Coming in May 2024: Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 8

 

Reciprocal ads for Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 8

I'm busy getting Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 8 ready for publication in May. I already have several reciprocal ads included in it. If there are any other publishers who would like to partake please message me as soon as possible and I'll reserve you a spot.

paralleluniversepublications@gmx.co.uk

Self Publishing Workshop

This should be of interest for anyone within travelling distance of Accrington who would like to self publish something they have written or in creating their own small press using print on demand.

I have been running my own small press - Parallel Universe Publications - for over a decade, with hardcover, paperback and kindle ebooks. You can see those books that are still in print here. 

The hour-long workshops will be held at 7 o’clock on Friday evenings at a date still to be decided, but hopefully sometime soon, depending on the response I receive. If you are interested please let me know on the email address given below.

The workshops will be held at ReAct Academy of Theatre Arts Studios, 43b Market Street, Church, Lancashire, BB5 0DP, close to Church & Oswaldtwistle Railway Station and bus routes from Blackburn to Accrington and elsewhere. There is also a spacious car park.  Please see the map below.

To contact me email paralleluniversepublications@gmx.co.uk

The workshops will last an hour and cost £5. They will cover how to set up your own press, format what you intend to print and how to create covers. They will also instruct you on how to avoid the many pitfalls, not least being amateurish or unattrative publications.  

No previous experience in publishing or writing is needed, but you should have a reasonable knowledge of spelling and English grammar.

 

 

Update on Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 8

Volume 8 of our Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy series has now begun the process to be published and pdfs have already been sent out to all contributors for them to check their details in the Introduction and to make any last minute tweaks or alterations to their stories.

 

Everything is in line for publication at the beginning of May as a paperback and kindle eBook.

 

Submissions for Volume 9 will open on the 1st October for one full calendar month, with publication scheduled for November. More details later.

Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 6

 

 

There was a great recent 5-star review on amazon for Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 6:

Day Thirty-Nine of Showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications: Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 7

 

And here we are at day thirty-nine of showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications with Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 7, which we published last November.

This is the final showcasing. We have published other books (The Winter Hunt & Other Stories by Steve Lockley and Paul Lewis; England 'B': Ninety Minutes of Hell by Richard Stains (Mark Samuels); Will Anyone Figure That This Is A Repackaged First Collection by Johnny Mains; A Distasteful Horror Story by Johnny Mains; and A Little Light Screaming by Johnny Mains) but all of these have been discontinued and are out of print. 

In 2024 we will be publishing two further volumes of Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy plus a trilogy of interlinked sword and sorcery collections by a veteran writer (further information to be issued later).  All five books will be illustrated by Jim Pitts. 

 Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 7 is available as a paperback and ebook (kindle)

amazon.co.uk

amazon.com

 

The stories and authors included are:

 

PITILESS by Stephen Frame

UNHALLOWED TOMBS by Paul Batteiger

SORCERIES IN ASSABARR by Andrew Graham

SCHISM OF SPECTRES by Phil Emery

THE CROSSROADS IN THE FOREST by Gavin Chappell

WISPS by Jason M Waltz

DARK THE SKY, RADIANT THE ROAD by Jalyn Renae Fiske

THE BLOOD OF KHALID AL'TAHIR by Craig Comer

THE DARK KNIGHT OF THE SOUL by eric Ian Steele

PROHAIRESIS by Jon Zaremba

BLADES FOR A BOUNTY by Harry Elliott

The artwork, as always, is by Jim Pitts.

Day Thirty-Eight of Showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications: Lucilla - a novella by David A. Riley

 

Day thirty-eight of showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications and it's my own Lucilla - a novella, which was originally serialised in Bewildering Stories. 

 

Lucilla - a novella by David A. Riley is available in hardcover for £13.99, in paperback for £5.50, and in kindle for £2.99. The cover artwork is by Jim Pitts.

It was just another standard day at the Women’s Refuge until the arrival of Lucilla. Then Miranda’s world was never the same again.
Unaccountably influenced by what the girl needed, her job, her friendships, even freedom itself were of no importance. It was not until her niece’s life was at risk that Miranda knew she had to act.
But what could she do against someone who had such a tight, insidious grip on her?

amazon UK £13.99 in hardcover, £5.50 in paperback, £2.99 in kindle

amazon.com $17.19 in hardcover, $6.70 in paperback, $3.70 in kindle

Day Thirty-Seven of Showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications: Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 6

For day thirty-seven of showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications it's Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 6.

Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 6 is available as a paperback and ebook (kindle)

amazon.com

amazon.co.uk

 The contents are: 

LAND OF THE DEAD by Dev Agarwal

THE HOUSE OF BONES by Carson Ray

THRENODY OF GHOSTS by Phil Emery

WARDARK AND THE SIREN QUEEN by Craig Herbertson

OTRIM by Lyndon Perry

GODS, MEN, AND NEPHILIM by David Dubrow

GOLDEN WITCH OF ADZELGAR by Scott McCloskey

RAIDING THE GRAVEYARD OF LOST SHIPS by Tais Teng

A PLACE OF GHOSTS by Andrew Darlington

THOSE WHO WEAR THEIR WHITE HAIR PROUDLY by Lauren C. Teffeau

TRIALS FOR TREASURE by Harry Elliott

GOD OF THE DREAMING ISLES by Adrian Cole

Day Thirty-Six of Showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications: Childe Rolande by Samantha Lee

 

For day thirty-six of showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications, it's Samantha Lee's amazing mix of sword & sorcery and post apocalyptic science fantasy Childe Rolande. 

Parallel Universe Publications is proud to announce that we have published Samantha Lee's groundbreaking post-apocalyptic dark fantasy novel Childe Rolande as a paperback and kindle e-book.

amazon.co.uk

amazon.com

Originally published by Futura Books in 1989, our new version includes an Introduction by the author and a brand-new cover by talented Scottish artist Paul Mudie, who will be familiar to many for the iconic covers he created for the Black Books of Horror. There is also the added bonus of interior chapter headings by award-winning artist Jim Pitts.

Childe Rolande has been optioned by Forlan Films for a proposed TV series and is currently in pre-production development.

Day Thirty-Five of Showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications: A Handful of Zombies: Tales of the Restless Dead

 

Day thirty-five of showcasing books published by Parallel Universe Publications and it's the turn of our first (and only) chapbook: A Handful of Zombies: Tales of the Restless Dead by David A. Riley, illustrated throughout by award-winning artist Jim Pitts.

What was intended as the start of a series of low-priced chapbooks, A Handful of Zombies: Tales of the Restless Dead included four previously published short stories by David A. Riley with illustrations by Jim Pitts.

amazon.co.uk

amazon.com

All four stories in this collection cover a wide range of tropes within the zombie genre. 

Dead Ronnie and I is a tale of high adventure by plane and sea, with an abortive escape by our protagonist to the as yet untainted Isles of Scotland. This was originally published in Sanitarium Magazine No 44 in 2016.

His Pale Blue Eyes is probably the most traditional take of zombie stories today, featuring a young girl’s determined search for her parents during a zombie apocalypse. It’s a story, though, about conditioning and how what someone is taught can radically affect their behaviour. Is the horror in this the shambling undead or the girl herself? See what you think. This first appeared in Bite-Sized Horror edited by Johnny Mains for Obverse Books in 2011.

By contrast Right For You Now, originally published in Weirdbook Zombie Annual No 3 in 2021, harks back to the original concept of the zombie in Voodoo-haunted Haiti, though this tale is set in present-day Britain. It’s a combination of a crime story, revenge, and a man’s obsessive fascination with age-old practices.

Our final tale, Romero’s Children, is more in the way of a science fiction story. The zombies here are certainly the most different. For a start off they are not dead but have been granted near immortality by a drug that swept the world with its promise to stop aging. Alas for those caught up in the frenzied demand to use it, though, its side effects were such that they would have been better off dead. This story appeared in 2010 in The Seventh Black Book of Horror edited by the late Charles Black and was subsequently picked up by American editor Paula Guran for her 2012 anthology Extreme Zombies.