Holly Lisle has been writing fiction professionally since 1991, when she sold FIRE IN THE MIST, the novel that won the Compton Crook Award for best first novel. She has to date published more than thirty novels and more than twenty comprehensive writing courses.

Having finished up THE LONGVIEW CHRONICLES, she's taking a short break from Settled Space to finally write the third and final episode in the MOON & SUN series, THE EMERALD SUN.

Holly had an ideal childhood for a writer...which is to say, it was filled with foreign countries and exotic terrains, alien cultures, new languages, the occasional earthquake, flood, or civil war, and one story about a bear, which follows:

"Back when I was ten years old, my father and I had finished hunting ducks for our dinner and were walking across the tundra in Alaska toward the spot on the river where we'd tied our boat. We had a couple miles to go by boat to get back to the Moravian Children's Home, where we lived.

"My father was carrying the big bag of decoys and the shotgun; I was carrying the small bag of ducks.

"It was getting dark, we could hear the thud, thud, thud of the generator across the tundra, and suddenly he stopped, pointed down to a pie-pan sized indentation in the tundra that was rapidly filling with water, and said, in a calm and steady voice, "That's a bear footprint. From the size of it, it's a grizzly. The fact that the track is filling with water right now means the bear's still around."

"Which got my attention, but not as much as what he said next.

" 'I don't have the gun with me that will kill a bear,' he told me. 'I just have the one that will make him angry. So if we see the bear, I'm going to shoot him so he'll attack me. I want you to run to the river, follow it to the boat, get the boat back home, and tell everyone what happened.'

"The rest of our walk was very quiet. He was, I'm sure, listening for the bear. I was doing my damnedest to make sure that I remembered where the boat was, how to get to it, how to start the pull-cord engine, and how to drive it back home, because I did not want to let him down.

"We were not eaten by a bear that night...but neither is that walk back from our hunt for supper a part of my life I'll ever forget.

"I keep that story in mind as I write. If what I'm putting on paper isn't at least as memorable as having a grizzly stalking my father and me across the tundra while I was carrying a bag of delicious-smelling ducks, it doesn't make my cut."

Cheerfully,

Holly Lisle

Katharina Gerlach was born in Germany in 1968. She and her three younger brothers grew up in the middle of a forest in the heart of the Luneburgian Heather. After romping through the forest with imagination as her guide, the tomboy learned to read and disappeared into magical adventures, past times or eerie fairytale woods.

She didn't stop at reading. During her training as a landscape gardener, she wrote her first novel, a manuscript full of a beginner's mistakes. Fortunately, she found books on Creative Writing and soon her stories improved. For a while, reality interfered with her writing but after finishing a degree in forestry and a PhD in Science she returned to her vocation. She likes to write Fantasy, Science Fiction and Historical Novels for all age groups.

At present, she is writing at her next project in a small house near Hildesheim, Germany, where she lives with her husband, three children and a dog.

Oren Litwin is a lawyer specializing in financial regulation; in the past, he worked in financial advising, public advocacy, and academia. Oren currently lives with his family in the DC Metro area.

Eileen Mueller is a USA Today bestselling and multi-award-winning author of heart-pounding fantasy novels that will keep you turning the page. Dive into her worlds, full of magic, love, adventure and dragons!

Eileen lives in New Zealand in a cave with her dragonets, writing for young adults, children and everyone who loves adventure.

Visit her website at www.EileenMuellerAuthor.com for Eileen's FREE books, new releases or to become a Rider of Fire!

Riders of Fire - YA epic fantasy adventure:

1: Ezaara

2: Dragon Hero

3: Dragon Rift

4: Dragon Strike

5: Dragon War

6: Sea Dragon

Riders of Fire Dragon Masters - YA epic fantasy adventure:

1: Anakisha’s Dragon

2: Dragon Mage

3: Dragon Pirate

4: Master Mage

5: Dragon Spy

6: Dragon Healer

7: Dragon Rider

Riders of Fire Dragons - Prequels

1: Bronze Dragon (free novelette)

2: Ruby Dragon (short story)

3: Silver Dragon - free novelette only at EileenMuellerAuthor.com

Dragon Shifters’ Hoard - Urban Fantasy

1: Snow and Red

2: Zephyr and Snow

3: Dante and Red

Children’s adventures:

Attack on Dragons' Realm (same world as Riders of Fire)

Dragons' Realm -Winner SJV Award Best Youth Novel (same world as Riders of Fire)

Dragon Tales

Mystic Portal

Free children's short stories at www.EileenMuellerAuthor.com:

Wingspan

Legless - A Twisty Christmas Tale

Fangtastic Dragon Jokes

Eileen’s Awards:

2019 Quarterfinalist Epic Fantasy Fanatics Readers’ Choice Awards

2 x 2019 Storylines NZ Notable Book Awards for Excellence in Young Adult fiction - Ezaara & Dragon Hero

2017 Finalist in Romance Writers NZ Short Story Contest

2016 Sir Julius Vogel Award for Best New Talent

2015 Sir Julius Vogel Award for Best Youth Novel - Dragons' Realm

2013 Co-winner NorthWrite Collaboration contest - co-authored short literary work, Ahi Ka

2013 Winner SpecFicNZ Going Global

Those who can, do. Those who can do no longer, teach - or better still, write! Tom Vetter has done both - living it first and then writing about it. As a naval officer he served more than two decades in submarines and deep submergence vehicles. During his career, Commander Vetter sailed more than 100,000 miles, operated diesel and nuclear submarines during the Vietnam and Cold Wars, piloted the Navy’s bathyscaph TRIESTE II (DSV-1) and commercial submersibles, and found men, equipment, aircraft and shipwrecks on dives venturing deeper than 3 miles. His undersea exploration and search innovations are still used by the U.S. Navy and others.

After several lives' worth of adventure at sea, Tom retired from the U.S. Navy's Submarine Force and worked another career in IT and telecommunications, operating a successful IT architecture business for a decade before his wife's health required a second retirement.

Writing has become his third career. In the past three years, Tom has written a memoir of his undersea adventures and two books of a planned four-book historical fiction series centered on The First Crusade.

Tom lives with his wife in Virginia. And as care-giving duties permit, he writes every day.

I’m a writer, general creative sort, and occasional tech nerd. I love books, dogs, chocolate, and the beach. I’m very much a jeans and t-shirts kind of girl—don’t expect to see me in too many dresses unless it’s a very, very special occasion… and even then, the heels won’t stay on for long.

My passion in writing is light, color, the unexpected, and the triumph of good over evil (but only after a considerable amount of stress and aggravation to make things interesting, of course). I strive to see the good in the world, the magical in the mundane, the light in the darkness, and the transcendent in the ordinary.

In addition to writing, I enjoy art, photography, graphic design, music, and playing mind-numbing games on shiny, new electronics.

A Californian at heart, I currently reside in North Texas with one husband, two grown children, and a pair of neurotic dogs.

VS Stark has been reading sf since the age of eight and writing spec fic, before it was called that, for nearly that long. Writing has been supported by forays into music licensing, baking, insurance, and web design. Despite a grandfather born in the 1800s, still not a vampire.

Joyce Sully believes in magic and dragons and ghosts, but is not convinced their next-door neighbors are real. So they write stories. Really, what else could they do?

Joyce lives in Central California. Moving there made them consider a career change: engineer developing teleportation technology. In an alternate universe, they raise and train horses, one of the oldest ways of getting around after our own two feet. Joyce pines for the future, but they plan to drag a few pieces of the past along with them.

In their universes, you’ll need your sense of wonder, a few good friends, and maybe a flamethrower.

A 20-year Air Force career, time as a manager at a computer operations company, wife, mother, sister and volunteer, provides a rich background for Connie Cockrell’s story-telling.

Cockrell grew up in upstate NY, just outside of Gloversville, NY before she joined the military at age 18. Having lived in Europe, Great Britain, and several places around the United States, she now lives in Payson, AZ with her husband: hiking, gardening, and playing bunko. She writes about whatever comes into her head so her books could be in any genre. She's published seventeen books so far, has been included in five different anthologies and been published on EveryDayStories.com and FrontierTales.com. Connie's always on the lookout for a good story idea. Beware, you may be the next one.

She can be found at www.conniesrandomthoughts.com or on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/ConniesRandomThoughts or on Twitter at: @ConnieCockrell

​Rachel Hobbs lives in South West Wales, where she hibernates with with her bearded dragon and her husband. By day she is a dental nurse at a small local practice. By night, she writes.

​Her debut novel SHADOW-STAINED is the first in a dark fantasy series for adults, inspired by her dark and peculiar experiences with narcolepsy and parasomnia. She's since subjugated her demons, and writes under the tenuous guise that they work for her.

​Fuelled by an unhealthy amount of coffee, she writes about hard-boiled monsters with soft centres and things that go bump in the night. ​

You can find her at www.authorrachelhobbs.co.uk

Nicky Penttila writes stories with adventure, history, ideas and love. She likes to come up with stories that are set in faraway cities and countries, because then she *must* travel there, you know, for research. She lives in Maryland with her reading-mad husband and amazing rescue cat.

Nicky loves hearing from readers. You can find her at:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/NickyPenttila (chattiest here)

Website: http://www.nickypenttila.com/

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5857925.Nicky_Penttila

J.L. Perry grew up in Southeastern Oklahoma, in a rural area. At an early age she fell in love with the magic of stories. Knights, dragons, and witches sparked her imagination, making her realize that she had her own stories to tell. J.L. Perry can be found baking up stories and sweet treats in Texas.

Angela Wooldridge lives in Devon, England, in a rackety old house with her husband, the railway children and an assortment of creatures.

She always wanted to be a writer, ever since the early days of exploring Narnia with the Pevensies, and eating sardine sandwiches with the Famous Five. She managed to hold off for a while but started writing in earnest in 2009.

Her work has appeared in magazines, anthologies and she has been shortlisted in various competitions. She is currently seeking representation for her Middle Grade fantasy novel, ‘The Merewoods Witches’.

You can read her blog at www.angelawooldridge.wordpress.com or follow her on Twitter: @angwooldridge.

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James Husum writes in multiple genres, but mainly in the science fiction, fantasy and mystery genres (sometimes in various combinations of the three.) He writes for all ages, from adult to YA to kids books. He strives to make his works entertaining for his readers, offering them a distraction from the real world.

James spent several decades working in the software industry, creating online publishing platforms, corporate training platforms, and writing software for NASA. In addition to writing software he has written technical manuals in how to operate various programs.

When he isn't writing, he spends his time reading anything he can get his hands on, doodling, and working at his local makerspace teaching members about 3D printers, laser cutters and CNC routers. He's also been known to teach Python programming classes from time to time.

James has had several short stories published and won several writing competitions. He is working on his first novel.

Chaitali Gawade's writerly musings are fuelled by tea and coffee. She writes flash pieces, poems and novels. Her work has been published by Unbroken Journal, Duckbill Anthology and Vagabondage Press, among others.

www.ChaitaliGawade.com

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Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

I was born in 1966 to some loving parents. This is where many writers now state: From the age of two months I knew I wanted to be a writer. Well, that's not my next sentence. In fact, I didn't even like to read when I was young, and reading is a precursor to writing. I was into sports. They were my life growing up. And reading took a long time and kept me from doing the thing I loved most, sports.

But things started to change when I discovered The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien the summer before my freshman year of college. I instantly fell in love with the fantasy genre, and particularly dragons. I still didn't have any aspirations of writing stories at that point, but it did stoke my love for reading and since then I have read hundreds of books in various genres.

The first time I got the bug to write my own story was after reading Intensity by Dean Koontz in 1996. After finishing that book I set a goal to finish a novel by the end of 1997. Unfortunately that did not work out. Life started throwing me some serious curve balls, so pursuing the act of writing a novel quickly moved onto the back burner.

I hadn't considered writing again until the year 2000 when the Harry Potter books entered my life. Those books gave me the bug again, and I decided to pursue it once more. Throughout the next several years I began learning the craft of writing and started writing my first novel. But life was still too crazy for me to focus on something that required so much time and energy. I never finished that first novel. I will go back and finish it someday. It is deeply personal to me. But that one wasn't meant to be my first novel. Instead, I took up writing short stories for a while because writing a novel was simply taking too long with my busy life.

And then came the event that changed my attitude towards writing forever. A friend of someone I know committed suicide. This rocked my world big time! Suddenly, some of the things I thought I knew -- life is short, pursue your dreams while you can, etc. -- instantly became very real to me. That was the night, with these old perspectives newly imprinted into my mind, when I made the decision that I WOULD be a writer and publish stories if it was the good Lord's will.

From that point on, I kept plodding along. I couldn't write as often as I would have liked, but I did keep writing and learning the craft. My progress was slow -- VERY SLOW. It became an off and on adventure as the kids grew older and became more involved in their activities, but I never gave up. I chipped away little by little and kept moving forward.

Fast forward to 2016, the year I turned fifty years old. My life was finally to the point that I could now dedicate some time to a writing business. My ideal scenario would be to find a core group of Tuff Readers who love to read my fiction to escape from the realities of every day life. As long as I have people reading my writing, and as long as I am able to write, I will do so. I can't think of a better way to spend the rest of my life!

Author website: www.tuffgartin.com

Author correspondence address:

Tuff Gartin

P.O. Box 218294

Nashville, TN 37221

Born only a few miles from where Jesse James robbed his first train, Rachel Kovaciny has loved the Old West all her life. She now lives in Virginia with her husband and their three homeschooled children. In her free time, Rachel writes for the "Prairie Times" and "Femnista," reads, bakes, blogs, watches movies, and daydreams.

Her book "Cloaked" was a finalist for the 2018 Peacemaker Awards for Best Western YA/Children's Fiction.

After consumption of a truly massive quantity of fiction books for many, many years in multiple genres and an extended diversion into technical fields, Marie's muse finally got her attention. Then rabid plot bunnies bred like tribbles to take over her life. Ideas keep accumulating: ideas for fan pastiches, ideas for original fiction, ideas for a short series that could be a cool animated movie, ideas ideas ideas. Marie cannot understand how writers don't have enough ideas as some practically tackle her... especially the weird or funny ones.

Marie has mostly done short fiction in science fiction and fantasy which include notes of horror, mystery, and romance. (sometimes all in the same story) Her first collection was the "Necklace of Amber," followed four more necklace chapbooks and eventually by the "Necklace of Gems," which collected all five chapbooks. A novel is in the works and others stuffed in the proverbial trunk begging for attention with a pencil-cup.

Moira K. Brennan is a high school English teacher who loves to take many and varied adventures through the pages of books. When not grading homework she writes the stories the voices in her head demand be told. She lives in central North Carolina with her husband, son, and pack of rescued dogs.

Janna Willard was born and raised in small-town Alberta, Canada, and moved several times while growing up. She became fascinated with words at an early age, reciting a poem about her new baby brother to a room of adults at age two years, and learning to read the following year. Now married to a fellow word-lover (who is also an engineer), she is doing her best to raise their child to love words as much as his parents do.

Janna's creativity spans from writing stories and the odd poem, through visual art (including painting and drawing, especially Celtic knots), to composing music (including chamber works, pieces for solo instruments, and a few songs). She obtained her BMus in Composition from the University of Calgary in 1998. Her career has included a decade working in early intervention, primarily with autistic children, a couple of years working as a church secretary, and another decade as a copy editor and proofreader. A lifelong reader and writer with a few publishing credits in anthologies under her belt, she finally took the plunge in 2017 and self-published her first collection of flash fiction (short stories under 1,000 words in length).

Her primary goal as a writer is to share Truth with her readers through her stories. Please come, read, and rest a while. May your spirit be blessed by these words.

On a family vacation in grade school, Laura Wilson-Anderson saw her first double-decker bus and fell in love. Her family had been camping every summer as long as she could remember, and she loved the skoolie they had at the time. A converted bus with a second story seemed like heaven! Her goal from then on was to become an author, live in a double-decker bus, and see the entire country a few months at a time, writing stories and mailing them off to the Great Writing Gods. The story could have the typical ending of the girl growing up and realizing none of that was practical, but! She found a job that let her travel, going places for three months or so at a time, picked up writing again after twenty years, and while it's not a huge bus, she travels in her RV as long as she's not going somewhere cold. :-)

She writes fantasy, time travel, and some mystery and romance, because life just isn't as much fun without them.

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Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more