Welcome to Terranue. Prepare to be Eaten, baked, frozen, or pummeled to death.

Welcome to Terranue!

Lots of vegetation presently.

We’ve two lovely moons.

It’s a scenic wonderland during this season.

But…..

We do have T. Rexes, large bears the size of elephants and saber-tooth lions…
and the blue bulls in your valley would have killed you on sight if not for the blue bull you brought with you. He killed our former lunatic king and declared himself both messiah and king of Terranue. 

But your biggest worry should be what lives in the ridge…

Your next biggest worry should be the three ‘trying’ seasons. Neither you nor your fragile homes will survive them.

Surviving Terranue

By

Liza O’Connor

 Blurb

 Leading a colony of frightened people on a new world is rarely easy. The human colonists of Terranue have as their leader, Tamsarandem, the only Soul-bond of Three that has ever existed. Unfortunately, some perceive the innate kindness in the shaman’s choice of leaders as a weakness, thus, challenges begin. From the moment they arrive on the planet, self-survival instincts take hold among the colonists, putting the survival of the colony at risk.

To survive, they must act for the good of the colony rather themselves, even when their natural instincts tell them to do the opposite. First, they must befriend the dominant intelligent life form on the planet, long-haired blue cattle, only slightly smaller than the blue bull Tamsarandem brought with them. Second, they must find a way to survive three of the planet’s five seasons. Otherwise, they’ll be baked, frozen, and pummeled to death. Third, they must protect themselves from the giant bears, saber tooth lions, and T. rexes that roam their planet. But worst of all, deep within the planet, a seed of evil grows, waiting to devour every living creature on the surface.

Every day in their new paradise is a challenge to survive. Despite all the advantages the Gods have provided, success is neither easy nor certain, and people are rarely as good as they need to be.

Excerpt

Everyone wanted to be on the Improvement Committee, and those not invited were gravely offended since they had a great deal of things they wished improved.

Dmitri found sad irony in their complaints. They were unhappy with life presently, while he would give anything to keep life as it was now.

Over the next week, he was impressed with the men Brenner put on the committee. Dmitri shared everything he knew and brought a Sargon to answer further questions. This information only revealed their situation more precarious.

Healer Soy provided the first bad news. “For a full grown Sargon to be carried two miles, the winds probably rise to over two hundred miles an hour. Those shelters won’t withstand winds over fifty. Even if they did, any stone shrapnel flying through the air would tear them to pieces.”

Another man by the name of Johanson chimed in. “Before we ever face those winds, we’ve got to worry about the dry season. To dry that river three feet a day, we are probably looking at temperatures around a hundred and forty to a hundred and sixty degrees. Those shelters will cook us alive.”

“At that temp, those shelters will buckle,” Brenner said.

“Can we expand the caves?” Dmitri asked.

A muscular fellow named Rocky, who looked out of place among this erudite group, spoke up. “I spent most of my life as a miner, and that rock is solid.”

“Is that good or bad?”

“Pends. The harder to carve, the stronger our home. And it won’t collapse on top of you when the storm season arrives. It’ll protect us from heat and cold better too. I’d say it’s our best chance of surviving, but we’ll need a lot of dynamite to do it.”

Brenner frowned. “We don’t have dynamite. We have a case of ten thousand bullets, ten rifles, and five lasers.”

“Could we cut the stone with lasers?” Dmitri asked Rocky.

Sales Link

Book 3: Surviving Terranue

Amazon

Book 2: Surviving Outbound

Amazon

Book 1: The Gods of Probabilities

Amazon

All books are free for KU subscribers

About Author

Liza is a multiple genre author of 16 novels. A Late Victorian Series, The Adventures of Xavier & Vic, plus a spinoff, A Right to Love, is an ongoing series.    A Long Road to Love is a humorous Contemporary Disaster Romance series of five books. She has two single books. One is a humorous, bad boys contemporary novel with ghosts, called Ghost Lover, the other is Untamed & Unabashed, a spinoff from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.

Now, she’s rolling out her Science fiction series (with romance & humor) called The Multiverses. The first four books are slotted for last half of 2015.  In addition she hopes, if she hasn’t dropped from exhaustion by then, to re-release a sometimes humorous/suspense thriller called Saving Casey

Social Networks

FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT

LIZA O'CONNOR

Investigate these sites:

Liza’s Multiverse Blog

Liza's Blog and Website   Facebook   Twitter

Liza ponders if publishing a series one per month a good idea?

When I first decided I would publish my Sci Fi series 1 book per month, I thought it a brilliant idea, since sci-fi readers like to read an entire series in one sweep.

I'm not going to discuss that 'truth' because I've only two books out so far. But my next book, Surviving Terranue will come out in a couple of days.

So what AM I going to discuss?
Feasibility, Insanity, and Chronic fatigue.

Here are the main items that need to incur around a book release: 

#1: Write the book
Okay I had already done this. All four books were already written during my write whatever you want and don't bother with publishing yet. You can do that later.

There are some drawbacks with writing early, such as forgetting all your character's names and accidentally respelling or  renaming a character mid-stream.

Fortunately #2 will normally catch that.

#2: Get your books edited.
Here I had a problem. Originally, I planned to publish the books in the order I wrote them. But my editor on the first two had serious issues concerning my Three Soul-bond, who truly does know what each other is thinking and feeling since they share one soul. 

My editor believed I would confuse the bloody hell out of my readers if I changed POV every other sentence.  And she's a very good editor, so I rewrote, and rewrote, and rewrote. 

Worried I was going to miss the first release date as we struggled over this issue, I engaged a second editor to edit the latter two books I wrote.

And before my deadline, I had all four books edited and ready to go.

But be warned: you will need many editors if you try to attempt 9 books a year.

Then I decided to make book 4 the first book. To do this I had to change the cover to say book 1. Fortunately, I made the covers, so I didn't give myself any grief over the matter.

But as I read my new book 1, I decided the Gods who I had imagined pulling miracles from behind the God curtain, might give me the funny bits I longed for. (For some reason sentients struggling to survive just aren't that funny. I tried to get them to lighten up, but they kept focusing on the high probability of dying.) 

So I  yanked open the Gods curtain and discovered a far less serious group of sentients behind the scenes. However, this required me to go back and write them in all the books. They had always been in the books, but now instead of way too easy unexplained miracles, we discover how hard it is to  get anything done. Seriously, most of the crew are complete deadbeats. Only four sentients are any help to Zousan at all.

That's right. The God who declares himself God of the Gods (aka Zeus) is the captain of our God ship. He's got a bet going with his soul devouring father, Cronus, that his multiverse will be far better than his horrid father's. 

Cronus excels at cheating and Zousan failed to read his tiny print contract. So Cronus is allowed to cheat while Zousan must comply with a trillion rules and and even greater amount of paperwork. 

Zousan must win the rigged contest because otherwise he'll be scrubbing toilets with a toothbrush for eternity.

So, after receiving back all my edits, I write all this humorous layer over my four stories.  I had great fun doing so. But then began self editing.

Self Editing: Don't even get me started...If your brain didn't do it right the first time, why would you think you'll see the error on the second read?

The human brain reads what it wants to read, not what is there. Self editing is an illusion.

But I had run out of editing funds, so I turned to fellow authors for help. 

I also had David, my robot,  read each book to me about 30 times.  David is great for finding missed words such as 'to', 'at', 'in', 'the'.  But he doesn't help at all with words that sound alike: 'hear' vs 'here'.

So I follow along on my manuscript. Over and over. Then when I think I've got all the errors out of my book, I send ARCs out with a request to make note of any errors.

And my ARC readers always find errors, which I fix at once. In fact, if you ever find an error in one of my books and let me know, I will fix it. I would love to write a perfectly clean book. I try extremely hard to do so, but my fingers don't appear to be precisely in sync with my brain.

And all the while I'm doing all this writing and proofing, I am also lining up and writing blog tour packages. 

On time, I publish book 1, The Gods of Probabilities and the tour goes well. But it's my debut sci-fi novel and not a lot of the sci-fi readers know who I am. So sales are low, but I'm focused on proofing book 2's new God Parts (which used to be book 1, so it had to have it's cover fixed too).  

Month 2: I was able to get promos for book 1, so nearly 100 peeps bought book 1 for 99 cents.

However, the overlap meant that book 2 got short shift during it's first week out, but my thought is that since most people start reading at book 1, that is where my promotional focus should be.

When I wrote my contemporary series: A Long Road to Love, over half the people that read book 1 went on to read the whole series. I was hoping for a similar pattern, but either the shortage of time between books OR perhaps 99 cent books aren't actually read as often as they were a few years ago, but read-through to Surviving Outbound is less than I'd hoped for. 

Those who read and wrote reviews for book 2 gave it five stars, so I think I need to be patient.

In a couple of days, book 3 will come out.

Here's my thoughts so far:
I think publishing a book a month is 
a) hard but doable for me as long as books are edited before I begin. But be warned, you will forget what book you are supposed to be writing blogs for, which you are editing and which you are promoting. All, your ability to retweet will become unreliable. 

b)This may be hard on readers who also wish to read other author's books. 

c) The fast publication may actually entice serial readers to wait for the last of the series to come out so they can zip through the series quickly.

I've noticed this behavior on my two other non-sci-fi series, especially with KU readers. I've seen them go through a series of five books in two days.


Unless I see an increase in sales once I publish the last book in October, I'll probably return to a slower publication format in the future. (Maybe just 6 books a year... for all genres instead of the 9 I had planned.)

My readers of contemporary romance and Late Victorian mysteries will expect books as well.

 Below is my contemporary series for 2016. It's sassy, humorous, and constant danger to lives.

But have no fear. I have a Sci-Fi Rom series in which an AI program (Adam) falls in love with his writer.











If the Multiverse Series picks up, I have a spinoff series, starring Sojourn and his crew called Search for Sentients Series. However, I'm going to require down time to actually write the novels that go with my inspiring covers. But I would love to know which stories you would love to read first (based solely on cover.)

And if there isn't an interest in these stories then I'll probably publish my SkyRyder's series, which are written, just not funny.

And this is precisely why I won't just publish six books next year. I've too many to share and all I want to do is write more.

Liza and Space rep question Catherine Haustein re Natural Attraction

Today, I have the lovely Catherine Haustein, author of Natural Attraction in my Multiverse.

We'll be going back into time, so look about for the seat belts. They tend to go missing. While you're doing that, Space Rep and I'll ask Catherine a few questions. 

Space Rep: I'll start. Why did you write Natural Attraction? 

I’ve been a chemist for over thirty years and it’s stimulating and often amusing. I must admit however, that, like Clementine in Natural Attraction, I’ve frequently imagined that things would have gone more smoothly had I been a man. I also thought it would be fun to give a scientist a romantic link with a preacher in the post Darwin days to let them explore what they had in common.

Space Rep: It’s historical. Why? 

I chose to set Natural Attraction in 1871 because it was a time of great social change. The theory of evolution and the discovery of sperm and egg cells were quietly ushering in ideas of social equality. I wanted to compare the past with today to show what has changed and what hasn’t for women.

Liza: Okay, I'm taking over the questions. How is this novel different from others in this genre? 

Besides the historical aspect, it has a friendly seven-pound rodent as a character. And cowboys are bad guys.

Liza: Why did you make those choices? 

I wanted to include some light-hearted discoveries into Natural Attraction since science is playful. My family’s had a succession of pet rats and guinea pigs. I guess you could say that I’m used to handling rodents. Cowboys weren’t viewed as romantic until Wild West Shows became popular. Natural Attraction is set before that time so I wanted the cowboys to be troublemakers.

Space Rep: What’s your most common reader question about Natural Attraction? Some want to know if Clementine/Calvin is trans-gender. I don’t see her that way. She simply enjoys the privileges of being a man in her society.

Liza: What challenges do you see facing you as a writer? 

I’m not the first to say this but getting romance readers to see science as something accessible to them and getting scientists to appreciate the craftsmanship found in a romance.

Liza: Enough with the questions. The ship's warmed up, so let's head back to the past. 

Clementine dreams of being a naturalist—a career that leaves no time for romance. To sneak on an adventurous prospecting expedition, Clementine will have to convince everyone she’s a man. A mysterious tonic offers her just that disguise.

But “Calvin,” as she calls herself now, had no idea what she was giving up. When Wesley, the expedition’s gentle preacher, catches her eye, she can’t get him out of her head; not his lush lips, wide brown eyes…or broad chest. Dare she reveal her secret to him? Can she keep her career if she does?

Among run-ins with cowboys, natural disasters, and traveling shows, Wesley’s most fascinating adventure is meeting Calvin. Though Wesley’s betrothed to another, the cute, clever naturalist threatens to make him fall into temptation… 

I was beginning to doubt this notion of me posing as a man.

We had arrived at the decision easily enough. It was to be an experiment in biological mimicry—a harmless insect posing as a poisonous one to avoid being eaten—a form of evolution that Alburtus had observed while classifying butterflies in the Amazon with British naturalist Henry Walter Bates. Alburtus, my natural history tutor had set up the internship: I would be a naturalist traveling with the Malachite Overland Mining Company, a position open only to a young, healthy male. His chemist friend, Theophrastus, had made the tonic. Granny had stitched the trousers. She’d taken scissors to my pale hair that morning. I’d tried not to look at the floor as the strands fell like spider silk. In Spookstad, we were matter of fact. Neither falling hair nor tonics rattled us.

http://www.amazon.com/Natural-Attraction-Catherine-Haustein/dp/194081121X

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/natural-attraction-catherine-haustein/1121761786?ean=9781940811192&cm_mmc=AFFILIATES-_-Linkshare-_-hqC9qWQq7/0-_-10:1

https://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/natural-attraction-1?utm_source=linkshare_us&utm_medium=Affiliate&utm_campaign=linkshare_us&siteID=hqC9qWQq7_0-4lIx6cL.yV2TGUv8PTtM4A

http://www.lybrary.com/698876.html

https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/natural-attraction/id986589113?mt=11&ign-mpt=uo%3D6

http://catherinehaustein.com/

A graduate of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, Catherine Haustein is a chemistry and English professor at Central College in Iowa. She studies chemicals found in plants and is writing a sustainable lab manual. Her ancestors lived in the famous ghost town of Singapore on the shores of Lake Michigan. Natural Attraction is her first novel.

Six Superb Sci Fi's for your Reading Delight

Today, I have gathered six superb sci-fi stories

to feed your hunger for excellent science fiction. They are all different. So check them out and see which calls out to you.

ESCAPE FROM ZULAIRE 

by 
Veronica Scott

SFR Galaxy Award Winner

National Excellence in Romance Fiction Award

Andi Markriss hasn’t exactly enjoyed being the houseguest of the planetary high-lord, but her company sent her to represent them at a political wedding. When hotshot Sectors Special Forces Captain Tom Deverane barges in on the night of the biggest social event of the summer, Andi isn’t about to offend her high-ranking host on Deverane’s say-so—no matter how sexy he is, or how much he believes they need to leave now.

Deverane was thinking about how to spend his retirement bonus when HQ assigned him one last mission: rescue a civilian woman stranded on a planet on the verge of civil war. Someone has pulled some serious strings to get her plucked out of the hot zone. Deverane’s never met anyone so hard-headed—or so appealing. Suddenly his mission to protect this one woman has become more than just mere orders.

That mission proves more dangerous than he expected when rebel fighters attack the village and raze it to the ground. Deverane escapes with Andi, and on their hazardous journey through the wilderness, Andi finds herself fighting her uncomfortable attraction to the gallant and courageous captain. But Deverane’s not the type to settle down, and running for one’s life doesn’t leave much time to explore a romance.

Then Andi is captured by the rebel fighters, but Deverane has discovered that Zulaire’s so-called civil war is part of a terrifying alien race’s attempt to subjugate the entire Sector. If he pushes on to the capitol Andi will die. Deverane must decide whether to save the woman he loves, or sacrifice her to save Zulaire.

AMAZON  B&N   Kobo   Apple iBooks

Also available in Audiobook

GRAND MASTER’S PAWN 

by 

Aurora Springer
Grand Master's Trilogy
Book 1

Who are the most powerful entities in the galaxy? The twelve Grand Masters claim that exalted status.  

Twenty-two year old empath Violet Hunter hides her prohibited talent to follow her dream of exploring unknown planets as the pawn of a Grand Master. The Griffin Grand Master risks selecting her as his pawn, despite her father’s dire prophesy. Violet sees only his griffin avatar for instructions on her missions. She discovers the mysterious Grand Masters are suspects in the deadly epidemics sweeping the galaxy and the failure of the interplanetary portal web.

Violet hunts for the culprits, finding clues and strange allies in her missions. While seeking the truth, she does the unthinkable. She bargains with her obnoxious Grand Master and plunges into a world of vicious conflicts and an impossible love. Pursued by hostile aliens and Grand Masters, she escapes on a desperate search for allies to save the Griffin.

AMAZON

WINTER'S KISS

by

KG Stutts
Amethyst Chronicles
Book 1

Amethyst is a team of genetically enhanced people which is Earth's greatest defense weapon. Leading the team of super soldiers is Ember Wilson, a tough woman with a huge chip on her shoulder. The team gets their name from the after effect of the Genesis Project which turned their eyes and even their blood purple.

After unpredictable weather has devastated Earth's crops and food sources, a scientist by the name of Dr. Clayton Rudo says he has the means to save with a weather machine. Only he freezes the West Coast and Washington, DC. Amethyst now is forced to work with an Air Force strike team to defeat Rudo. Tensions between Ember and Major Liam Ross rise as they butt heads. Can they work together before Earth is completely under ice? #DPPub

#Scifi #Romance $.99

AMAZON   B&N

ANOTHER NIGHT, ANOTHER PLANET

by 

Jessica Subject

Limited by status…

Ava is a housekeeper aboard Star Spirit, a luxury cruise ship travelling between the Milky Way and the Belvarian System. Coming from a middle-class family on Earth, she is considered by passengers as nothing more than an object to be tossed away when they’re done with her.

Shunned because of his lineage…

Banned from several planets across the universe, Nate struggles to run his interstellar shipping business. But the DNA of an exterminated race runs through his blood, giving him a diluted form of their powers, and leaving him labeled as a terrorist.

Both searching for the one…

Through her 1Night Stand dating service, Madame Evangeline matches these two together for a celestial escape on the pleasure planet, Elatia.

Will Ava and Nate find what they’re looking for, or will their date be just another night on another planet?

All Romance  AMAZON   B&N  iTUNES  KOBO

Audiobook links:

AUDIBLE  AMAZON  ITUNES

THE KEY
by 
Pauline Baird Jones
Project Enterprise
Book 1

When Sara Donovan joins Project Enterprise she finds out that what doesn’t kill her makes her stronger…

An Air Force pilot – the best of the best to be assigned to this mission – Sara isn’t afraid to travel far beyond the Milky Way on an assignment that takes her into a galaxy torn apart by a long and bitter warfare between the Dusan and the Gadi.

After she’s shot down and manages to land safely on an inhospitable planet, Sara encounters Kiernan Fyn – a seriously hot alien with a few secrets of his own – he’s a member of a resistance group called the Ojemba, lead by the mysterious and ruthless Kalian. Together they must avoid capture, but can they avoid their growing attraction to each other?

A mysterious, hidden city on the planet brings Sara closer to the answers she seeks – about her baffling abilities and her mother’s past. She has no idea she’s being pulled into the same danger her mother fled – the key to a secret left behind by a lost civilization, the Garradians.

The Dusan and the Gadi want the key. So do the Ojemba. They think Sara has it. They are willing to do anything to get it.

Sara will have to do anything to stop them…

Amazon  NOOK  iBooks   Kobo  GooglePlay

WHEN DARK FALLS
by
Pippa Jay

In a city where Dark Technologies Inc. now runs the show, Kadie Williams has more immediate concerns than the fall of Blaze, their guardian superhero. Almost every morning for the last few months she’s woken up with cuts and bruises on her body, and no idea how she got them. There are no nightmares. No evidence that she sleepwalks, or any sign of a break in. And nothing to tell her who’s been cleaning up after her. As just one of thousands of civilians conscripted to slave away in the labs of Professor Dark, she knew there'd be trouble ahead. But  she never expected it to be so bad, or so personal.

Desperate for answers, Kadie looks to the new defender of the night, the only person who can hinder the total domination of Professor Dark—Nocturnelle. The mysterious vigilante superhero came from nowhere with her cybernetic sidekick Shadow, set on putting an end to the brutality of Dark's regime. But as his laboratories work on a new secret super-weapon, Nocturnelle and Shadow may not be enough to save Nephopolis...or to save Kadie either.

 AMAZON   ALLROMANCE   KOBO 

  iTUNES     B&N    SMASHWORDS   

Thanks for checking out these six fabulous Sci-fi authors and their very fine books.