Congratulations to M. Fenn, whose edgy space opera novella Piper Deez and the Case of the Winter Planet starts its ultra-cool investigations into domed city villainy today!
Piper Deez is a nifty SFnal twist on hardboiled noir fused to space opera—Outland meets Smilla’s Sense of Snow with a hefty soupçon of Blade Runner—and the second shuttle launched from The Reckless digital imprint of Candlemark & Gleam after the inaugural Wisps of Spider Silk. Here’s a synopsis that fully captures the story’s harsh, intrigue-riddled world:
Detective Piper Deez, newlywed but still hardboiled, is a solar system away from home investigating murder and thievery on Alta-na-Schell, the Winter Planet. Who can she trust? Who should she trust? Why didn’t anyone tell her monogamy was going to be this difficult? Eye of the Storm, a domed city riven by clan rivalries and corruption—with only fingerlengths of shielding protecting its denizens from certain death—may hold some answers and, perhaps, even the end of Piper Deez.
If monogamy doesn’t get to her first…
M. Fenn has lived in eight U.S. states and visited forty more, as well as three Canadian provinces. She has been a veterinary technician, a radio dj, and an office manager for a house museum, among other things. She has rescued marine mammals in California, seen the full moon rise over Chimney Rock in Colorado, hiked Chaco Canyon in New Mexico, marched for women’s rights in D.C., and driven U.S Hwy 50 from end to end by herself.
M. Fenn now lives and writes in the wilderness of southern Vermont with her furniture maker husband and a clowder of ghost cats. Her alt-history novella “So The Taino Call It” appears in Substitution Cipher (2012), her near-future dystopian novella “To The Edges” opens Winter Well: Speculative Novellas About Older Women (Crossed Genres, 2013), and her near-future SF story “Chlorophyll is Thicker than Water” is part of To Shape the Dark (Candlemark & Gleam, 2016). She blogs spasmodically at mfennwrites.wordpress.com and can also be found on Facebook more often than she would like.
Piper Deez is available on Amazon — and of course on our website, where a purchase brings along the full digital bundle (PDF, Epub and Mobi, with the PDF containing the usual bells and whistles). The eloquent, atmospheric cover is by Chelsea Neveu.
