Elizabeth Darcy's Blog

Looking for some great reads? I love to recommend books by other indie authors, who are doing some really innovative and exciting things with various genres. Plus, I aim to find a book for every reader, so here are a couple of finds for you:
Coilhunter by Dean F. Wilson
Welcome to the Wild North, a desolate wasteland where criminals go to hide—if they can outlast the drought and the dangers of the desert. Or the dangers of something else.

Meet Nox, the Coilhunter. A mechanic and toymaker by trade, a bounty hunter by circumstance. He isn't in it for the money. He's in it for justice, and there's a lot of justice that needs to be paid.

Between each kill, he's looking for someone who has kept out of his crosshairs for quite a while—the person who murdered his wife and children. The trail has long gone cold, but there are changes happening, the kind of changes that uncover footprints and spent bullet casings.

Plagued by nightmares, he's made himself into a living one, the kind the criminals and conmen fear.

So, welcome, fair folk, to the Wild North. If the land doesn't get you, the Coilhunter will.

This is a standalone book in the Coilhunter Chronicles series, which can be read in any order.

Coilhunter is available exclusively at Amazon, and is free for Kindle Unlimited subscribers.
Blade's Edge (Chronicles of Gensokai, book 1) by Virginia McClain
Mishi and Taka live each day of their lives with the shadow of death lurking behind them. The struggle to hide the elemental powers that mark the two girls as Kisōshi separates them from the other orphans, yet forges a deep bond between them.

When Mishi is dragged from the orphanage at the age of eight, the girls are unsure if or when they will find each other again. While their powers grow with each season-cycle, the girls must come to terms with their true selves--Mishi as a warrior, Taka as a healer--as they forge separate paths which lead to the same horrifying discovery...

The Rōjū council’s dark secret is one that it has spent centuries killing to keep, and Mishi and Taka know too much. The two young women have overcome desperate odds in a society where their very existence is a crime, but now that they know the Rōjū’s secret they find themselves fighting for much more than their own survival.

Blade's Edge is available for 99c for a limited time on:

Amazon | Apple | Barnes & Noble | Google | Kobo

Many of you know that diversity in fiction is a cause I'm really passionate about, so I make a conscious effort to introduce diversity into my own books. I have no doubt that I screw things up at times because I'm a straight, white woman who doesn't know what it's like to be an LGBTQIA+ person, or a person of color. I do know what it's like to be a woman, so while I'm comfortable with addressing sexism and misogyny, I am conscious of how I could come off as way off base or spectacularly insensitive when it comes to the issues LGBTQIA+ people or people of color face. I want to learn and understand, so I try to read, watch, and listen to as much as I can get my hands on, but if at any time any of my readers would like to point something out to me, I am very receptive to that. I want to do better, I really do.

I'm addressing this because the Wasteland trilogy features my first gay main character. This isn't the first time I've written about lesbian, bi, or gay characters. There are secondary LGBTQIA+ characters in Committed, Court of Illusion (the third Astoran Asunder book), and Prejudice, Persuasion, and Sensibility. You can tell these books are a bit dated because in both Committed and Prejudice, Persuasion, and Sensibility, characters comment about being unable to marry because they're lesbian or gay, something I'm very glad has changed in the intervening years.

I've heard people talk about books that depict LGBTQIA+ characters as having an "agenda". Do my books have an agenda? Well, yeah. My agenda is to write about characters who hopefully come across as human beings, to do my best to depict their struggles in a vivid way, and to put forth my best effort to create a story that draws readers in and leaves them wanting more. The Wasteland trilogy books are no exception. Alessandro is gay. It's an aspect of his character. It's not his defining aspect, but it is who he is, and I'm writing about that in the most honest way I know how. He will have a romance in books two and three, and though the romances in these books are not explicit, they do exist as part of the characters' subplots.

(Not to toot my own horn here, but if I do say so myself, Alessandro's romance is shaping up to be one of the sweetest romances I've written. Editing those passages is giving me some serious feels.)

I will be both frank and blunt here. If some readers are uncomfortable with the idea of reading about a romance between two teen boys, well, they're welcome to read other books. I'm not going to change mine. LGBTQIA+ people and people of color exist, and they deserve to have their stories told. (Preferably by own voice authors--authors who are people of color and/or LGBTQIA+, but I also firmly believe white, straight authors ought to make more of an effort to diversify their books.)

Look, as a woman who majored in French and minored in English, I spent a LOT of time reading books by dead white men. Sometimes I got other, more diverse viewpoints as part of my education, but mostly I was supposed to read, understand, and be able to sympathize with a WHOLE lot of dead white guys. Why is it that I, as a woman, or readers of color, or LGBTQIA+ readers, or neurodiverse readers, or disabled readers, are supposed to be able to see from the point of view of able-bodied, straight, white men, but the reverse isn't true? I don't buy it. There's academic evidence that reading can make us more empathetic, and the best way I can imagine to achieve that is by having people read about characters who aren't like them, as well as characters who are.

Which is why I'm going to do my best to be part of the change I want to continue to see in the world of publishing. I think publishing as a whole is taking steps toward progress, but I also think we've still got a long road ahead of us. Diverse fiction isn't a "trend", and it shouldn't be seen as one. If authors, readers, and publishers care about continuing to advance literature as an art form, we should get behind diverse fiction, because a vast, rich wealth of stories is the only way to elevate our art form.

I've said this before, but it's something some people may still not know about me: I used to write fanfic, and I also had an extremely satisfying run of writing Harry Potter filks (song parodies in which you take a popular tune and rewrite the lyrics to reflect whatever subject you're covering) for the group Harry Potter for Grownups. On the fanfic side, I dabbled in Tolkien, writing lots of wish-fulfillment fics about elves (yes, I admit it, I had a mad crush on Orlando Bloom as Legolas), and I've also written a few short Mass Effect fanfics (starring my femShep, natch), but my longest fanfic by far was a Knights of the Old Republic fic detailing the exploits of my light-side female Jedi, Brinna Warrim.

Now, I obviously didn't create Harry Potter or Mass Effect or KOTOR (*sigh* If only I had...), but, boy, how I love those worlds. I've been writing for as long as I can remember, and I've never had a problem creating my own stories, but playing around with characters I loved in other people's worlds was such a pleasure for me. It got my creative juices going in a whole different way from creating my own worlds and characters, and it was excellent writing practice during times when I went through long stretches of not writing original material.

I'm not ashamed of having written fanfic, nor am I ashamed of having once been an enthusiastic member of the fanfic community, not only writing my own but also reading and commenting on others' work. It was a great community full of supportive people who genuinely enjoyed reading one another's work and sharing a dialog about it. Think about it. For someone like me, who aspired to be a writer but wasn't yet in a place where I felt ready to share my own creations, it was invaluable. I was WAAAAAY too shy and insecure to let people read my original stuff, but I was fine with sharing fanfic. That willingness helped me receive and process critiques, which in turn helped me improve my writing skills, a process that continues to this day.

Given this, I cheered my way through The Bodies of the Girls Who Made Me: Fanfic and the Modern World on the Tor blog. I was already familiar with Seanan McGuire because I fanatically love her Wayward Children series, and knowing her writing origins are much like mine is pretty awesome. Her critique of how fanfic writers are treated is spot-on, and she has some very important stuff to say about how female writers are treated versus how male writers are treated.

It's a great article and I highly recommend it because the continuing conversation about the lack of diversity in publishing is necessary and good for the industry as a whole--as is the discussion of the lack of diversity in movies, TV, video games, etc. Loving stories as much as I do, I am so eager for the inclusion of more diverse voices because I'm excited about how they'll enrich the literary/film/television/video game worlds.

As a lifelong geek/nerd, I have a healthy appreciation for pop culture that not only embraces but celebrates the nerdy/geeky things I love: literature, video games, superhero movies, science fiction, etc. I also absolutely love romantic comedies and cannot get enough of the good ones. One of the reasons I started writing rom-coms and romances is because there was a dearth of the kind of romances I enjoy reading about, so imagine how utterly, over-the-moon thrilled I was to stumble on Susannah Nix's romantic comedy series, Chemistry Lessons.

I picked the first one up on a whim and before I'd even finished it, I hurried to purchase books two and three. These books hit *all* my buttons. The heroines are smart, career-focused women with a healthy appreciation for various types of pop culture. They're not perfect, and the prickly Esther in particular, the main character in Intermediate Thermodynamics, is downright exasperating at times. But these characters feel so real, and they are the kind of nuanced, smart female characters I long for every time I pick up a book, turn on the TV, go to the movies, or fire up a video game.

As someone who's struggled with weight and body image issues, I can't even begin to express how much I appreciate Penny, the main character in Advanced Physical Chemistry. I wanted to cry when I read Nix's description of how Penny eats well and exercises, and is naturally a size 16. I could write an entire essay about how much I relate to that.

Not only are these ladies marvelous, their male love interests are *exactly* the kinds of male characters calibrated to make me swoon. Jeremy, the love interest in Remedial Rocket Science, has some alpha male characteristics--at least at first glance. But then he grows and develops throughout the book. Every male love interest in these books not only lusts after the female main characters, they admire and are fascinated by them, and they are *kind*. One of the things that really turns me off about so many romances and rom-coms is when the female characters are saddled with either jerky manboys who need their women to make them grow up or when the alpha male needs to assert his dominance over his woman, treating her in downright abusive ways as their "love" story develops. Those tropes are blissfully 100% absent from these books. And, trust me, these very nice, sweet, and caring men are SUPER sexy.

I do wish the books were available wide for my non-Kindle readers, but the upside is that they're free to Kindle Unlimited subscribers. Please, please read them so you can come back here and gush with me about how fantastic they are.
Get Remedial Rocket Science on Amazon Get Intermediate Thermodynamics on Amazon Get Advanced Physical Chemistry on Amazon

Those of you who have kids have hopefully experienced this great side benefits of being a parent: when your kid gets something you also like, you get to enjoy that gift as well. Boom!

Well, I'm experiencing that right now because my teenager daughter's gift of a subscription to Amazon music is a gift to the rest of the family as well. I always play music when I write, and though I had a pretty hefty collection of digital music, I now have access to ALL THE SONGS! I've especially enjoyed streaming Amazon's Top Alternative station and discovering new music to add to my collection of current favorites. Just for fun, here's are ten songs from my playlist.

Sometimes 40-something mothers *do* like the same music as their teenagers:

Play That Song by Train (I'm a big Train fan in general.)

A song to listen to when you're feeling annoyed by the patriarchy (which probably happens a lot these days, considering the endless stream of sexual harassment allegations coming to light):

Castle by Halsey (My husband and I got to see her open for Imagine Dragons a couple of years ago and she's absolutely stellar live. I used the audio link because I like the album version better, but there's also this version, from the soundtrack for The Huntsman: Winter's War.)

The feels when you're in a relationship with someone who's maybe still hung up on someone else:

Paranoia by Liza Anne (One of my favorite discoveries from listening to the aforementioned alternative station on Amazon.)

Some days, you just need some screaming in your music:

Car Radio by twenty one pilots

We can all use a good pop anthem every now and then:

Fight Song by Rachel Platten (No surprise, but I identify with the struggle between the need to create and the frustration when it doesn't quite go the way you want it to.)

Don't you just love songs you can't help but bop along to?

Feels Like Summer by Weezer

That voice is ah-may-zing!

River by Bishop Briggs

This beat is awesome and you can't deny it:

Feel It Still by Portugal. The Man

The song you're surprised you like because you don't typically like songs like it:

Something Just Like This by The Chainsmokers and Coldplay

That song you sing when you want to stick it to your ex:

Hell No by Ingrid Michaelson (So, so cool to watch the song be signed.)

What else should I add to my playlist? I'm always on the lookout for good new music!

It's Friday! You've made it through the week, and now you're looking to unwind with a good SFF book, aren't you?

*Of course* you are.

Well, lucky you. I have a whole slew of giveaways and promotions to tell you about, including some huge instaFreebie giveaways. You'll find enough sci-fi and fantasy books to please any discerning fan, from a variety of voices. Happy reading!
Click here for a wealth of sci-fi novels featuring diverse characters.
Love fantasy fiction? Looking for fantasy featuring diverse characters? Click here for a great selection.
Want even more sci-fi and fantasy reads? Well, look no further! Click here for the SFF Book Bonanza instaFreebie giveaway, featuring 100+ SFF books.
And last but not least, if you love the SFF Book Bonanza instaFreebie selection, why not click here for a sister promotion for 99c books? Many are the second books in the new series you fell in love with, thanks to the instaFreebie giveaway.

I am an unabashed feminist, so current events have really got me worked up.

(Now, it should go without saying that being a feminist simply means I believe everyone who identifies as female deserves rights equal to those of everyone who identifies as male. That's it.)

On the one hand, it's a good thing that all of these abuse allegations are coming out in the open. From Roger Ailes to Harvey Weinstein, I'm heartened to know that a light is *finally* being shed on problems that have been going on for basically forever.

Naturally, some people will ask why women sometimes wait so long before speaking out about the harassment they've endured. I understand what prompts that question. I think most of us like to think that if someone did something illegal to us, we'd go straight to the police and report it, or at least expose the offender.

The truth, though, as it so often is, is a lot more nuanced. When your livelihood depends on staying in someone's good graces, when your career could be toppled by a powerful force in your industry, when making it in your chosen field means putting up with the crap other people sling at you, you might not say anything. Really, you might be crazy if you do say anything, because, after all, you're risking everything you've worked so hard to achieve. That's why you might remain silent, why you might not speak up for years.

Also, there's the fact that our society casts a skeptical eye on women who do speak up about sexual abuse. Newspaper articles will comment on what the victim was wearing, or they'll include quotes from people who talk about how "mature" for her age a young woman is. What is this other than casting some doubt on the validity of the victim's claim? Do articles ever mention what male crime victims are wearing, or how "mature" others perceived them to be? If your car is stolen, do you expect a police officer to say to you, "Well, sir, maybe if you weren't wearing that Michigan State University baseball cap, your car wouldn't have been stolen"? Maybe that last statement sounds ridiculous to you. If it does, I hope you'll think long and hard about why it's equally ridiculous when applied to a rape victim's clothing.

I love being a woman--except for all the things I hate about it. I hate having my qualifications and my intelligence questioned. I hate that someone like me, who doesn't wear makeup, has a lower chance of getting a job based on that fact alone. I hate that I think all the time about how to say things in the least offensive way possible, because women are socialized to be likable and liked.

There are so many everyday indignities to being a woman. They include things like:Being catcalled while walking down the streetHaving male coworkers voice the opinion that mothers have no right to be working rather than staying home with their kidsWalking through a secluded hallway in your high school and fearing for your safety because a much larger guy is walking with a friend behind you, making lewd comments about you while his friend snickers and eggs him onHaving a man explain something to you, even when you're an expert in that field, because he perceives your knowledge as being inferior to his, solely on the basis of his presenting as a man and your presenting as a womanTrying to gently let a man know you're uninterested in him, only to have him turn viciously on you and call you hurtful words like "bitch" or tell you you're not that good-looking anywayBeing afraid to go out alone at night because you've been conditioned to believe it's your responsibility to prevent yourself from being raped
I've experienced all of these things at various points in my life. I still experience many of them.

One of my favorite video game series is the Mass Effect trilogy. With the exception of an incident in Mass Effect 1, in which an NPC refers to a female Shepard dismissively as "princess" and makes suggestive comments about her (been there, experienced that too), Commander Shepard isn't questioned about her competence or her leadership. Her squad follows her, and if they have an issue, it's because of something she does and not because she's a woman. She becomes a hero, and people admire and idolize her because of her accomplishments.

A big reason why I love this game so much is because it is so liberating, as a woman, to vicariously experience a world in which I have a job to get done and no one stands in my way just because I'm a woman. No one questions my ability to get the job done; on the contrary, many of my companions repeatedly tell me how strongly they believe I can do it. When I'm tough, no one tells me to stop being a bitch. When I'm assertive, people react to me the same way they do to the male version of my character.

I want the real world to be like this, for myself, for my daughter, for every woman I know. I also want it to be like this for my son, because I work hard to teach him that every human being is worthwhile and worthy.

Writing is a good space for me, and being an independent author is particularly good for me, because it gives me the freedom to explore sexism and its insidious effects. It allows me to create worlds where women are heroes and leaders and no one thinks that's weird. In short, it allows me to imagine a place where no matter where someone falls on the gender spectrum, they are treated equally. I love the idea of that place, and while I know that in reality we'll never reach a point where every last person acknowledges and respects women's basic humanity, I  like to think we're moving in the right direction. I find all of these things coming to light personally painful because they are such a pointed reminder of how little my basic humanity is respected at times, but I hope they mean things will improve in the future. I hope they mean people will stop and think very hard about what they observe, and that they'll take small steps to change their behavior.

Where we are now isn't where we have to be.

Quick update: I just finished reading The New Yorker's excellent piece on Harvey Weinstein. It's chilling and devastating, and it really helps illustrate how backed into a corner victims feel when a powerful figure abuses them.

At long last, my newest release is finally available on several major retailers! It's a steamy contemporary new adult romance, and I hope you'll all love it!
Catalina Martinez is used to being alone. Only seventeen when her mother died, Lina has since built her life around a single purpose: honoring her mother’s legacy by seizing every opportunity her mother worked herself to the bone to provide.

Now a college student, Lina is ambivalent when she lands a part-time job that sounds too good to be true. The hours are flexible and won’t interfere with her studies, allowing her to maintain her grades and keep her scholarships, and the pay is generous. However, she’ll be helping restore an old mansion, doing the kind of physical labor her mother was determined to prevent her daughter from having to do.

When she meets Byron Eaton, her new boss, he opens up a whole new world of additional complications—and possibilities. Not only is he young, rich, and gorgeous, he’s the first person Lina has felt a connection with since losing her mother. Her growing attraction to him threatens to overrule her misgivings, but even so she can’t shake her discomfort over the contrasts between his privileged upbringing and her hardscrabble life, not to mention how reluctant he is to talk about his family.

Just as she’s finally on the verge of reaping the rewards of her years of hard work, she finds herself on shaky ground. Does Byron trust her enough to tell her the truth about his past, or will his secrets prove too great an obstacle for their love to overcome? Overcome is available on:

Amazon | Apple | Barnes & Noble | Kobo
As if releasing a new book wasn't enough, I'm also participating in a group giveaway on instaFreebie. You can snap up a whole bunch of SFF romances (including A House Divided, the first Astoran Asunder book) to warm your e-reader. Click the image below to browse the titles.
Happy reading!

So I’m going to give this blogging thing another go, mostly because I’ve disconnected from social media but still have stuff to say. (God, I have SO much to say—whether people want to hear it, that’s a whole different matter.) I do say things in my newsletter, so if you’re not a subscriber, you may want to be (plus, you know, you get free books, so that’s cool), but since my newsletter only goes out twice a month I wanted somewhere to collect my thoughts. Plus, blogging gives me a whole lot more leisure to develop my ideas and better express them.

Here goes. Strap yourself in. I have opinions.

I spend a lot of time writing stuff.

That goes without saying, right? The thing is, I don’t write just anything. I mean, I write a lot of things, but not just anything, if you get what I’m saying. I’m an avid reader, have been my whole life, and I love stories in a way I can’t fully articulate or quantify. However, I have beefs with stories. Oh so many beefs.

In college, I majored in French and minored in English, which means I read a LOT of books and plays. Like a metric crapton. Most of the stuff I read was stuff I frankly didn’t want to be reading. Yes, I love literature, but I don’t love all literature. (Hemingway. *shudder*) Sure, I did love some of it (Shakespeare, you masterful bard, you), but when you’re forced to read four books a semester, none of which you want to be reading, it ends up taking a toll.

College temporarily killed my love of reading—which shouldn’t be interpreted as me saying I hated higher education, because I am a nerd and I loved college. I’m one of those people who would probably be an eternal student if I had endless money and endless time. But after having been force-fed so much literature, much of it excruciating for me to read, I just lost that reading spark.

I can’t tell you how good it felt to dive back into books, once I was free to read what I wanted to read when I wanted to read it. I inhaled everything I could get my hands on.

Then I started noticing things that really annoyed me. There were some tropes I couldn’t stomach, and if I stuck with any particular genre long enough I started to feel like I was reading the same books over and over.

Now, I’ll take a timeout here to say I am NOT trying to insult other authors. I love other authors. I love reading their work and being surprised by how different their minds are, by how they write things I would never have thought of writing, by how some of it is so gorgeous and delicious and perfect that I wish I had written it.

That said, genres have their tropes. This is true of books, movies, video games, and TV shows. I get tropes, I do. I’m like everyone else in that I enjoy predictability in certain aspects of my life, so I get wanting the assurance that if you pick up a book, you’re going to get what you expect out of it.

The thing is, *I* don’t like predictability in my media. I don’t like it at all.

Because of this, I am almost gleeful about blowing up tropes and defying genre conventions. This is to my own detriment at times, as it makes my writing particular, and I understand this. Maybe I’ll never write anything that appeals to a mass market. I’m okay with this, because I am a niche reader, which makes me a niche writer. I know I’m not alone, and I want to reach those other niche readers who, like me, are frustrated by the challenge of trying to find just the right book.

One of my absolute favorite genre tropes to slay is anything—ANYTHING—to do with gender stereotyping. I am a woman. I am a woman who wants to imagine myself in the role of superhero, chosen one, savior of the world. It is sometimes extremely hard to find this kind of woman in literature, sadly. I think things are changing. I’m finding more amazing female characters with each year that passes, I’m happy to say, but for sure one of the reasons I started writing is because I wanted to see different, more diverse female characters out in the book world.

I have a particular beef with fantasy. Again, there are exceptions to this, I know (The Broken Earth series, I am looking with particular admiration at you), but, ugh, the female tropes in fantasy fiction.

(And do not, DO NOT, tell me that, “Well, this is the way things were in the past, so the author is going for authenticity…” No. Just, no. By definition, fantasy worlds are completely made up—I mean, they often have DRAGONS, for crying out loud—so there is NO reason for them to bear any resemblance to our culture, past or present, unless the author is using that culture as a way of exploring a specific issue.)

One of my favorite things to do is make my female characters warriors, rulers, and leaders, and have other characters not only accept this, but not even question it. It’s not even weird to them because it’s the norm. Oh, so the Captain of the Royal Guard is a woman? Yeah, that makes sense. No big deal.

In other words, I love to write female characters who do the same things my male characters do. I imagine worlds where female characters can be anything and everything without anyone saying, “But you’re a woman!” or “You’re good at ____ — for a woman”.

A world like that would probably look something like this:
To this end, I have written a five-book fantasy series in which my female characters have magical, gods-granted gifts—or they don’t. They’re leaders and loners, prickly and friendly, strong and weak. I’ve written a YA dystopian trilogy in which female characters are engineers and revolutionaries who work in concert with their male counterparts to better their world. In short, I try to make my female characters multifaceted human beings. Because, you know, women ARE multifaceted human beings.

Bye, bye, damsel in distress trope. Don’t let the door hit ya. See ya later, women in fridges. You really irk me.

You want genre tropes? That’s awesome, and I definitely want there to be books for you. I’m just probably not going to write them is all.

But if you don’t like genre tropes, if you’re looking for something a little different, a little outside of the box, well, I’m your woman.

(But not THE woman, though. That title is reserved.)

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