, eccentric professors, reclusive millionaires and snotty babes, she must draw on all her power―both muscular and magical―to learn the truth. But as she delves into the case, she uncovers a secret that knocks her for a loop and threatens her love for the man of her dreams.
	Excerpt Word Count: 100,578 Pages to Print: 262 File Format: PDF                  Price: $5.99
Reviews:    From Fat Grrl   From Socrates From Blogcritics    From Bookingly Yours
	Taram Zhod is one of the hottest dancers on the planet, and he has millions of female fans. But two of them are a royal pain—Queen Gelydia and Queen Scaldera. Each one claims to be the rightful ruler of the United Realms of Mariga and both are desperate to win public approval, using any means necessary. Hoping to score a propaganda coup, Scaldera orders her soldiers to kidnap Taram and bring him down South for a command performance, but Gelydia sends her own army to intercept them, vowing that Taram will dance to HER tune instead. Taram has no desire to be a pawn in a civil war, but with two sets of soldiers on his trail, as well as alien gangsters, foreign assassins and absinthe-guzzling socialites, he'll really have to keep on his toes if he hopes to stay one step ahead of them all.
	Excerpt Word Count: 74,200 Pages to Print: 249 File Format: PDF                  Price: $5.99

 

EXCERPTS

Petchy Maligula

The flesh of Adono Phrebus was a delightful shade of blue—often referred to as "sky blue," although that phrase was meaningless in the city of Betroit—and his wavy hair had a coppery tinge. His sharp, angular cheekbones were offset by an inviting rosebud mouth, and his eyes resembled sapphires (stolen sapphires, of course).      Petchy Maligula liked pretty men, but she had been forced to make some alterations to Adono's face—adding some purplish bruises and puffy skin, and splitting open those rosebud lips, causing cyanish blood to trickle down the cleft in his chin and stain his expensive peach-colored shirt. Since Cygnians had a high pain threshold, she knew Adono wouldn't break down and cry from a few love taps, but the damage to his looks and his wardrobe was definitely getting on his nerves.      Petchy was lucky; she never had to worry about her own looks. Because she didn't have any. If forced to describe herself, she would compare her blotchy skin to sandpaper, while her reddish-brown fuzzy-buzzy hair resembled rusted Brillo and her eyes were pea-soup green. Her facial features lacked Adono's finely chiseled look; "hacked" would be a better word—hacked out of gnarly wood by a bad carver with a dull knife.      And while Adono's body could be described as lithe, Petchy's was . . .      Unlithe.      Very unlithe.      But she couldn't complain. This was the way the Goddess had made her. And in Petchy's line of work, size came in handy—especially when you needed to lean on a slimeball to loosen his lips.      "OK, Adono," she said. "I'll ask you one more time. Where the hell is Faladan Pala?"      She twisted the collar of his emerald-green suit and heard a satisfying ripping sound.      "Stop that!" Adono replied in his thick Cygnian accent.      "Sure. As soon as you tell me where Pala is."      "I already told you, I don't know anything about Faladan Pala."      "So why does the SIB want the dagger?"        "Who?"      "Come off it. Everyone's heard of the Sisters of Inner Beauty."      He smirked. "Sisters of INNER beauty? Heh. With a name like that they must be ugly as sin. I'm surprised you're not a member."      She whacked him again. For a second she thought she saw a tooth fly out of his mouth, but it was only a blob of phlegm. Too bad.      "That was cute," she said. "Nearly as cute as you. Oh wait, I forgot. You're not that cute right now, are you? I hope you don't have a hot date tonight, 'cause with that messed-up face you've got as much chance of scoring as the Betroit LionCubs."      "What would you know about hot dates, Maligula?"      She hauled off to hit him again, a real good wallop right on the chin, but thought better of it; she might knock him out cold and then he couldn't talk.      "Come on, Adono. Make it easy on yourself. Why did you come here? Who's the dagger for?"      "I dunno."      "Bull. You're not the kind to work blind. You know who Bardoko's buyer is."      "I didn't bring the dagger here. I found it on the floor when I arrived."      "Then why did you come here?"      "Just a social call. Garek's a friend." He glanced at the massive blob of goo on the floor behind him. "Uh . . . he WAS a friend."      "Can the crap. You don't hang out with people unless there's money involved."      "Shows how much you know. I've got lots of friends. But you wouldn't know what that's like, would you?"      "If Bardoko was such a friend, why did you kill him?"      "I didn't. I'm not into violence. That's your line."      "Oh yeah? Then why did you try to stick me with the dagger?"      "You startled me. I thought you might be the killer returning to the scene of the crime. You should know better than to sneak up behind people. I was just trying to defend myself."      Petchy gave him a dirty look and let go of his collar, then turned around and walked a dozen steps to the other side of the living room, dodging the contents of a book shelf that were strewn across the floor.      Maybe "living room" wasn't quite the right word, for there was a dead body lying in the middle of it, or the remnants of one, melted by a beam gun into an ash-colored blob that resembled a big wad of gum someone had tossed on the ground and stepped on. Only this wad of gum had a face at one end—smeary eyes and a crumpled nose and fused lips—and at the other end was part of a foot, still clad in a shoe; an Abidas, judging by the tread pattern.      The blob could have been anyone, but Petchy assumed it was Garek Bardoko, although the name on the mailbox downstairs identified the tenant of Apartment 613 as "Mr. Johnson."      She wasn't well acquainted with Bardoko, and had never been to his place before (he moved fairly frequently), but she knew he was a first-class fence and one of Adono's main contacts in Betroit.      Bardoko was a Deshian—a humanoid race with dimpled, slate-colored skin and tufts of orange hair protruding from odd places—and even though the beam gun had erased all those distinctive characteristics there were other clues pointing to the blob's identity. The TV set was on, the DVD player set to Repeat, showing a music video of a Desh group called Slof. Mercifully the sound was muted, but Petchy had heard The Slof before; their shrill squeaks and whistles were the kind of cacophony only Deshians would call music.      Another clue was the newspaper on the coffee table: The Strident, a rag put out by the Deshian Protective Front.      Then there was the pile of cat heads in the wastebasket. Deshians considered cat brains a delicacy. They'd cut the heads off and drill a hole in the top of the skull—with a special tool purchased from a Deshian food shop—then suck out the brains and toss the heads away. Petchy didn't remember what they did with the bodies. And didn't care to find out.          Back to Petchy Maligula

The Depraved Dances of Taram Zhod

Lelly’s fingers tightened on the barrel of her spyglass as she zoomed in on Taram Zhod.      “That dance he’s doing is way over the top,” she muttered.      “Way over,” Tasca replied.      “It’s almost obscene!”      “Almost.”      “And that outfit of his!”      Frowning, Tasca adjusted the focus on her own spyglass. “What outfit? All I see is a scarlet thong.”      “That’s what I’m talking about. How can he dress that way?”      “Well, we are in the desert.”      “It’s not that hot.”      Tasca licked her lips. “Hmm. I’d say it’s getting hotter by the minute.”      Lelly twisted the zoom dial up another notch. “Is that oil all over his body?” she said in alarm.      Tasca squinted. “Hmm. I can’t tell for sure. Could be sweat.”      “Too shiny, don’t you think?”      “What does it matter?”      “Tactically speaking, it doesn’t. But if he’s smeared oil all over himself, that’s just, you know...”      “Way over the top?      “Exactly.”      “Maybe it’s suntan lotion.”      “Somehow I doubt it.”      The music skipped a beat. The dancer didn’t.      “Zhod is nimble, I’ll give him that,” Lelly said. “It can’t be easy dancing under these conditions, especially with that god-awful music.”      She wasn’t referring to the tune itself—a sprightly Brazenian number played on clarilutes, guitubas and trumpums—but the quality of the recording. Phonograph cylinders never fared well in the Nirvada desert, even the copper ones, because the metal was softened by the relentless heat, and the windblown grit got into the turntable gears. Yet Taram Zhod seemed unbothered by the skips and scratches—and by the clapping of his Liberationist captors, which was enthusiastic, but way out of sync with the music. He wasn’t even fazed by the giant crustaccas looming over him, who were clicking their wicked-looking claws like castanets.      Lelly lowered her ‘glass and shoved hard on the eyepiece, the brass cylinders snicking softly as they slid into one another.      “I’ve seen enough, Tasca,” she said. “It’s time to attack.”      “In the middle of his performance?”      “You call that a performance? I call it debauchery.”      “Perhaps he does something uplifting at the end.”      “Like what?”      “Oh I don’t know; he might fall to the ground in supplication to the Goddess—or something.”      “Fat chance of that. Besides, the Libs are distracted now, and they haven’t had their breakfast yet. This is the perfect time to go after them.”      Tasca sighed. “Yes, ma’am.”      She put away her spyglass, then drew her war wand from its scabbard. It was an ancient tube of dark green gnometal, covered with arcane symbols etched deeply into the surface and blurred by time. Tasca pressed a button at the base and the wand telescoped to nearly a yard in length, the sections clicking into place.      Lelly reached into a sheath on her belt and pulled out her own weapon, a swordagger. It wasn’t government issue, but had served her well over the years. The handle was made of ivory and covered with bas-relief carvings depicting Shynese demons and hell dogs, and the telescoping blade was fashioned from Glamascus steel on which a single word was etched in tiny letters, repeated once on each of the six sections. She smiled as she squeezed the handle, the well-worn carvings pressing comfortably into the palm of her hand. Exotic energies throbbed within the blades.      Her dragocorn, Kekawek, had been rooting around in the sand, searching for the succulent duneberries that often lurked just beneath the surface, but now he raised his head as he sensed impending action, his wing muscles flexing with anticipation. Tasca’s mount, Fenwek, looked up a moment later, whickering softly.      Lelly looked over her shoulder at the rest of her squad, which was lurking on the far side of the dune. Their blue caps were pushed up from their sweaty foreheads, their damp hair pasted to their reddened brows, their youthful faces full of curiosity. They could hear the music but couldn’t see the enemy encampment, and had no idea what was going on.      Time to clue them in.      “Form up!” Lelly shouted. “Form up!”      The troopers yanked on their dragocorns’ reins and the beasts reluctantly pulled their snouts from the sand. Snorting with displeasure, they trudged to the crest of the dune, where their riders brought them to a stop.      As the troopers caught sight of the dancer below, they let out a collective gasp, their jaws dropping open, their eyes lighting up.      “Crimaneewillikers, get a load of that hotty!” said Trooper Banda.      “Ooh baby!” said Trooper Waish.      “Pipe down!” Lelly snapped. “And listen up! We’re going to attack. You’ve got to watch your lines of fire and your blowbacks so you don’t hit the dancer. It’s imperative we take him alive. Understood?”      Fifteen heads bobbed enthusiastically up and down.      “Okay,” Lelly said, “let’s go kick some Libby butt!”      The troopers drew their war wands from their sheaths, the metal shafts shooting up with a chorus of clicks. Lelly made eye contact with each grrl, then turned toward the enemy and raised her sword.      “Charge!”                                              Back to The Depraved Dances of Taram Zhod