SELA: Book 1: The Abyss

by Regina Clarke

Shifting dimensions on an abandoned planet fill the mind of a woman who believes she once lived in its thrall across eons of time, as a star warrior called Sela. Yet did she go to the place, an outreach beyond the known universe? Or is the memory a remnant of some random game played by her brain as it senses its own imminent destruction?

What of her memory of Ren, the sarcastic and devious ruler of a starship who insists she explore the planet and find a hidden portal? What of Goren, whose love for her is both twisted and futile? Most of all, what of Randall, her best friend, who tells her what paradise can be before he is taken from her?

The planet carries voices and landscapes that change constantly. Scenes from the past and future emerge out of the air and play out on the flat sand, leading Sela and Goren ever closer to an abyss that lies waiting to open. Yet for Sela there is more, something sensed from childhood, an awareness that what is also waiting can transcend everything, forever. Is it all true? Did the woman know the planet in another life? Or is memory the greatest deceiver?

88 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 30, 2014

About the author

My intent is for the stories and books I write to bring others a good read, a respite from the frenetic pace we sometimes live, and most of all, a path into other ways of seeing.

RIA QUINN MYSTERIES is my cozy mystery series, beginning with "Hidden In Stone"... An amateur archaeologist transplanted from London to upstate New York discovers more than prehistoric artifacts when she settles into the small town of Shokan Falls, having a murder occur on the very day she arrives. I am writing Book 4 now, still to be titled...

The Standalone books--Fantasy, Science Fiction, and Mystery:
In MARI a young girl searches for her mother in a fantasy world that brings her knowledge of herself and a way out of darkness ~ A homicide detective in The Magic Hour faces mental collapse that sends him into a backwater town and a parallel dimension at the same time, and each one teaches him about love ~ In Retrieval a woman who manages a cafe in the desert encounters an alien presence that is both dangerous and familiar ~ The university town in Gene Pool becomes the target of a pact between the government and an unknown entity, while four friends race to unravel the doomsday scenario ~ In The Gatekeepers of Genthor, a brother and sister must fight an unseen enemy in a virtual world to save those they love ~ STOPOVER and Other Stories for a Rainy Night, is a collection of short mystery stories ~ My other books explore more alternate worlds, both in fantasy and science fiction, and all the books seek to explore matters of the heart. I hope indeed you enjoy them.

My stories have appeared in Thrice Fiction, Kzine, Bewildering Stories, Subtle Fiction, Mad Scientist Journal, Over My Dead Body!, T. Gene Davis's Speculative Blog, tNY Press, and NewMyths, among others.

I was a finalist in the Hollywood SCRIPTOID Screenwriter's Feature Challenge for my script about a mother seeking the disabled child she had abandoned, in "Second Chances." My book MARI was a finalist in the ListenUp Audiobook competition.

Life includes creative friends and a brilliant, talkative, and very green eclectus parrot named Harry. Home is in the evocative and hauntingly beautiful Hudson River Valley.