Hey awesome,

We are not quiiiite close enough to the mountains to avoid heat + humidity entirely, but I'm locking myself in air conditioning and writing as much as possible. How are you keeping cool in this very melty summer?

I'm trying to have 1.5 novels done by the time I leave for DragonCon, so it's basically me and a computer (and a fan or three), though I have left the house semi-recently!

As you might remember, I went to Liberty Con! It was, as always, an incredible time. If you're interested in mostly coherent excited reports, you can find my post-Liberty notes here. If you'd prefer something with slightly less implied cackling, and also luminaries like Monalisa Foster, Dave Butler, Griffin Barber, Robert E. Hampson, and Sean Patrick Hazlett, I joined them on the Baen Free Radio Hour to chat about Liberty, and there was some great advice shared.

Anything on your con schedule for the next few months? Will I get to see you at DragonCon?

This is definitely how I fend off some of the sadness after a con - I start looking forward to the next one. I might do a few more next year - definitely let me know if you have any favorites I should check out!

In other news, I've recently updated how my newsletter works, so as new folks join there's a whole welcome series with a few extra free short stories to help them figure out who I am and what to expect from the list.

And you, since you've been here already, deserve the same (but with, you know, no additional emails!). So I want to make sure you have a chance to download, for free, a sampling of my short stories:

• The Hunter and The Ship: originally published in Negotiation, which was a collection of stories Hunters tell of themselves, and gathered tales of survivors. "The Hunter and the Ship" is something like a creation story different clans tell, and I had a lot of fun coming up with it.
• Unforced Errors: was in the first Peacemaker anthology, Set the Terms, also in the Four Horsemen Universe. It's the introduction to Balin, one of my favorite characters. He's all around too old for this sh-, and you can see more of him in World Enders - and the next Peacemaker anthology, Bureau 42, coming early next year!
• The Bookseller: This one's a fantasy story, in a world of my own. It was originally published in Onward, LibertyCon, and, as an exciting piece of news announced at this year's Liberty Con...I'm returning to this world in novel form. If you let me know if there's anything that jumps out at you when you read it that you wanna see more of, maybe it can work it's way in there!

And if more no-cost reading is appealing to you, may I present:

https://books.bookfunnel.com/midsummersciencefantasybash/vc08ahog7y

https://books.bookfunnel.com/bookspry-scifi-for-free/zf82ufw57n

Now my writing cave is calling. Gotta go finish a horror short story...

Til next time,

Marisa