Comin’ atcha like a magic master — it’s my brand new story series HARD-BOILED WITCH. Obviously, it’s a mash-up of magic and crime, set in a sort of magical Dundee (mostly) and just fun stuff. We kick off the adventures with HOCUS POCUS, YOU’RE DEAD, which is available now on Amazon (and fingers crossed, will soon be an official Kindle Single). Here’s the low down:
Hecate Sidlaw eats punks like you for breakfast — at least that’s what her familiar Henry claims. When someone needs a protection spell or a nasty hex, they knock on her door. Hecate can handle most magical problems, but what happens when a new crime kingpin gets a magic man of their own? This 20-page ebook single is the first in a new series from the author of WHITE RABBIT, OWL STRETCHING, and the CHASTITY FLAME thriller series.
Yes, I know — one more thing not on the to-do list, but honestly it had to be done. Don’t believe me? I offer the following as proof of the need to write an idea once it’s bursting out of your head: in Mad World (the book what I wrote up for FFB last week), Paula Byrne quotes from a letter written by Evelyn Waugh to his commanding officer more or less demanding leave to write a novel (let that sink in for a moment; now imagine writing such a letter to your boss in non-war circumstances!).
It is a peculiarity of the literary profession that, once an idea becomes fully formed in the author’s mind, it cannot be left unexploited without deterioration. If, in fact, the book is not written now it will never be written.
Amazingly enough, Waugh did get leave and thus we have Brideshead Revisited (depending on how you feel about that book you may cheer or curse). I’m lucky enough to be on a sort of ‘leave’ all this year until late August (sob!) and there’s enough wiggle room in my deadlines to get away with this.
It’s out under the auspices of the Women’s League of Ale Drinkers (those fine purveyors of brew and indy art) instead of one of my usual publishers mostly because I want instant gratification! I also don’t wish to tax the patience of the wonderful publishers I work with who mostly have things coming out from me now or soon. Specifically:
- White Rabbit now
- Extricate/Throw the Bones very soon (ebook out!)
- Girl at the End of the World not far off
- Missing Monarchs not long after that I suspect
- a secret fairy tale project [hush hush]
- High Plains Lazarus ebook novella in August
- Chastity Flame series out in print
- The Big Spin (Kit Marlowe – follow up to The Big Splash)
- Unquiet Dreams will be just 99¢ in June!
Immanion Press
- Alas, I have to announce that my novels are going out of print: get them while you can!
- Pelzmantel and Owl Stretching will continue to be available as ebooks, however.
And of course there are more things coming, both fiction and non-fiction, short, long and everything in between. Despite the lack of interest from the world at large (as evidenced by the resounding silence that greets each new release) I keep writing because there’s stuff in my head that wants to be made and I keep making it. That’s what makes me happy. I find when I forget that, when I try to be ‘sensible’ about it, I feel crushed and straightjacketed. Words gotta be free.
K. A. Laity 
Yaaaaaaaaay … *waves arms like Kermit*
Heh!