Rockets & Robots

by James Maxey (Editor), Cheryl Maxey (Editor), Lancer Kind

ROCKETS & ROBOTS
Edited by James and Cheryl Maxey

A sabotaged spacecraft hurtles toward destruction. Around a black hole, an alien tree sinks roots beneath reality. During a solar eclipse, tourists shimmer and vanish like ghosts. Elsewhen, dinosaurs explore a portal to a parallel Earth. In the clouds above Venus, the survival of a city depends on a restless cat. Just when things can't get worse, the pumpkins rise up in rebellion! Nobody said exploring the universe would be easy! Blast off for adventure with bold visions of tomorrow in ... Rockets & Robots!

Rockets & Robots assembles an international crew of acclaimed authors to bring you a kid-friendly collection of twenty-two amazing adventures set in the far future or on distant worlds. A must-read for lovers of science fiction!

Our stories and authors:

Morning Star City by Lancer Kind
Swebba’s Swarm by Anne E. Johnson
Battle at the Pit by Karl El-Koura
Dinosaur Portal by Mayhem Beth Goder
Attitude Adjustment by Eric James Stone
Son of Mars by Amar Tian
Robotics Genius by Bruce H. Markuson
The What-The Tree by Liam Hogan
JUMBO by Gregory L. Norris
Osmosis Camp boy Franco Amati
Woomie Saves the Day by Holly Schofield
Mister S And the Cosmic Invaders by Michael H. Hanson
Invasion of the Heavy Croppers by Robert Stapleton
Robot on a Rampage by Lena Ng
Sardines in a Tin Can by Wendy Nikel
Spots Got Bite by Daniel R. Robichaud
Luke and Odett by James Fitzsimmons
Nits! by Jenny Blackford
Opening the Box by Robert Dawson
Exploration by Carter Lappin
First Contact by Kay Hanifen
A World Aflutter by L.R. Conti

James and Cheryl Maxey are frequently found at comic conventions and renaissance festivals selling Cheryl’s crochet critters and James’ books, including the Bitterwood saga, Dragon Apocalypse, and the Dragonsgate trilogy. With years of experience publishing and selling books, they decided to expand their publishing empire to include a diverse range of authors writing high-quality science fiction and fantasy crafted for younger readers via Word Balloon Books.

214 pages, Paperback

Published July 3, 2022

About the author

I've been an avid reader since I first picked up a book. Luckily, I was within biking distance of three different libraries growing up. I was a skinny kid. If only I had maintained that link between biking and reading, I might be a skinny adult.

I'm also a writer. I wrote my first book as a kid, an adventure about pirates and ghosts. When I was a teenager, I used to write superhero adventures. Then I went to college and was steered toward writing "literature." It took me several years to shake that off, and today I write the sort of books I devoured by the shelf when I was sixteen, fast-paced fantasy, SF, and superhero adventures, which I use to explore deeper questions about life. My goal is to always be thought-provoking and always be fun.

I've had short stories in about a dozen anthologies and magazines. My novels to date are:

Nobody Gets the Girl

The Dragon Age trilogy
Bitterwood
Dragonforge
Dragonseed

Burn Baby Burn

The Dragon Apocalypse
Greatshadow (January 2012) -- A team of superpowered adventurers are recruited by the Church of the Book to extinguish the primal dragon of fire, Greatshadow.

Hush (July 2012) -- An effort to complete a quest for a fallen friend, the warrior woman Infidel stumbles onto a plot to kill Glorious, the primal dragon of the sun, and plunge the world into permanent cold and darkness, the elemental domain of the dragon Hush.

Witchbreaker (January 2013) -- A young witch named Sorrow has lost control of her magic after tapping into the spirit of Rott, the primal dragon of decay. Her desperate quest to save what remains of her humanity leads to an uneasy alliance with an amnesiatic warrior who might be the legendary champion of the church known as the Witchbreaker. But can there combined powers prevail when they trigger the wrath of Tempest, the primal dragon of storms?