Self-published Science Fiction & Fantasy & Horror

[salty-horse]

The Way of Unity by Sarah K. Balstrup and its sequel Black Stream are $2 each on Amazon.com
Dark fantasy. The first novel was a semi-finalist in the self-publlishing-focused SPFBO contest.

The Seven Lands of Velspar put their faith in the Intercessors, a psychic priesthood responsible for the purification of the spirit. Where passion flares, they soothe its intent. Those who cannot be soothed, are cast out, their spirits destroyed by fire.

The Intercessors are mystics of the highest order, but Velspar’s ruling Skalens believe their power has grown too great.

Surviving the Intercessor’s murder plot against her family, Sybilla Ladain rises to power. The Skalens come together under the banner of her grief, bringing the practice of Intercession to its brutal, bloody end.

Yet victory brings Sybilla no peace. In time, she will have to face the people of Velspar, forced to live in a psychically alienated world, and a band of rebels led by an escaped Intercessor set on her annihilation.

[salty-horse]

Spirits Rising (Spirit Caller #1) by Krista D. Ball is FREE on Amazon.com and the author's Payhip store.
Novella. Recommended by Janny Wurts

Rachel has no trouble believing in spirits. It's the living she has a tough time believing in. The man she's in love with? Taken. The job she loved? Gone. Her neighbours? They're taping religious tracts to her door. Then a rebellious teenager Wiccan accidentally summons the area's ancestral Viking spirits -- who promptly bring their thousand-year war to the remote Newfoundland fishing village. If Rachel's going to have any hope of sending the spirits to their peace, she'll have to stop drooling over unattainable men and trust her 93-year-old neighbour to help her stand against the spirits before their supernatural war engulfs them all.

Isaac by Allee Mead is $2 on Amazon.com
A Cozy Ace Android Relationship. Positive review by Alex Kingsley on Strange Horizons

When Eleanor Lane, estranged from her family, makes the drive to her deceased father’s house to arrange his funeral, she discovers Isaac, a care-bot. Isaac had been caring for her father ever since the incident six years ago, when her father, confused, accidentally cut her with a kitchen knife.

Eleanor convinces her sister to let her take the care-bot home, beginning a new relationship with him despite herself. As she learns more about Isaac, she also discovers a caring, sensitive person in the android. He fills the void in her life created from her fear of connecting with others, and starts to reconnect Eleanor to how her fathers, John and Javi, met and fell in love.

But is Isaac a replacement for human contact? For that matter, what is Isaac? A simple programmed construct, or a person who can grow and learn? Explore love, community, and what it means to be human in Allee Mead’s debut book, Isaac.

[salty-horse]

Admins, can you add "FREE/BARGAIN — " to the thread title? I'm not sure if I can edit it myself.

[salty-horse]

Rivers Solomon has started serializing an epic fantasy novel on AO3: Once I Was Made of Earth
https://archiveofourown.org/works/91618061

One chapter is available. If you're new to the platform, you can create a user and subscribe to receive email notifications once new chapters are posted.

Quoting the author introducing it:

ONCE I WAS MADE OF EARTH is here, an epic fantasy that's been rattling in my brain for years now and that I'm putting out into the world serially outside of the capitalist publishing apparatus. Share, and read, and comment.

It's not really about anything other than surviving in unsurvivable circumstances. I suppose it's about stories, too, and how we are all one. I do believe that truly, some days, at least.

[ZodWallop]

Thank you for this thread!

[DrNefario]

15 Free Kindle books from Luke Chmilenko, books 1-3 of 5 different series. I think they're mostly in the LitRPG/Progression Fantasy vein:

Ascend Online - Early VRMMO LitRPG. I already had these, and have read and enjoyed book 1.
Book 1 UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ascend-Onli.../dp/B01M01ET8E
US: https://www.amazon.com/Ascend-Online.../dp/B01M01ET8E

Starbreaker - I paid actual money (sure, only 0.99) for book 1 a few weeks ago, but haven't read it yet.
Book 1 UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Starbreaker.../dp/B0DW7CGM5X
US: https://www.amazon.com/Starbreaker-1.../dp/B0DW7CGM5X

Paragon - Co-authored with Alex Knight
Book 1 UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09T3S5MGS
US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09T3S5MGS

Immortal's Ascent
Book 1 UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DJPRJ3ZK
US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DJPRJ3ZK

Savage Dominion - Co-authored with G D Penman. Complete trilogy. - LAST DAY
Omnibus UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CZV39FZ7
US: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CZV39FZ7

Note that Savage Dominion is only free until the 3rd September, according to his website. The rest are free until the 7th.

Immortal's Ascent and Starbreaker seem to be "downloadable in other formats."

[salty-horse]

I forgot to post about Ghost of the Neon God by T. R. Napper earlier today, so here's another recent cyberpunk release:

Killswitch Protocol by M. J. Kuhn is $1 on Amazon.com

Logan's Run meets The Giver with a dash of Cyberpunk 2077.

In New Avarita, every person is born with a purpose. Once fulfilled, they are eligible for Ascent, a peaceful passing and assumed rebirth on the next plane of existence, celebrated for having left their perfect mark upon the world.

At least, that's what the powers that be want them to believe.

When Liv Spencer's husband reaches Ascent under more than suspicious circumstances, she doesn't feel like celebrating—she wants revenge. Her path takes her deep into the neon-drenched streets of New Avarita's seedy underbelly, a world filled with black-market cybernetics, synthetic drugs, and people who see Ascent for what it truly is: a killswitch.

Liv is soon embroiled in an anarchist plot to overthrow the ruling body of New Avarita, but the further she sinks into this world, the blurrier the line between "righteous rebellion" and "terrorism" begins to grow. With hundreds of thousands of innocent lives on the line, Liv must find a way to strike back against the fascist rule of the shadowy figures controlling New Avarita without getting flagged for Ascent herself.