Edward Hoornaert's Blog, page 35

Effing Feline gets a Valentine #wewriwa

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I, Effing Feline, got a Valentine and it was from . . . from . . .

Twiggles the Dog! Not only a Valentine, but a byootiful stuffed heart that’s perfect for digging my kitty claws into. And not only that, it’s filled with, with — catnip!

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I don’t know what to say. I didn’t get a Valentine for her. I didn’t even think about giving her anything except more insults. I think about those a lot, I’m ashamed to say. Sigh.

On a brighter note, Ed’s Valentine’s Day sci fi romance, Constellation XXI, has now been released!

Today’s snippet continues from last week’s. It’s the calm before the storm, because we’ve flashed back to the very beginning of her first solo mission, before her ship dies. Ed allows his heroine, Sienna Dukelsky, a brief moment of contentment before she jinxes herself with the fateful words “Nothing, absolutely nothing, was going to screw up her maiden flight.”

“Step forty,” she recited from memory, “run automatic diagnostic tests on the scanners and drive systems.”

She ran the tests with a few mental commands then duplicated the diagnostics manually, just in case. Nothing, absolutely nothing, was going to screw up her maiden flight.

Sienna had trained herself not to smile on the job — her favorite instructor had frowned on cadets who smiled, especially female cadets who barely made the Tugship Service’s minimum height and weight — but now she grinned. She thought the command to rotate her chair in an unhurried circle. She drank in the gleaming beauty of readout screens, toggle banks, computer controls, storage compartments, and clocks set to Crassin’s major cities. Everything was in perfect working order, perfect balance . . . including, finally, her life. She sighed with satisfaction and savored the perfection of this moment. Her dreams had come true, even though no one had expected baby sister, the afterthought born ten years after her siblings, to fly the stars.

Effing Feline here again. After getting such a great present, I, Effing Feline, am choked up. Speechless — except to admit, reluctantly, that I kinda, maybe, sorta love Twiggles. Just a tiny bit.[image error]

But don’t hold me to it!

Be sure to check out the other great writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.

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Now live — Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

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Although Sienna Dukelsky had been the most promising student pilot at Keening AstroSpace Academy, she inexplicably settles for a routine, unglamorous job guiding incoming spaceships to safe berths at Farflung Space Station. Rumors blamed her startling decision on heartbreak after Crispin Hunt, the love of her life, got expelled.

Approaching Farflung years several later, Crispin’s freighter is met by Sienna’s tugship. Love rekindles, though dampened by old betrayals. And when her ship loses power while aimed straight at the space station, Sienna must confront astonishing secrets about Crispin and his cargo—secrets that make hers the most important job in the galaxy.

This book kept me up til 3:30 because I could not put it down.  – Amazon reader

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Constellation XXI has sprung to life

My latest science fiction romance, Constellation XXI, is now available.

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The first reviews are in at Goodreads. Here’s a peek at them:

[image error]5 stars — Frances

Once again, Ed Hoornaert takes us on a rollicking ride full of action and romance. He manages to engage us fully. This is the third in the ‘Repelling the Invasion’ series but they are all stand alone. It helps if you have read the other two but it’s not necessary.

I always end one of his stories feeling disassociated from the world for a while. Good sci-fi with a touch of romance.

5 stars — Jo

I loved both Sienna and Crispin. They had a past and it was getting in the way of the present. Sienna had a secret that was covered in guilt. Crispin was just happy to finally be back around Sienna. He also had a secret . . . Great story line with interesting aliens as well as humans.

And Kathryn Lance, science fiction author and longtime member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, has this to say:

Great suspense and believable sci fi premise and details. I . . . can see why your work is so popular.

Do you have your copy of Constellation XXI yet?

Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

Although Sienna Dukelsky had been the most promising student pilot at Keening AstroSpace Academy, she inexplicably settles for a routine, unglamorous job guiding incoming spaceships to safe berths at Farflung Space Station. Rumors blamed her startling decision on heartbreak after Crispin Hunt, the love of her life, got expelled.

Approaching Farflung years several later, Crispin’s freighter is met by Sienna’s tugship. Love rekindles, though dampened by old betrayals. And when her ship loses power while aimed straight at the space station, Sienna must confront astonishing secrets about Crispin and his cargo—secrets that make hers the most important job in the galaxy.[image error]

You can order Constellation XXI from these fine sites:

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Apple iBooks
Kobo Books
Smashwords

 

You’re about to be deflowered #mfrwhooks

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This is the last hook from Constellation XXI., my sci-fi romance. The last hook, that is, before the book officially releases on Valentines Day.

Sienna Dukelsky is a starship pilot on her first solo flight when all power, lights, and mechanical systems on her ship suddenly, inexplicably die.

The visor of Sienna’s flight helmet cycled from jade to burgundy and back in a soft, ever-brighter rhythm. The signal combined with a subtle influx of drugs to nudge her out of trance.

Incoming ship!

She jerked straight in her command chair even before it was fully upright. Her hands flew to the dashboard and tapped sensors to life. Only then did she remember to use mind controls.

Gravitational-wave sensor eight displayed an insignificant dot. When she magnified it to maximum, the dot grew a short tail that wiggled like a stringfish tadpole. Sienna thought the command to turn on the communication channel to Rampart-G Base so she could report the approaching ship.

“Sergeant Scheherazade Vallant here,” a raspy alto replied through the radio after a short pause.

Sienna sat up even straighter. This marine was a Tugship Service legend. Everyone knew about the fight with six space pirates. Her voice could grate the peel off an orange, because the pirates had damaged her vocal chords. Everyone also knew Vallant had single-handedly defeated those six pirates, killing four of them.

“You have a tadpole?” Vallant asked.

“Tracking,” Sienna said.

“If this one holds course, it’ll be yours, Cherry. You’re about to be deflowered.”

Sienna hoped this one worked out better than her physical deflowering. He Whose Name She Dared Not Speak had thought she was joking about being a virgin at her age. He apologized for days afterward for being too rough —  even though he hadn’t been. Not at all.

Be sure to check out the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.

Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

[image error]Although Sienna Dukelsky had been the most promising student pilot at Keening AstroSpace Academy, she inexplicably settles for a routine, unglamorous job guiding incoming spaceships to safe berths at Farflung Space Station. Rumors blamed her startling decision on heartbreak after Crispin Hunt, the love of her life, got expelled.

Approaching Farflung years several later, Crispin’s freighter is met by Sienna’s tugship. Love rekindles, though dampened by old betrayals. And when her ship loses power while aimed straight at the space station, Sienna must confront astonishing secrets about Crispin and his cargo—secrets that make hers the most important job in the galaxy.

Constellation XXI will be released February XIV. Until then, pre-order it from these fine sites:

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Apple iBooks
Kobo Books
Smashwords

Effing Feline ponders dogs #wewriwa

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I, Effing Feline, have been thinking about Twiggles the Dog. I may have looked like I was sleeping, but really, I was pondering whether I should treat Twiggles better. First, I came up with reasons why Twiggles is inferior to me:

She barks at passersby
She smells
She’s so eager to please she debases herself
She gets to go for walks outside and I don’t
And the clincher — she’s so dumb she can’t even use litter!

Once again, today’s snippet is from Ed’s Valentine’s Day sci fi romance, Constellation XXI. We’ve seen how her spaceship has mysteriously died, but this week we move back in time to the lead up to that terrifying moment. Heroine Sienna Dukelsky turns on the ship’s sensors for spotting incoming ships that will need to be guided to the space station orbiting her home world. Here we learn how her tugship, a crucial character in the story, operates using thoughts.

“Step thirty-nine: upon reaching alpha position, turn on gravitational-wave sensors.”

She thought a sequence of letters and colors to activate the grav-wave grid. She would’ve preferred flipping switches with gratifying clicks, but DA387 was a Thought Ship, with a limited array of manual controls. It had been delivered only two months ago with every bell and whistle, costs be damned. And it was hers, all hers.

In response to her brainwaves, a grid showing the scanning sensors glowed on her helmet’s visor. She thought with sufficient force to send a command through the bioelectrode nanos in her neurons. The nerve impulses leaped at the speed of light through the finger sockets in her gauntlets and then to the ship’s computers.

A request for confirmation appeared on her visor.

“Aye, aye,” Sienna said, though she could’ve thought the confirmation, instead.

Effing Feline here again. Being a fair feline, intellectual honesty compelled me to come  up with a complete and comprehensive list of Twiggle’s strong points:

She means no harm, except to the mailman

I’m sure you agree with my scientificational proof that cats are superior to dogs! Right?

Be sure to check out the other great writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.

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Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

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Although Sienna Dukelsky had been the most promising student pilot at Keening AstroSpace Academy, she inexplicably settles for a routine, unglamorous job guiding incoming spaceships to safe berths at Farflung Space Station. Rumors blamed her startling decision on heartbreak after Crispin Hunt, the love of her life, got expelled.

Approaching Farflung years several later, Crispin’s freighter is met by Sienna’s tugship. Love rekindles, though dampened by old betrayals. And when her ship loses power while aimed straight at the space station, Sienna must confront astonishing secrets about Crispin and his cargo—secrets that make hers the most important job in the galaxy.

Constellation XXI is a standalone book that continues the saga of the Dukelsky family begun in The Guardian Angel of Farflung Station and Escapee. It will be released February XIV. Until then, pre-order it from these fine sites:

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Apple iBooks
Kobo Books
Smashwords

A creature from the distant past #mfrwhooks

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Today, another hook from Constellation XXI., my sci-fi romance releasing on Valentines Day. Sienna Dukelsky is a starship pilot on her first solo flight when all power, lights, and mechanical systems on her ship suddenly, inexplicably die.

She’d spent the last three years memorizing procedures for troubleshooting every component of this ship. All the procedures required power, though—and there was no procedure for recovering from a total shutdown. No procedure for dealing with a tyrannosaurus rex materializing in the mess hall, either. No need. Both were impossible.

Yeah, right. Impossible

Shock had made her waste time precious time. Habit forced her eyes up to check how much on her helmet’s visor, but it remained dark.

Sienna took several deep breaths as she flicked switches and pressed touch-panels, hoping to troubleshoot systems manually. Nothing worked, of course. Had she really done it, then? Ruined a magnificent new tugship?

An echoing voice from downstairs was a reminder her duty now lay with the crew . . . and her passenger, Crispin Hunt.

Sorry, Crispin. I’ve let you down — betrayed you, destroyed your life — yet again.

Before she left the bridge, she attached the other magnetized torch to her belt, pulled the log wafer from the dashboard recorder, and grabbed a water bottle. She rose and spared two seconds to look around for anything else of use, then yanked her family pictures from the wall. The violence of that motion caused her to spin in the darkness like a leaf in a whirlwind, but without gravity to confuse her inner ear, she felt no dizziness. The holograms folded easily as she spun. She stashed them in a pocket then pushed against the command chair to propel herself toward the ladder.

She pushed too hard and slammed against a bulkhead. It would take awhile to get her zero-gravity legs under her . . . but she wouldn’t have enough time because she would fix the damned problem. Really, she would. Soon, very soon.

No colors glimmered from downstairs. Afraid of what she’d find, she shined the torch at the tube leading to the lower deck, where Crispin awaited. Her thought about a dinosaur in the mess room had been gallows humor, but he kind of fit the description — a creature from the distant past, capable of tearing into her hard-won peace and balance until only quivering flesh and raw emotions remained.

And to think that this mission had begun so well . . .

Be sure to check out the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.

Last week you saw the book’s back cover blurb. Here’s the short blurb:

Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

[image error]Although Sienna Dukelsky had been the most promising student pilot at Keening AstroSpace Academy, she inexplicably settles for a routine, unglamorous job guiding incoming spaceships to safe berths at Farflung Space Station. Rumors blamed her startling decision on heartbreak after Crispin Hunt, the love of her life, got expelled.

Approaching Farflung years several later, Crispin’s freighter is met by Sienna’s tugship. Love rekindles, though dampened by old betrayals. And when her ship loses power while aimed straight at the space station, Sienna must confront astonishing secrets about Crispin and his cargo—secrets that make hers the most important job in the galaxy.

Constellation XXI will be released February XIV. Until then, pre-order it from these fine sites:

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Apple iBooks
Kobo Books
Smashwords

Effing Feline returns! #wewriwa

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I, Effing Feline, am back after being gagged during a one-week infestation of blandness in the form of dear, sweet, adorable Twiggles the Dog. (Barf!)

Once again, today’s snippet is from Ed’s Valentine’s Day sci fi romance, Constellation XXI. We’ve seen how her spaceship has mysteriously died, but this week we move back in time to the lead up to that terrifying moment.

Chapter 1 ended with “And yet this mission had begun so well . . .” and chapter 2 begins with “A few days earlier.” (Notice how I slipped in a couple of illegal extra sentences with a feline agility Twiggles could never manage?)

Sienna Dukelsky’s big day had finally arrived — her first solo flight. Excitement fizzed like champagne through her veins, but she ruthlessly popped every bubble. Spaceship captains did not giggle like schoolgirls.

“Step thirty-eight of Monitoring Hyperspace for Incoming Ships Procedure,” she said in the forceful tone of a captain rather than her real voice. Her favorite apprenticeship instructor had cautioned her about speaking in a voice he said was too shy, too feminine, too darned nice.

Crews won’t snap to attention and obey you, he’d said apologetically.

No one reprimanded her now, or even answered. Sienna was alone on the DA387. Alone for the first time, on her maiden solo flight after five years as a flight cadet and three years as a tugship apprentice. Alone like few people had ever been. Alone like few people could tolerate without running mad.

Effing Feline here again. I’ll give you a hint: Those last two words about running mad are foreshadowing.

Be sure to check out the other great writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.

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Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

[image error]Some of you may remember that I create “travel posters” for each of my fictional worlds as part of my marketing campaign. Here’s the poster for this latest book!

Constellation XXI will be released February XIV. Until then, pre-order it from these fine sites:

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Apple iBooks
Kobo Books
Smashwords

Visit this fictional world

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So far, the hooks I’ve shared for my upcoming release, Constellation XXI, have included, a cover, a blurb, and the opening paragraphs. Today, something totally different.

For each of my books I create a “travel poster” inviting readers to enter my fictional world. The posters become part of my marketing materials. The travel poster for Constellation XXI is now done, and here’s the Poster Reveal.

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Be sure to check out the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.

Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

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Although Sienna Dukelsky had been the most promising student pilot at Keening AstroSpace Academy, she inexplicably settles for a routine, unglamorous job guiding incoming spaceships to safe berths at Farflung Space Station. Rumors blamed her odd decision on heartbreak after Crispin Hunt, the love of her life, got expelled.

Approaching Farflung, Crispin’s freighter is greeted by Sienna’s tugship. Love almost rekindles, but is threatened by old betrayals. And when her ship loses power while aimed straight at the space station, Sienna must confront astonishing secrets about Crispin and his cargo—secrets that make hers the most important job in the whole galaxy.

Constellation XXI, Edward Hoornaert’s romantic space opera, is a standalone book that continues the saga of the Dukelsky family begun in The Guardian Angel of Farflung Station and Escapee.

Constellation XXI will be released February XIV, Valentines Day. Until then, you can pre-order it from these fine sites:

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Apple iBooks
Kobo Books
Smashwords

 

Effing Feline gets replaced #wewriwa

I, Effing Feline I, Twiggles the Dog, am writing this weex Weekend Writing Warriors post ‘cuz Effing’s in the dog house. He’s bin nasty about me the last 2 weex an I don’t deserve it. Im not as litterary as Effing — I don’t use litter at all — but Im a nicer person.

Once again, today’s snippet is from Ed’s Valentine’s Day sci fi romance, Constellation XXI. We continue with Sienna Dukelsky’s predicament. The young starship pilot is facing disaster when her ship’s lights, power, and artificial gravity all die.

She fumbled through tarry blackness to click a compartment open. She moved her hand toward the left . . .

There! Pressing the end of the torch, she was rewarded with light, blessed light. The beam cast sharp shadows that transformed the bridge into a grotesque parody of safety, but she could see, and as long as she could see, she could do . . . something.

[image error]But what?

She’d spent the last three years memorizing procedures for troubleshooting every component of this ship, but all the procedures required power — and there was no procedure for recovering from a total shutdown. No procedure for dealing with a tyrannosaurus rex materializing in the mess hall, either. No need; both were impossible.

Yeah, right. Impossible

Effing Feline Twiggles the Dog here again. I’m smart at doggie stuff but I don’t lick writing. I hope my great lord an master, Ed — the bestest man in the hole whirled! — lets Effing do this next week. Or maybe my cuzzin Sadie, a Lab from Toronto. She’s so smart she has her own Instagram page!

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My Canadian cuzzin, Sadie

Be sure to check out the other great writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.

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Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

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When her tugship inexplicably loses power while aimed straight at her space station home, Sienna Dukelsky tries frantically to get her ship working in time. But can she cooperate with Crispin Hunt, a former lover she’d once betrayed, to create a way to regain control before the ship kills thousands — while also burdened with an alien about to give birth?

Constellation XXI will be released February XIV. Until then, please pre-order it from these fine sites:

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Apple iBooks
Kobo Books
Smashwords

Love was just a cruel ghost — #mfrwhooks

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Last week I showed you the cover and blurb for my upcoming science fiction romance, Constellation XXI. Today you get the opening of the book.

She didn’t do it.

Couldn’t have. There was simply no way. Everything about it was impossible.

Nonetheless, guilt slammed Captain Sienna Dukelsky as hard as if she’d rammed her beloved ship nose-first into an asteroid — because at the instant the ship’s systems all died, she was indulging in an erotic daydream of the glorious affair she’d had with Crispin Hunt while at Keening AstroSpace Academy.

Through him, she’d learned how happiness could transcend all boundaries. Learned her life up to then had been sepia compared to the astonishing crimsons, shimmering golds, psychedelic greens, and black velvet nights love had revealed. He was her first lover, so she’d naively assumed passion would eventually deliver another such life-changing fulfillment. But there were no second chances for undeserving women, and after Crispin, sex wasn’t even sepia, but monochrome.

Now he was here, on this very ship, trailing rainbow memories that seduced her senses and shrouded her brain as thoroughly as the shielding on the ship’s reactors. It was no surprise, then, that her first coherent thought, post-ship-death, was that he’d turned off the lights on the bridge to sneak up and throw his arms around her like old times and then —

No. The past was ashes. Love was just a cruel ghost. She had murdered it.

I have a question for you. Is the color imagery too much or too fancy for genre fiction?

And be sure to check out the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.

 

Last week you saw the book’s back cover blurb. Here’s the short blurb:

Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

[image error]When her tugship inexplicably loses power while aimed straight at her space station home, Sienna Dukelsky tries frantically to get her ship working in time. But can she cooperate with Crispin Hunt, a former lover she’d once betrayed, to create a way to regain control before the ship kills thousands – and in her spare moments, help an alien give birth?

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I have some ARCs available if anyone is interested in reviewing Constellation XXI when it comes out on Valentine’s Day. Just shoot me a line.

Effing Feline repents #wewriwa

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I, Effing Feline, am shaky, nauseous, and I can’t sleep. Withdrawal symptoms — because Mr Valentine (aka Ed, my cruel, cruel pet human) has cut off my catnip allowance. The horrible jerk insists I apologize for posting that nasty picture of Twiggles the Dog last week. He wants me to admit that Twiggles is a cuddly sweetheart who sorta likes cats — and all in all is a well-trained saint among dogs who has never bitten a living creature.

There — is that good enough, Ed?

Once again, today’s snippet is from Ed’s Valentine’s Day sci fi romance, Constellation XXI. We jump ahead a few paragraphs from last week. Sienna Dukelsky is a young starship pilot on her first solo flight on a tugship. But things get complicated when her ship’s lights, power, even artificial gravity, all die.

Her third thought after the ship’s death felt like an obituary. She could almost see the scoffing headshakes and curled lips of Tugship Service veterans as they gossiped about her with sniggers of contempt.

Have you heard about that Dukelsky idiot? On her first mission—the very first!—the dumb Cherry destroyed one of our newest, most expensive tugships.

“No,” she growled into the blackness. There was nothing she or anyone else could’ve done to kill the ship’s electronics; if she flew it into the rocky head of a comet at top speed, this ship was built so some systems would survive, for a while at least.

Mere facts didn’t matter, though. She was the captain, so she was responsible — period.

When an uncaptain-like whimper escaped her, her cheeks flamed with humiliation, even though no one could’ve heard. “Calm down; think; breathe.”

She wished she hadn’t said the word breathe –– if everything else had shut down, why not life support, too?

Effing Feline here again. Groan — Mr V noticed that I didn’t actually admit anything or apologize. Okay, okay. Sheesh. I’m sorry, regretful, remorseful, wretched, and repentant that I posted this picture of Twiggles:

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(Notice how sneakily I slipped in the picture again? Heh, heh, heh.)

Be sure to check out the other great writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.

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Constellation XXI

Rediscovering Love at the Worst Possible Time

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Although Sienna Dukelsky had been the most promising student pilot at Keening AstroSpace Academy, she inexplicably settles for a routine, unglamorous job guiding incoming spaceships to safe berths at Farflung Space Station. Rumors blamed her odd decision on heartbreak after Crispin Hunt, the love of her life, got expelled.

Approaching Farflung, Crispin’s freighter is greeted by Sienna’s tugship. Love rekindles, but is threatened by old betrayals. And when her ship loses power while aimed straight at the space station, Sienna must confront astonishing secrets about Crispin and his cargo—secrets that make hers the most important job in the whole galaxy.

Constellation XXI will be released February XIV. Until then, pre-order it from these fine sites:

Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Apple iBooks
Kobo Books
Smashwords