Tag Archives: Stephanie Flint

October 11, 2025 · 8:03 am

A Focus on the Telepathy Power

There are a bunch of powers in the Distant Horizon universe, from Tim’s techno sight ability to mentally connect with computers to Jenna’s elemental ability to manipulate plant growth and use super speed. Previously, I’ve talked about the life-spirit power and it’s ability to save or suspend lives.

Today, let’s talk about telepathy.

There are several uses for telepathy, including the common ability to read minds and broadcast thoughts for communication, to the more obscure abilities of possession, and even more skilled (albeit nefarious) trick of planting specific memories in a target’s thoughts.

It’s the latter I want to focus on today. Tim got a taste of this in The Glitch Saga.

But Jenna… she deals a lot with the finer troubles of telepathy.  While she’s not a telepath herself, a certain notorious Lady Winters leaves a set of memory seeds in Jenna’s head—seeds which, over time, attack her mind with false memories and nightmares meant to leave her more susceptible to future telepathic attacks. The primary seed she has to deal with in Distant Horizon is of beastie transformation, which proves burdensome while she’s trying to search a beastie plant.

Here’s an excerpt from Distant Horizon:

The winding corridor opened to rows upon rows of floor-to-ceiling tanks, each filled with thick, greenish fluid. Bubbles traveled up the tubes, passing over occupants who had been stripped of everything but a breath mask. A helpless, sickening sensation spread through me. I stared at the liquid, petrified.

Lady Winters dragged me into a tube and shoved me inside, the numbing liquid surrounding me, slick against my skin. Burning.

I needed to escape, to breathe, to run—

“Let’s not open these doors, ‘kay?” Jack said, jarring me from my nightmare. I glared at him, but for once, I didn’t mind his sarcasm. Lady Winters had taken joy in giving me that memory. Her identity charm rustled against the fabric of my shirt.

“Isn’t there some way we can help them?” I asked.

“By the time they’re here, it’s too late.” Inese motioned to the tanks around us.

I closed my hands into fists. Lance pushed me forward, and as we passed the tanks, one of the occupants woke. Bubbles erupted around her mask. Her eyes bulged, terrified. She pounded her fists on the glass.

Lance stepped back, despite all his show for strength, but I saw my reflection. It placed me in that tube—in that thick, unknown liquid with its sense of helplessness…

I flinched and turned away. I was betraying the people who were imprisoned here, but every time I looked at them, I was the prisoner.

A memory seed tends to use some sort of outside world trigger (in this case, the beastie tanks), to activate a pre-planted memory. In some cases, the victim will be aware they’re the target of an attack, and in some cases they’ll simply react without knowing why. In other cases, the victim is trapped in the memory, only aware of of what the memory is showing them.

The more skilled the telepath, the harder it is to remove these seeds. Unfortunately for Jenna, Lady Winters is one of the most skilled telepaths within the Camaraderie. And, unfortunately, the memory seeds makes it a tad difficult for her to do research that the rebels need in order to combat the Camaraderie.

Here’s a look at one such scene in Fractured Skies.

I huddled under a mass of vines, Tim’s tablet in my lap. All the lights were on, and I’d made sure the flower charm was nestled firmly against my skin. There was a good chance the charm was the only thing that was going to keep me from having a memory attack. I pressed the icon on the tablet for the Legion Spore folder. A list of files popped up. Some of the documents contained lines of code—gibberish I had no hope of understanding. But some of the documents looked promising, more like a research paper.
 
Biology—a science I understood.
 
My heart pulsed in my wrists, warning me this was a bad idea. But if I wanted control of my memories, I had to understand what the Legion Spore was and what it could do.
 
I opened the first document:
 
The Legion Spore is an experimental project requiring beasts and power users to be merged with a computer AI to form a single entity of enormous capability and power. To do this, the Legion Spore utilizes a hub system. This system consists of both beasts and power users, each assigned to use their powers for specific tasks while being linked to a single mainframe.
 
That must have been why I heard multiple voices when the Legion Spore spoke, why it sounded like a discordant chorus. If everyone was trying to think at once, with so many voices crying in pain…
 
The tablet shook in my fingers.
 
I could do this. I could read a simple research paper without freaking out because of some stupid thoughts in my head.
 
For mobility, the Legion Spore flies by utilizing a combination of air and fire elementals who provide the upper membrane with hot gas. In order to conserve space, the air sacs may be deflated while inside a hangar. The hull of the ship, including the membrane, is formed from the bodies of shapeshifters.
 
I stared at the words. I’d seen all of this before. Not personally, but I’d seen what Lady Winters showed me in the memory attacks. The shapeshifters had been tied to the outer steel frame, a grid of interlinked metal that created the skeleton of the hull. The other beasties and humans were forced to kneel inside a tower of cages. Though the structure was metal, it was mostly empty space and not much bigger than a cargo-hold. Wires ran around their skulls and across their bodies, and into glass tubes between them…
 
Cold sweat poured down my back.
 
Dear Community, how could anyone have supported this project?
 
The vessel is mostly organic, and entirely self-sustaining. Like the Portuguese Man O’ War that it was designed to resemble, the Legion Spore ensnares its prey with long tentacles, targeting organic matter and devouring it through the use of various acidic agents. This may prove doubly useful in battle, as the Legion Spore can feed itself while targeting enemy combatants.
 
The Legion Spore ate people?
 
The room wavered in the corners of my vision. My stomach revolted. I closed my eyes and took quick, shallow breaths. I needed a drink of water—
 
I needed to get through this document first. This was a short one. The more I understood, the better off I’d be against the Legion Spore next time.
 
Even if the ship did eat its enemies.
 
Once its prey is devoured, the nutrients go to the Legion Spore’s nutrient tanks. These tanks feed into the hull of the ship, which mimics the flesh and muscle of various warm-blooded creatures—
 
The fleshy hull stretched out before me, veins pulsing underneath its skin. A sour odor drifted to my nose, but when I tried to wipe it away, a thin tentacle caught my hand.
 
Thud-thump.
 
A heart was beating.
 
Thud-thump. Thud-thump. Thud-thump.
 
My heart pounded, each thump growing louder as other beating hearts joined in.
 
A column of thinly covered muscle rose above me as the tentacle dragged me toward a seething, bleeding organ. I couldn’t let it take me! I yanked my hand from the tentacle and fled to a small door at the end of the vessel. A sticky hand grabbed my ankle. I careened to the ground. Airy whispers filled my head, vying for attention. My eyes were dry from the heat of the ship. I was on the top level, next to the air sac. Hot air swirled above me. Their murmurs tickled my ear.
 
We are legion…
 
No—I couldn’t let it catch me—couldn’t let it trick me into revealing the location of the Coalition. I pounded on its walls. I had to get out—

Needless to say, Jenna is ready to put a stop to the memory seeds’ attacks, and much of Fractured Skies revolves around her searching for a solution to the problem of those seeds.

Eventually we get to Starless Night, where, without giving too many spoiler, Jenna discovers that the memory seed is a lot more involved than she first thought, and considerably more dangerous. Because, what might happen if a telepath leaves more of themselves in a seed than anyone realizes?

* * *

Join Jenna’s fight with memory seeds in the Distant Horizon series!

Book Cover for Distant Horizon, with a gold title. A young woman faces a sterile white hallway with faces in the doors. She has vines around her arms.
Book cover for Fractured Skies with gold text. A young woman in a coat faces a wintery, pink-tinted forest. She has vines around her arms.
Book cover for Starless Night. A young woman in a black combat suit with thorny vines around her arms faces ghostly spirits in a wintery city street at night.

* * *

Happy reading and writing!

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October 4, 2025 · 8:57 am

How to make an author happy – Tips for Writing a Quick Book Review

So… you read a book you really enjoyed. You tell all your friends (yay!) and if you’re a librarian, eagerly await a patron asking for book recommendations because now you can tell them about this underrated book (have I done this? Yes. Now go read City of Nightmares by Rebecca Schaeffer. It’s a city where you don’t want to go to sleep because if you do, you might turn into your worst nightmare. Art deco vibes. A man-eating pterodactyl. And a main character who’s a coward, but there’s a very important plot reason for that and she’s a fun coward, okay? Go read it.)

But do you want to make an author even happier?

Leave us a quick book review!

Here’s why!

  • Social proof. Long story short, when other readers see people commenting on a book, they get curious. And those readers might see if those reviews mention anything that catches their interest (or makes them give a big old “NOPE” and bypass the book completely. This is why even negative reviews are important. You might not like that the big twist is that the main character is actually an alien, but I do and now that I know that twist is there, I’m going to snatch up the book because I want to see how well it was foreshadowed. For the record, I thought the author did well. (Click here if you want to know which book I’m referring to. Not naming it directly because yeah… spoilers.)
  • Stoke the author’s ego and let them know someone connected with their writing. Not even going to hide this one. I love reading reviews because I want to see what you got of the story. It’s awesome when you see something I hoped you would, and also awesome when you make connections that I didn’t realize I’d put in there. Granted, if it’s a negative review, it’s not so awesome… but it means you did take the time to read my book, so that’s cool. And also, see “Social proof” above.
  • Encourages the author to write more in the series. Or finish it faster. Nothing says “I should prioritize finishing this series” than a lot of book reviews. Especially because book reviews tend to be considerably more rare than sales or downloads. AND if you say what you enjoyed or wanted to see, there’s a chance the author is going to keep that in mind for future books.

Okay, so now you know why authors want you to leave a book review, let’s do a quick how.

There’s no one way to write a review. Some are really long and super detailed. Others are only a couple sentences. Either is great! Don’t sweat it. This isn’t supposed to be a chore.

But, things to keep in mind…

  • Please don’t list major spoilers without a spoiler warning! Give other readers a chance to be surprised.
  • Do say what you enjoyed! While this can be an essay (I’m certainly not going to protest), even a couple sentences is super helpful. Who was your favorite character? Why? Did you like the world-building? Was the prose fun to read? Was it a page-turner? Did you want to scream and throw the book across the room because the author ended it on a major cliffhanger and you wanted to know what happens next as of yesterday? Choose at least one, write a sentence or two, and you have the basics of a review!
  • Feel free to say what you didn’t like. These reviews need to be honest, after all, and as I mentioned earlier, what might not be your cup of tea might be someone else’s, so this is still really helpful. Though… if you want to be nice to the author, maybe sandwich this with something the author did well?

Now… where should you share your review?

Some of the most popular places are going to be directly with the online retailer. Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Google Play… those are all really helpful for the author, because you’re going right to where readers are looking to buy more books.

Goodreads is another good one, since it’s meant for book reviews, as are apps like StoryGraph.

But you can also share your review on your own blog or social media.

You don’t have to overthink this. Now, get out there and write a review!

* * *

Want to leave a review on one of my books?
Here’s a couple free first-in-series you could start with…

The Wind Mage of Maijev - Book Cover
SBibb - Whispers in the Code Cover

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Happy reading and writing!

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September 27, 2025 · 8:22 am

A Focus on the Life-Spirit Power

There are a bunch of powers in the Distant Horizon Universe, and at some point I’ll go into detail about all 40-something powers that Isaac and I listed for use in the original role-playing campaign that we played, with each power divided between one of four categories: Mental, Physical, Reality Shift, and Elemental.

Today I want to focus on the “elemental” category, and in specific, the “life-spirit” power.

The life part is easy. A life-spirit elemental typically has healing abilities and can sense the presence of living beings around them.

Here’s an example from Distant Horizon, with a character who uses a combination of healing and telepathy to do her work (slightly edited to avoid spoilers):


I rested my elbow on my knee as Gwen moved to treating Lance. It’ll be okay, I wanted to tell him, but I couldn’t. I didn’t know how much this elderly woman could help us.

Over the next half hour, the bruises cleared from Lance’s face and the deep scratches turned to faint scars. Finally, Gwen leaned against the wall and rubbed her eyes.

Lance rotated his shoulder as if he’d never been wounded. “What’d’ya do?”

“My power is in healing: the ability to save or suspend lives.” She rubbed her forehead gingerly, then looked at me. “It’s your turn. I won’t go deep in your thoughts; I just use telepathy to find the damage.”

I swallowed hard, then felt something else—be there. She was present, searching across my mind, but she wasn’t intrusive. Each memory was tucked away, as if it’d come unbidden, and her presence was friendly. When she did find pain, the memory flashed to the surface and vanished as quickly.

I tried to focus on memories I didn’t mind her seeing, drowsy as she soothed the grazed shoulder and eased the bruises.

However, when it comes to the “spirit” side, that’s when the details get trickier. Life-spirit elementals can “suspend” lives, partially removing a person’s spirit and causing them to go unconscious, or even remove a person’s spirit completely, killing them in the process.

An example from Whispers in the Code:

“Have the Legion Spore remove her spirit,” Commander Rick says, “then dispose of the corpse.”

My throat constricts. I know that it isn’t practical to keep the scout around, but there’s still something unsettling about the idea of having just been in the mind of someone about to die. “Dispose?”

“The Legion Spore needs nutrients and, this way, there will be no evidence for the Oriental Alliance to find,” Commander Rick explains.

What he leaves unspoken sends shivers down my neck. “You want it” —I swallow hard— “to eat her?”

Commander Rick glances at me, and his cocked eyebrows indicates that he understands I’m not ready to give that command. I know he’s right. The process is efficient, but the idea doesn’t settle in my stomach.

Legion Spore, remove her spirit, he sends.

Her head lolls. I detect one less presence of life through the vessel’s scanners.

Legion Spore—consume the remaining body for sustaining nutrients.

Dozens of tiny, translucent tendrils extend from the ivory floor, wrapping around her body. They flatten against her arms and chest and her skin dissolves, revealing the muscle and bone beneath. The body melts away. I force myself to watch, despite the terror creeping through every pore of my skin.

Within a minute, she’s gone.


On the farthest extreme, a life-spirit elemental can bind their spirit (or someone else’s) to an artifact, separate from a body, and thus allow a person to live on as a spirit, rather than die. It’s a tricky process, and not easily achieved.

But a few notorious figures have succeeded. Benjamin (the enthusiastic alchemist we see in the Glitch saga, and who has a cameo in Distant Horizon) is one such spirit.

Another scene from Whispers in the Code (again, slightly edited to avoid spoilers):


Benjamin’s sharp features glow a faint blue. His crisp sleeves are rolled past his elbows, and he wears a work apron over his shirt. His pockets are filled with small tools that may or may not be apparition. He’s odd like that. Sometimes he only manifests the appearance of a craftsman, while at other times, the tools are actually present.

Most noticeable, however, are his wire frame spectacles, green eyes, and his spiky, dark red hair, their colors prominent even with the lack of color across the rest of his translucent body. He’s also got a slightly mad gleam in his eye, though my encounters with the man suggest he’s mostly sane.

Benjamin grins and soundlessly claps his hands. Wonderful! Shall I take amber or emerald? His thoughts echo in my head with the determined curiosity that his voice might have held in life.


The upside of being a spirit is having additional powers. Once a person becomes a spirit, they automatically gain access to telepathy, life-spirit powers (because that’s how they sustain themselves), telekinesis, and to some extent, enhanced insight. However, it still takes them time for them to learn how to use their new powers to interact with the world, and even to manifest, unless they’ve had practice with such powers in their former life.

There are a few downsides to being a spirit, though.

First, they’re attached to an artifact. If their artifact gets destroyed, they die. Also, radiation, life-spirit powers, and electricity become much more damaging. “Shielding,” which temporarily shuts down powers, is especially devastating, since a spirit can’t manifest without access to their powers.

Still, it’s a trade-off some characters are willing to take, and one we see to an extent in Fractured Skies, and definitely becomes more of an issue in the Starless Night.

What do you think? Would you want to be a life-spirit elemental in that universe?

(Bonus: Life-spirit elementals also tend to have a natural bonus against telepaths and those with enhanced charisma!)

* * *

Life-spirit powers play a huge role in the Distant Horizon and Glitch series.

And if you don’t mind diving right into the action, Whispers in the Code is free at most online ebook retailers!

Book Cover for Distant Horizon, with a gold title. A young woman faces a sterile white hallway with faces in the doors. She has vines around her arms.
SBibb - Whispers in the Code Cover

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Happy reading and writing!

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September 20, 2025 · 8:31 am

Lonely Child Song – Conlang Poetry

I enjoy creating the language of word magic and the Cantingen Islands in my Wishing Blade Universe. So much so that I have a handy Excel sheet with a handful of pages and a semi-clear structure that I’ve realized I really need to get organized (because it’s rather… fun… trying to remember sentence structure when I’m in the middle of revising my current project, The Dark Forest of Aneth, and need to construct a sentence in Cantingen and don’t remember if I’ve decided how that particular grammar is supposed to look.)

One exercise I’ve especially enjoyed, however, is the creation of poetry and songs using the conlang (constructed language). Whether or not I’m actually good at poetry is an entirely different matter, but it’s still fun.

Wind and Words, the second book in the Stone and String series, features two different poems/songs (well, one is intended to be a chant), and one of those songs is called “Dornoram” (“Lonely Child”) and features Madia when she was still a young goddess, before she created mortal-kind.

Though I don’t include the entire song in the story itself (I did include both the Cantingen version and the rough English translation in the back of the book), here’s a look at part of the song:

Dornoram, dornoram
Lonely child, lonely child

illselvimorin sut wuget so vinllada’ralencos.
wandering in the fog of her father’s new world.

Dornoram, dornoram
Lonely child, lonely child

fallamin kidame nevésil vego cochome si kecirme.
She has no toys to play with but feathers and strings.

*

Viskar vrethin si walin
So she sits and she weaves

drogos osain vieram jévidasil.
while she yearns for a playmate that she understands.

Vego éda ralencos dratethia shadi si fashuvasia.
But this new world is magic and does not comprehend.

*

Dor so shadi si niitéra
Child of magic and creation,

morladiin vieram.
she dreams of a playmate,

Morladiin vieram néollased.
dreams of a playmate to keep company.

Viskar novanin vincede loch lalli esil, esildo.
So she weaves her hair into the form of a doll, little doll.

Morladiin kryl vinvieram llullamia.
Dreams of the story her playmate might have.

Vego esil dratethia goréso,
But the doll is a puppet,

fallamia kareme,
has no thoughts of its own,

si luuh vinmorladsme ketondruv nékryl.
and only her dreams give it life.

Essentially, the Cantingen Islanders believe they are Madia’s esilme, her dolls, who return to her from the mortal realm after they die. The rest of the song continues that story, and the idea plays an important role in the Stone and String series.

Do you enjoy seeing fictional languages in stories?

If so, what’s your favorite one? (I’m personally a fan of Tolkien’s Sindarin Elvish, though I never learned more than a few words).

* * *

A spell to infuriate the goddess of the dead…

Book cover for Stone and String
Wind and Words Book Cover

Quick reminder… you can read Stone and String for free by signing up to my newsletter!

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Happy reading and writing!

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September 13, 2025 · 8:17 am

Did you know you can get our books on Kobo Plus?

📚 There are many subscription options available in the reading/publishing world. Here, I’m going to briefly talk about two of them… Kindle Unlimited, and Kobo Plus.

The most well-known one is probably Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited (KU). A huge selection of books for $12.00. If you’re on a budget and don’t have access to a large local library selection (or want niche books that are harder to get through libraries), then Kindle Unlimited can seem like a pretty good deal.

However, for authors, it comes with a catch.

The biggest one is that any ebooks in KU (at least for independent publishers) must be exclusive to KU during the 90 day period that they’re enrolled (or longer, if the author chooses to extend the contract).

That said, very recently, Amazon has moved to allow KU books to be made available for public libraries, which is a huge win for both authors and readers. (Previously, you most likely wanted your books in Kobo’s Overdrive if you wanted library reach).

For more details, I found these two articles:

I’ve used Kindle Unlimited before, both for Glitch and for Huntress, but I ultimately chose to pull our books from KU because I’m really not a fan of exclusivity, or of the issue of “having all my eggs in one basket.”

Because of that, I’m like Kobo Plus.

While I haven’t, as a reader, used it for myself, Isaac did use the monthly Kobo audiobook credit subscription for a while, which was quite nice.

Now, as a writer I like Kobo Plus, because it offers an inexpensive way for readers to access my books ($7.99 a month) without requiring me to be exclusive with Kobo.

Woot!

So, if you read a lot of books and want to try a subscription service, have a look at Kobo Plus. 😁

(Psst… here’s where you can find our books on Kobo!)

(Note: I am not affiliated with Amazon or Kobo.
I don’t earn affiliate bonuses through your use of either subscription).

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A few first-in-series to get you started on Kobo…

Book Cover for Distant Horizon, with a gold title. A young woman faces a sterile white hallway with faces in the doors. She has vines around her arms.
Huntress Book Cover
Book Cover for Magic's Stealing

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Happy reading and writing!

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September 6, 2025 · 8:55 am

Story Length in the Wishing Blade Universe

When I set out to write The Wishing Blade series, I originally planned on it being a set of novellas. (Especially because the very first draft I wrote for the entire story arc of the series was 64,000 words).

Magic’ Stealing, the first book I published in the Wishing Blade series, was around 34,000 words, and I figured that future books would be similar.

What I didn’t count on was adding so many more words once I started exploring additional points of view.

Daernan got a chance to shine in The Shadow War, and the main plot really centers around him. Siklana has a major role and character arc in Magebane… and we still get the original views of Toranih and Shevanlagiy.

Not only were viewpoints added, I ended up further developing, and adding, magic systems (who knew word magic and charlago/magebane would play such a critical role in future stories?), and I added words as I reworked scenes to make more sense. Because Isaac–my writing partner and developmental editor–has a point: why try scaling a guarded wall when you could just… I dunno… take the sewers and discover even more fun stuff that affects the plot?

The result was that The Shadow War ended up clocking in around 55,000 words – a short novel, and Magebane clocked in at a whopping 109,000 words – a full-length novel.

(Fun fact… the first version of this post, sent to my newsletter years ago, had Magebane still in progress at 89,000 words.)

The Stone and String stories have also found themselves with longer stories than I originally planned. “Stone and String” was a short story of 8,000 words (surprisingly, it stayed within its expected count). It was meant to be a standalone story. But, of course, I wondered what happened next…

And so Wind and Words came along. While it took a couple starts to actually get it going the direction I wanted, I realized quickly it wasn’t going to be a short story. It ended up being a novella at 23,000 words.

Now the real question is, how long are the next books going to be? (Especially considering that Stone and String 3 should have direct ties to Wishing Blade 4).

While I cringe to look at the release dates of those books and realize I haven’t yet released the next in the series, I’ve found a similar pattern occurring within The Legends of Cirena series as it progresses.

  1. The Wind Mage of Maijev – 15,000 words
  2. The Gryphon and the Mountain Bear – 12,000 words
  3. The Restless Sands of Neel – 25,000 words
  4. The Cursed Halls of Kalecen – 18,000 words
  5. The Scars of Her Past – 21,000 words
  6. The Dragons of the Mist – 21,000 words
  7. The Wind Mage and the Wolf (Cross-over) – 47,000 words
  8. The Trial of Bells and Blood (Cross-over) – 32,000 words
  9. The Dark Forest of Aneth (Cross-over) – WORK-IN-PROGRESS Currently 68,000 words.
    • In its defense, it not only has the cross-over points of view, it got a third viewpoint and is delving into preplanned lore that wraps up the arc from the first 9 books while setting up the next arc. 🫣

I think a lot of this has to do with adding characters, getting deeper into the lore… stuff like that.

There’s a couple drafts already written for stories that will eventually come after The Dark Forest of Aneth, which you might have seen if you’re signed up for the Wishing Blade Universe newsletter. And then there’s the ongoing story which definitely is building into pre-planned lore and I don’t know if it’s going to be a novella or novel, but the next chapter is eight of sixteen, and it’s already 17,000 words long.

Anyhow, do you have a preferred book length you prefer to read or write?

Full-length novels, novellas, short stories? 🙂

* * *

Three series starters…

The Wind Mage of Maijev - Book Cover
Book Cover for Magic's Stealing
Book cover for Stone and String

Quick reminder… you can read Stone and String for free by signing up to my newsletter!

* * *

Happy reading and writing!

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August 30, 2025 · 9:15 am

Outpost – Do you remember this game?

When I was a kid, I was introduced to computer games early on because my dad does a lot of computer-related stuff. Somewhere there’s an old 4×6 photo of me sitting in a small pink chair on top of a regular adult chair so I could reach the computer. (Age of dial-up internet… ah… fun times).

It started with games like Wacky Wheels and Commander Keen, acquired on a small floppy disk (you know… the save icon?) Another fun note: the galactic alphabet used in Commander Keen is seen again when you’re enchanting items in Minecraft. I had an absolutely fun moment of going wait… I recognize those symbols!

Anyhow, once I got a little older, one of the games I absolutely loved was Outpost, a 1990s Windows 3.1 game.

Goal of the game?

Colonize a distant planet after Earth gets destroyed by an asteroid, and rebuild civilization to the point where you can launch back out into space.

The game was near impossible to beat. 😅

Part of that, I think, was because I was a kid, who didn’t realize until later that there was a helpful manual that told you what each building did. (Or why all those buildings underground kept turning into Red Light Districts when morale was low. Agh! I needed that laboratory!

(I didn’t realize until much later what a red light district was).

The other part, as it turns out, was that the game was actually released incomplete, and certain rather important functions for building up to a spacefaring age had been left out. If I recall, some editions of the game actually did have just enough to complete the game later on.

Since I think I beat the game once (and only once), I’m guessing I might have been playing the incomplete version. (I beat it on a DOSBox version with wonky colors and no sound because it wasn’t the most compatible with Windows XP but I was determined to play it again).

But everything had to be lined up just right in order to get that ending.

I usually died long before I ran into the issue of reaching the space technologies.

And from this game, I memorized two specific lines from the AI. “Don’t panic,” and “The people hate you, Commander.”

*Annoyed glare at computer.*

Rarely did I get the third line, “The people love you, Commander.”

Eventually, I moved on to other games, though the craving to play Outpost pops up every once in a while. Building tunnels and redundant oxygen systems. Dying within a few turns of starting the game because of choosing the wrong star systems. Old-school music that was catchy but not the best quality…

Imagine my surprise when, a few years ago I went to a local concert playing music from The Planets, and suddenly heard, in full symphonic glory, the primary background song of Outpost.

What?!?! 🥹

Apparently “Mars” was the song they chose for the game, and I’d had it ingrained in my head. I knew I was supposed to be looking for sections pulled for the Star Wars movies from the concert, but Outpost?

I was a happy camper.

You can find a few play-throughs on Youtube if you’re curious about what it sounded like in Outpost. In the meantime… I don’t think I’m quite ready to fight with DOSBox to get the game back up and running.

But the urge to go build a space colony may yet again return…

* * *

None of my space stories are published yet, so no links to point to this time. (But there’s a couple waiting for revisions!)

* * *

Happy reading and writing!

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August 23, 2025 · 9:00 am

About Ruetravahn – a god of wind, language, and Truth

I have a lot of fun creating the world and culture of the Wishing Blade Universe (Isaac has fun with this, too, as seen by the existence of the Legends of Cirena stories, which started because he went and created a role-playing guide for each of the regions).

One aspect of world-building I especially enjoy is creating the pantheon of gods, goddesses, and deities.

Many of the gods interact directly with mortals, as well as immortals, meaning we see their personalities and how people deal with them (or try to avoid them). Some worship them, some scorn them (especially the dragons of the Immortal Realm) and others are indifferent.

Today, I wanted to take a closer look at Ruetravahn.

As one of the older gods, Ruetravahn has a place in both the Cirenan and Cantingen pantheons, though he features more prominently in the latter. (But even Cirenan characters get stuck dealing with him, as Livena finds when she accidentally gets saddled with a truth spell/curse in The Wind Mage of Maijev).

Per Cirenan tales (as of The Wishing Blade series), when the high god, Listhant-Nsasrar, chose to retire, Ruetravahn convinced him to leave the gift of word magic with mortals so they would not always be at the mercy of the gods, and those without ribbon magic would have a defense against born mages.

As such, Ruetravahn became known as the god of language. Though the Cantingen language had been around for as long as mortals could remember, the ability to use it in spells only came after Ruetravahn’s deal. (Which gets fun when I’m writing anything in the Legends era, because I have to remember they don’t have access to word magic yet).

Even with this gift, Ruetravahn is rarely worshiped in Cirena, possibly because they continued to rely more on ribbon magic than word magic.

As for the Cantingen Islands, the people looked to him as not only the god of language, but also the god of Truth, the world as it really is, and the god of wind, capable of hearing everything that is spoken. Those who worship him consider lying an affront to the gods, and they are careful to choose their words and speak as accurately as possible.

He is the primary god that Edyli, the protagonist of Wind and Words (book two of the Stone and String series), chooses to worship. Her respect for him affects her actions. However, there are those who still see him as a lower god, and who therefore ignore his teachings in favor of completing tasks assigned by the high goddess, Madia.

This scene touches on the conflict between them. 🙂

From Wind and Words

The priestess spun on her heel and surveyed the room. “Do not tell anyone of your intentions, and do not tell them who sent you.”

“Nasillah?” Edyli asked, confused. What temple work could be so secretive? “I cannot lie. That is against Ruetravahn’s will.”

The priestess turned sharply and narrowed her eyes, but even the acolyte pressed his lips into a thin line behind her, his concern evident. “Do you question the will of Madia?” she demanded. “Would you put a lower god above Her Graciousness? You must do as she commands, and that is to bring the monster who stole the child’s string to justice. If you must lie to achieve that task, then it is necessary.”

Anger rushed through Edyli. Ruetravahn might not have been a high god, but his intentions were sacred. Their language rode in his wind, and he was the one who established the treaty with Lishivant, Madia’s father, to bring word magic to mortals.

Whatever happened, Edyli would not lie. She would not betray him.

“I will do what I must,” she said firmly. Even saying that much made her cringe, because the priestess would likely assume that she was agreeing to do as she had been asked. But, as familiar fables said, it was not the truth-sayer’s fault if they spoke Truth, but the listener turned a deaf ear.

While Edyli is determined to serve Ruetravahn faithfully, not everyone is so faithful, as seen above. Of course, those who don’t like magic or gods are even less inclined to like him, as we find with Livena after her magic goes haywire near a blessed scroll in The Wind Mage of Maijev.

(But hey… things like that happen when you accidentally mix a blessed scroll, wind magic, and magebane).

* * *

A spell to infuriate the goddess of the dead…

See more of Edyli’s faith in Ruetravahn in the Stone and String series:

Book cover for Stone and String
Book Cover for Wind and Words

Quick reminder… you can read Stone and String for free by signing up to my newsletter!

* * *

Happy reading and writing!

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August 16, 2025 · 8:58 am

Magical Guardians

In both the Glitch saga and Distant Horizon series, we see the mention of “time stones,” strange artifacts protected by a mythological guardian. While they’re only researched in Glitch, (and used as bait to lure the rebels into a trap), Jenna and the Coalition of Freedom, a ragtag team of rebels, are a bit more adventurous with these things in Distant Horizon. They have a hands-on experience with a time stone in the first book, and continue to deal with these stones in Fractured Skies.

Here’s a peek at their introduction to one of the guardians in Fractured Skies:

(SPOILER WARNING! – There are two characters present here who aren’t introduced until the beginning of Fractured Skies, so if you don’t want to know who is involved in this scene from later in the book, you may want to skip the quote block).

I grabbed the radio from my pocket. “Inese? Where are—”

A portal appeared in front of us with Inese, Dad, and Lance tumbling through. The portal closed and Inese—with the stone—skidded to a halt, staring at the statues. “Here, too?” Her eyes widened. She clutched the stone to the black body armor of her chest with one hand, her pistol in the other.

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“Lance,” Inese snapped, “portal to the car, now!”

“Sure thing.” Lance wiped perspiration from his forehead as another portal swirled in front
of us. “Let’s go before that mummy comes back.”

“Mummy?” Lily yipped. “The mummies are alive, too?”

“They’re not exactly living,” Lance muttered.

“They’re spirits,” Dad clarified, breathing hard. Dark purple rings colored the underside of his eyes. Inese disappeared through the portal. The rest of us followed them to the museum roof. Dust swirled around us, revealing the location of the car in faint, shifting sand. I yanked the edge of my turtleneck shirt over my nose. Inese slammed the driver’s door shut behind her and the car went visible. I hopped in. Lily dived in behind me and yanked the door shut. Outside, trees bent against the wind, leaves whipping across the roof as the sky turned a deep, rouge red. Dark yellow dust clouds rolled in the sky, crackling with electricity.

“Inese…” Dad pointed into the distance. “That’s not a statue.”

Bright, white light traced the outline of a giant lion with the face of a man. It stepped through the cityscape, purple lightning wrapping around it and flaring in bright streaks. Lily’s jaw dropped. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Lance shook his head. “After the mummies, nope. Not kidding.”

A deep, resounding voice pounded through my head, overriding my thoughts.

Return the stone.

I froze, my hands clenched on the edge of the seat. The voice of the guardian echoed in my head. A thick blanket of dark sand blasted the windows, obscuring the sphinx.

As seen here, one of the guardians has the appearance of a sphinx. Each one references a different mythology, and each one has a different set of powers:

  • Guatemala – Jaguar shapeshifter with power stealing
  • Japan – Asian dragon with water powers
  • Egypt – Sphinx with radiation and electricity powers
  • Peru – A puma earth elemental with radiation powers
  • India – A representation of Durga with healing powers, riding a lion mount

They all tend to be protective of their stones. They’re also extremely powerful spirits… making them difficult to steal from.

Not impossible, but not without cost.

And then trying to keep those stones is another story entirely…

* * *

See the interaction of the team with some of these guardians in the Distant Horizon series!

Book Cover for Distant Horizon, with a gold title. A young woman faces a sterile white hallway with faces in the doors. She has vines around her arms.
Book cover for Fractured Skies with gold text. A young woman in a coat faces a wintery, pink-tinted forest. She has vines around her arms.
Book cover for Starless Night. A young woman in a black combat suit with thorny vines around her arms faces ghostly spirits in a wintery city street at night.

* * *

Happy reading and writing!

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August 11, 2025 · 10:30 am

Infinitas Publishing – Status Report

Time for the April through mid-August Infinitas Publishing status report! 📋

Despite this primarily being during the so-called “chaos months” (in this case, lots of things happening that disrupt routine… including a couple of “meh” life events that weren’t planned, of which one is still ongoing), a lot of stuff got done, and I’m excited to go back through my planner and record it all here. 😁

The chaos months are only sort of over, but we’ve finished the big move and brought home a cat, so that’s one relief. (I even figured out where to put the fancy printer so I could prep for the June events!)

I’ve highlighted the projects that had changes in blue.

Warning… there’s a lot. (That’s a good thing!)

* * *

Changing Tides: (Book 4 of the Distant Horizon series). On hold while working on The Dark Forest of Aneth. Next step is to merge the two revised drafts and start writing the missing scenes.

Betrayed (Deceived #2): I’ve posted the launch review! If you’re looking for a deep dive into my launch process for this book, that’s the post to read.

Next up, revising Deceived #3 (tentatively titled Exposed).

Other future steps: Input Isaac’s notes from Deceived #5 (formerly #4) into the manuscript, revise Deceived #5, and revise #6 (formerly #5) before handing it to Isaac for his feedback.

Dossiers (Deceived Spin-off): I continued this story a bit further, adding two more chapters before completion. This also included adding a Daz render and dossier for Agent Shepherd. I’ve also done one more revision pass, but I feel something else needs added before formatting and sending it out to beta-readers.

While I was originally thinking I’d make this exclusive for newsletter subscribers, I’m now leaning toward making it a free or 99cent “1.5” book available in the Deceived series.

Multiverse Chronicles (Distant Horizon Universe Spin-off): I’ve started sharing this with the Distant Horizon Universe newsletter! After several years of being relegated to the back burner, the prologue and first seven chapters have been fully revised, edited in ProWritingAid, and sent out to newsletter subscribers. Fortunately, the majority of this has been edited already, with the exception of one chapter that Isaac and I both somehow missed writing, so it mostly just needs light revisions.

TWB 4: (Book Four of The Wishing Blade series). On hold. Next step is to add the remaining outline to Scrivener, review that outline for missing plot points, and then write the rough draft.

Legends of Cirena Volume One Ebook Cover

The Legends of Cirena Volume One (Collection of books 1-6): Released! (Including on Google Play and Smashwords, which I hadn’t uploaded previously).

I did a small launch of paid promos (which I still need to analyze), as well as sent extra book details to the Wishing Blade universe newsletter for each included story.

The Dark Forest of Aneth (“Ro’nor (“The Restless Sands of Neel”) & Zynia (“The Dragons of the Mist”) cross-over / A Legends of Cirena short novel): While this was on hold during the early chaos months, my goal was to finish the missing scenes during July. Which happened!

I completed a round of revisions on the already-written scenes, added in the missing scenes, and input ProWritingAid’s Manuscript Analysis feedback, with a few notes left behind for future tweaks.

I’ve been letting it sit for a couple weeks before I begin the next stage of revisions. Then it’ll be ready for ProWritingAid edits, any final AutoCrit Analysis tweaks, and then it’s off to beta-readers!

Other Goals: Revisit the book cover concept. Create a blurb. Polish the related poem/ballad so it can be included as back matter.

The Ruins of Amixthael (The Gryphon and the Mountain Bear Spin-Off): I’ve completed a full revision pass of the original six chapters, and drafted intermediary chapters for a secondary character (four complete, two to go, with one of those being outlined but not drafted). Those will still need polishing edits in ProWritingAid.

Additionally… while it’s not decided for certain, the secondary character’s perspective might allow me to start foreshadowing a much larger antagonist that appears later in the Wishing Blade world. (*Squee!*)

There’s a strong chance that this is going to be part of a new arc in the Legends of Cirena series (The Dark Forest of Aneth will conclude the previous arc while also laying the foundation for the new arc).

Future goals: Polish cover. Create blurb.

Untitled LoC Short Story (Standalone – Merchant in Reveratch): This story concluded with seven chapters, so I have drafted, polished and sent two additional chapters to the Wishing Blade Universe newsletter since the last update.

I’ve set aside the current manuscript so I can fully review it later with a fresh set of eyes. This is another story which will likely be part of the next Legends of Cirena arc.

Goals: Figure out a title. Create book cover and blurb. Polish the related poem/ballad so it can be included as back matter.

Untitled LoC Novella (Standalone – Twins in Ferta): I’ve outlined the next story to appear in the Wishing Blade Universe newsletter (5,400 words). I am really excited about the possibility for this one to connect with the larger Litkanston War arc, because I finally, finally get to introduce Lord Nomca. And it’s not even exactly a cameo, like I originally expected (he’s briefly referenced in the Wishing Blade series, but hadn’t yet made an appearance in any other stories). I’m currently working on chapter six, and the full draft (being revised/edited as each chapter goes out to the newsletter) is 13,300 words. I’m definitely expecting this to go into novella-length territory, if not that of a short novel. Six of the chapters have already been sent to the newsletter.

The Wind Mage and the Wolf Spin-Off (A Legends f Cirena short story) : I made some progress to Joran’s short story! I’ve revised what was already there and made note of a couple spots that still need work. Additionally, I’ve started cross-referencing the final scene in The Wind Mage and the Wolf from Joran’s point of view.

This will go to newsletter subscribers first, but I may make it a “7.5” story in the Legends of Cirena arc.

Goals: Edit in ProWritingAid, read-aloud, proofread. Book cover and blurb.

Huntress 3: On hold. Next step is to finish re-reading Changeling to make notes on the series guide, finalize the cover (proof created), and create a detailed outline.

Horse Shifter Romantasy (Maybe???) : This one was a surprise to me, too. 🐎

Unrelated to any of my current story worlds, this one got a lot farther along than I ever expected it to. (Thank a co-worker talking about fanfiction and me happening to be processing a book with a horse on its cover at the time). But it’s been a nice “refresher” story that’s allowed me to go running into the weeds with world-building ideas without falling down a rabbit hole in the other worlds (which often happens during chaos months when I can’t put my full attention on any particular project).

It currently has a 5,500 word outline, with additional details on the side. I’ve been using AutoCrit’s analysis features to figure out where I’m missing crucial beats and what details could still use fleshing out, and let me tell you, I’m excited for the world, the magic system, and the characters (and I think the characters might even actually be following the romance beats they’re supposed to, though that’s an area I notably have trouble writing).

If this gets written, it’s going to be because I wanted the challenge of writing a romance-focused story with really strong worldbuilding elements that tie directly into the plot.

Other Stories: I wrote a flash fiction short that I posted to Substack. This one was based on a picture Isaac created:

I also did a revision pass for the YA Alien Invasion/Dystopian story, which does need a bit more work before I’m ready to release it. The next step is to review the AutoCrit analysis to see if there’s any feedback I want to input before the next stage.

I also discovered there’s a fantasy anthology I’m interested in submitting to, so I’ve been outlining possible short story ideas I might use for my submission. I’ve got two so far:

  • One involves a grumpy sorcerer who wants to be left alone, and a sorceress who’s stuck in the form of a bat-winged squirrel and steals his pears to drag him out of his garden. Definitely a short story.
  • The other is a “love-wins-in-the-end” story involving refugees fleeing from evil ice mages whose single-minded fear/hatred has narrowed their magic to one purpose, and the refugees find support within a protective community whose magic hasn’t become so narrowly focused. Pretty sure this one is itching to be a novella.

Game Design: Not a whole lot of new updates for Anchor, but Isaac did a bit more prototype work and we’ve acquired a few more test pieces for future prototype testing.

He also reviewed our Legends of Cirena game and made notes for a shorter version of the game, and we went over some possible changes for a future edition of Battle Decks (and I like these changes, because while it’s still a war game, a new morale mechanic puts more emphasis on keeping your characters alive rather than using secondary characters as canon fodder).

Testing AutoCrit: I did a two-week trial of AutoCrit, a writing software with an analytical feature I’ve been wanting to try for a while. Mostly I uploaded previously completed manuscripts into its Story Analyzer tool to see how it did at finding loose plot threads, with hopes that it might make writing later books easier if I can quickly review what’s happened previously. Seemed to be potential there, and I liked its Story Builder tool for being able to analyze missing plot beats, so I went ahead and subscribed for a month.

Afterward, I finally went in for a year on this, because I rather like its Story Builder feature for organizing my thoughts, and because I like being able to write a chapter and then analyze it for potential issues (though I’ll admit that its analysis features are a bit hit and miss).

Additionally, while first exploring the AutoCrit Story Builder analysis features (not so much the generation features), I started exploring what I’m temporarily calling the “Greedy Adventurer” story idea, which now has a very loose outline but may influence Litkanston history within the Wishing Blade universe.

That said, because the AutoCrit tools (and the ProWritingAid chapter critique tool I like) does use Generative AI, I crafted an AI use policy so others can easily see how I do and don’t use AI.

Long story short, I don’t use generative AI for images or creating/writing the actual story, but at this point in time I do use writing-specialized genAI tools for the purpose of analyzing what I’ve already written and occasionally trying to brainstorm through a block.

As a note… I have also been trying to see what other AI features might be useful in analysis, helping organize my thoughts when it comes to quickly finding what I’ve already written, or searching for comp titles of books that I might not have considered previously. The AI policy goes more into that.

Still no plans to use it for image generation, however.

Marketing: The last several months had far less focus on marketing than the previous month. Meanwhile, these are some of the recent projects:

  • Amazon Ads same as usual, the ones that were already running and one extra as a test.
  • I created a list of my books by publication and word count for my personal use. Eventually I want to create a simple web page guide.
  • I did some research on various book pricing strategies, and I might update book prices in the near future.
  • I scheduled Initiated for a BookFunnel promo that ran in May and July, and I scheduled promos for June and August with Stone and String. It’s all scheduled and ready to send. I’ve also started doing author book swaps again where we exchange books to highlight in our newsletters.
  • The newsletters have been going out on time with their respective stories, so yay for that! (Apparently having one story in progress, and one that only needs revisions on a chapter-by-chapter basis, is working really well for me). I also finally did a scrub to remove subscribers who haven’t opened any of the newsletters in over a year.
  • I updated the design for the Distant Horizon Universe book pages on the Infinitas Publishing website. Minor tweaks, but should ultimately look better once all the details are in place (Goal is to add sample pages, Goodreads/BookBub links, additional book info, etc).
  • I kept up with Infinitas Publishing accounting through May… woot! Now it needs updated again.
  • I created my first book-themed quiz, and created a new “Extras” page on the Infinitas Publishing website! Check out the “Which of our series should you start with?” quiz!
  • I finally finished setting up the Payhip/Stripe Store accounts and linked them to BookFunnel, and I even created pages for the first six Legends of Cirena ebooks! They can now be purchased directly from me.
  • I tinkered with the idea of audiobooks, and I recorded chapter one of The Wind Mage of Maijev and tested editing the recording using Audacity. Thus far, I think if I plan to proceed with the process, I’ll likely need to re-record that chapter for better enunciation on my part. No big plans for that at this point.
  • I’ve been trying to get back into writing and marketing research, both with reading articles and listening to more podcasts and webinars. I picked up the Newsletter Ninja’s “Launch to Your List” course and I’m working on revamping upcoming book launches.

Next up: Continue updating the design of individual Infinitas Publishing book pages. Continue adding sample chapters to the BookFunnel sales pages for each book, and then to the main Infinitas Publishing website. Add BookBub and Goodreads links to each landing page. Update my author bio across the different retailers. Continue adding books to the Stripe store for direct sales. Revise Amazon ads, and overhaul book categories, keywords, and blurbs.

Substack – Sporadic posting at the moment, due to the chaos months, though I did get a couple more writing tip roundups posted. I also created a Tip Jar.

Weekly(ish) Writing Tip Round-Ups:

Crafting Your Fictional World:

A while back I’d started writing a non-fiction book focused on world-building, and while I haven’t made much more progress in that regards, I did post a couple of the chapters to Substack.

Repurposing Old Newsletter Content:

For a while now, I’ve been considering going back through my older newsletters and repurposing some of the behind-the-scenes content. I got the extra push to move forward with this plan upon learning that blog content is not only good for SEO (whee… the search engines can find you and point more readers your direction, yay!), but might also be good in the age of AI search engines, which seem to be interested in context when doing searches. And sense more search engines are moving to AI-powered searches… yeah. Now I get to have fun revisiting those older newsletters and updating them for the blog. (And this actually is fun for me. The content’s already there, and just needs revising, so it’s cool seeing what I did in the past for newsletters and what I might want to start doing again).

Events: June was busy with three events. Two we vended at, and the third was a writing workshop that we attended.

UP Rainbow Pride (Marquette) – June 14th

Lots of fun, and we tested a more condensed display with our SIFlint Art (the dragons) at the front to draw people in. To our surprise, the tote bags did really well (I need to order more of the yarn dragon now), and this definitely did better this year than last. We even had someone come looking for book two in a series. Yay!

The booth at UP Rainbow Pride

Writers of Warrensburg Workshop – June 22nd

We got a chance to reconnect with friends from Missouri in what was a combination trip to visit family, attend the writing workshop, and return to Michigan with our new cat, Baby Girl Neelix.

The workshop was a lot of fun, with three presentations and four great presenters, and a lot of helpful information. Plus, we got to participate in the author signing after.

An orange cat in a harness sits between car seats.

Hancock Pride Market – June 29th

Because we didn’t have a local artist alley for Pride month, one of our friends put together an awesome local pride market that ended up being lots of fun, one of my favorite setups we’ve tried (grids to the max, and condensed setup!) and I’m definitely hoping this happens again next year.

Stephanie and Isaac stand in front of their booth at the Hancock Pride Market.

SBibb’s Photographic Illustration: Mostly on hold for the moment, though I did do a photoshoot of my new houseplants I acquired from plant-sitting. I have chosen the ones for editing and done basic edits, but I still need to finish the bigger edits and send them to their previous owner.

I might also have another formatting project coming soon.

Future Goals: Update the SBibbPhoto website to incorporate Daz work and fix the SEO information. Finish designing cute mascot for a local store. Finish editing photos for a local Aikido group.

SIFlint Art: I finally got to print my shiny (literally, it’s on metallic paper!) dragon display!

I even printed my own business cards this time around. Wasn’t perfect (not happy with the paper chipping at the edges) but I’m still pretty satisfied with them.

Plus… Isaac made a shiny new self-serve sticker display! It’s been really nice so far (though we need to hot glue the back string on so it’ll stop falling off).

Goals: Finish the line-art for a bag-hoarding dragon, do a fun commission for a friend, and order new merch for upcoming events.

Daz PA: Though on hold for most of the chaos month, I’ve now returned to working on projects! Everything been updated to make it easier to work again, and I’m really glad Isaac and I made a Standard Operating Procedure for making poses last year. That really helped to fast-track me back to work on these.

I’ve finished reviewing the poses of the Leadership set Isaac started, which are ready for thumbnails. There’s been a bit of a hang-up on this one, however, because I’m hoping to include props… and it’s been a little while since I’ve done any 3D modeling. I’ve started designing a podium to go with the poses, but I need to review how to use Substance Painter so that the model (which is complete) looks decent.

In the meantime, I’ve started a “Cursed Expedition” centaur set that I’ve started making thumbnails for. Next step is to finish the thumbnails and create promo art.

Goals: Find collaborator for Genesis 9 Diverse Worlds set and complete the Ankylosaurus Rider pose set Isaac started. Maybe complete snow and ice texture pack idea?

* * *

Happy writing and reading (Or 3D rendering if you’re into Daz)! 🙂

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