Category Archives: Aphanasia Stuff

Aphanasian Stories on Sale

November 22, 2018 R. Parrish Leave a comment

Three of Rhonda Parrish’s beloved Aphanasian stories brought together in one collection for the first time!

A Love Story: Z’thandra, a swamp elf living with the Reptar, discovers a human near the village. When she falls in love with him, she faces the most difficult choice of her life, a decision that will affect the Reptar for generations.

Lost and Found: Xavier, the escaped subject of a madman’s experiments, and Colby, a young lady on a mission to save her brother, must combine their efforts to elude capture and recover the magical artifact that will save Colby’s brother before it’s too late.

Sister Margaret: A vampire hunter and a half-incubus swordsman are hired by a priestess to kill the undead pimp that is extorting, torturing and murdering vulnerable girls.

Okay, I admit it. The title is less than inspiring, but the stories are good 🙂

Aphanasian Stories are on sale for this weekend only–because Black Friday. You can pick up your copy now for less than a dollar… and the timing is great because I’ll be releasing a new Aphanasian story next year, so this will introduce you to the world and the characters just in time to pick that one up and dive in 🙂

Available Now

Amazon (US) (CA) (UK)

But wait! There’s more 🙂

Because of course there is, it’s Black Friday.

Aphanasian Stories is on sale as a part of a larger sale.

Click here to check out dozens of titles in all sorts of genres that have been marked down to $1 for this long weekend 🙂

Prairie Starport, Sister Margaret

Prairie Starport

May 8, 2018 R. Parrish Leave a comment

Prairie Starport: Stories in Celebration of Candas Jane Dorsey

I wanted to to do something to honour Candas Jane Dorsey, because she has done so very much to help me and countless other people. And not just writers or editors or publishers. No. Though she does that as well, Candas doesn’t limit herself to working to benefit people in the publishing industry, she has dedicated her life to helping people. Period.

That deserves recognition.

In fact, it deserves more recognition than I have the power to give, but I wanted to contribute what I could. As did all the authors and artists who contributed to creating Prairie Starport. Though my name is on the cover as the person who put all these things together I could not have done anything without the support and contributions of tonnes of other people — including, of course, my fellow contributors.

This collection contains work by Timothy J. Anderson, Greg Bechtel, Eileen Bell, Gregg Chamberlain, Alexandrea Flynn and Annalise Glinker, Barb Galler-Smith, Anita Jenkins, Laina Kelly, Derryl Murphy, John Park, Rhonda Parrish, Ursula Pflug, Robert Runté, Diane L. Walton, BD Wilson and S.G. Wong.

My contribution is “Sister Margaret” which is a short story about a vampire hunter and a half-incubus swordsman trying to save prostitutes from a vampiric pimp. I wrote it a looong time ago but it still remains one of my favourites.

And because my goal with this anthology is to show appreciation for and celebrate Candas, not to turn a profit, I am giving the electronic version away for free.

Download it for free at:
BookFunnel
Kobo
Playster
Apple
More coming soon!

Also available at Amazon

Paperback available at Amazon:
.com
.co.uk

And add it to your shelves at Goodreads

All profits from this collection will be donated to the Bent Arrow Traditional Healing Society in Candas’ name.

(In case you’re curious, yes, I could have used the word contribute in its various forms more if I’d tried. I really could have :-p )

One of the stories was accompanied by art. Since the interior only allowed for black and white art, we also included the piece on the back cover so that it could be displayed in colour… albeit with a text overlay.

Aphanasian Stories, Books, C is for Chimera, Editing, Sirens

2016 Eligibility Post

December 28, 2016 R. Parrish Leave a comment

If you are nominating for industry awards this year please consider the following works of mine which I published in 2016:

Short Story:

Sharper Than a Griffin’s Claw, Women in Practical Armor, March 2016

Where I come from they say there are a finite number of souls and after death each goes to a great repository to await another vessel to fill. By that reasoning, if one were to live forever, they would encounter the same souls over and over again…

Anthology / Related Works:

Sirens, World Weaver Press, April 2016

Sirens are beautiful, dangerous, and musical, whether they come from the sea or the sky. Greek sirens were described as part-bird, part-woman, and Roman sirens more like mermaids, but both had a voice that could captivate and destroy the strongest man. The pages of this book contain the stories of the Sirens of old, but also allow for modern re-imaginings, plucking the sirens out of their natural elements and placing them at a high school football game, or in wartime London, or even into outer space.

Featuring stories by Kelly Sandoval, Amanda Kespohl, L.S. Johnson, Pat Flewwelling, Gabriel F. Cuellar, Randall G. Arnold, Micheal Leonberger, V. F. LeSann, Tamsin Showbrook, Simon Kewin, Cat McDonald, Sandra Wickham, K.T. Ivanrest, Adam L. Bealby, Eliza Chan, and Tabitha Lord, these siren songs will both exemplify and defy your expectations.

C is for Chimera, Poise and Pen Publishing, April 2016

This installment of Rhonda Parrish’s alphabet anthology series asks skilled storytellers to write around the theme of chimera. The resulting tales are part fable, part poem, part dream. But like any chimera, the parts make up a greater whole.

Blend reality with fantasy. Mesh science fiction with mystery. Mix history with what should have been. They are all chimera.

A shadow tells a tale of schoolyard bullies. A long-vanished monster returns from the cold dark. Make-up makes up a life. Alchemy, Atlantis, and apocalypse. These 26 tales bring both chaos and closure to dark and elusively fantastic geographies.

If you are qualified to nominate for awards (of any flavour) and you’d like a copy of any of these works in order to read and consider them, please email me. I will be more than happy to provide what I can.

Aphanasian Stories, Books, Published

Women in Practical Armor

September 1, 2016 R. Parrish Leave a comment

If women in fantasy are capable and intelligent enough to lead in battle, wouldn’t they also be intelligent enough to protect their abdomens, tie their hair back, and cover their faces in battle?

Edited by Ed Greenwood and Gabrielle Harbowy, this anthology of eighteen short stories showcases an already empowered female warrior who knows how to handle herself in battle. Take charge of your fantasy reading with Women In Practical Armor!

Steve Bornstein – “Serendipity”
Cassandra Rose Clarke – “A Night in New Verashtin”
Erik Scott de Bie – “King’s Shield”
Kristy Griffin Green – “The Family Business”
Amy Griswold – “The Raven and the Swans”
Sarah Hendrix – “Hero of Ithar”
Crystal Lynn Hilbert – “Stone Woken”
Chris A. Jackson – “First Command”
Mary Robinette Kowal – “The Bound Man”
Eric Landreneau – “Pride and Joy”
Wunji Lau – “No Better Armor, No Heavier Burden”
Todd McCaffrey – “Golden”
Rhonda Parrish – “Sharp as a Griffin’s Claw”
Anya Penfold – “The Lioness”
Mary Pletsch – “The Blood Axe”
Alex C. Renwick – “Ravenblack”
David Szarzynski – “Armor the Color of War”
Judith Tarr – “Attrition”

It’s out! It’s out! See that bolded name up there? That’s mine! I am so stoked about this.

My contribution is an Aphanasian story that includes some new and some familiar (*cough* Bayne *cough*) characters.

And readers are enjoying it. Check out this review:

“An unusual love story unfolds between an imp and a half-elf in “Sharp as a Griffin’s Claw” by Rhonda Parrish. I liked the unusual protagonists in the story, and how they came to love each other. I really liked how each of them gave their all to the relationship, and each became much more than they would have been had they been alone. Very smartly told, and an awesome addition to Women in Practical Armor.”

Check out the full review of this anthology I’m SO proud to be a part of — http://www.my-sf.com/2016/08/29/women-in-practical-armor-edited-by-ed-greenwood-and-gabrielle-harbowy-anthology-review/

Buy It Now 🙂

Aphanasian Stories, Thoughts

Moving The #s

January 7, 2016 R. Parrish Leave a comment

A while back I put Aphanasian Stories on sale and asked my readers to help me move the numbers–meaning, help shift the book up the ranks of Amazon and Kobo. We were incredibly successful (helped in part by a Book Bub promotion going on at the same time) and I wanted to take a moment and share the results with everyone here. I’d meant to do it before now but with the Giftmas Tour, holidays and the like, it kind of got lost in the rush 🙂

This post is image intensive. The tl;dr version is YAY!

This is the graphic I whipped up on Canva to show where we were starting out rank-wise for the book:

If you click on the picture it should take you to a larger size so you can actually read it, but there’s no real need because I’m going to provide you with the numbers here too. Here are the Before and Afters 🙂 Starting with Amazon.ca.

Before:

After:

For one brief moment in time, in one category on Amazon.ca I was even ranked higher than a Neil Gaiman title 😉

And at another point I had books in both 1st and 5th place spots even though I wasn’t actively promoting Fae that weekend:

I was feeling the love on Kobo too, which was extra sweet because prior to this sale I’d sold less than a dozen books on Kobo total.

Before:

After:

Amazon.com didn’t love me quite as much as the other Amazons… but that makes sense, my Book Bub promotion didn’t include the USA (though the sale price did).

Before:

After:

Amazon.Co.Uk took a bit of time to warm up to me, something I’m mostly blaming on time zones (because I can LOL).

Before:

After:

This is the ‘After’ image I created on Canva to sum up the success of our ‘Moving the #s’ attempt:

In case you’re wondering what this looks like in sales, this line graph shows my KDP sales for Aphanasian Stories in the days leading up to the sale, the sale itself, and the days afterward:

You may not be able to see it without going to the larger version of the picture but basically it’s a straight line with a blip or two now and then right up until the sale… which is that ginormous spike that slowly declines back to the straight line with an occasional blip.

What does this mean in the long term? Probably nothing LOL Mostly my career is built on those blips, the hope being that with enough books out there blipping along the trickles will eventually combine to be something more substantial but it was fun to watch my little blips turn into an explosion for a couple days. Thank you to everyone who picked up a copy of Aphanasian Stories and helped me move the #s. It was a lot of fun and I truly appreciate your support.

…and if you liked what you read, you’re in luck! I have an Aphanasian story (starring Bayne & Teyat) in the Women in Practical Armor anthology coming out this spring, and my novella, Shadows, which is also set in Aphanasia should also be out this year too 🙂

Aphanasian Stories

Aphanasian Stories on Sale

November 25, 2015 R. Parrish Leave a comment

Aphanasian Stories is on sale for $0.99!

Available now at:
Amazon
Kobo
Smashwords

“Rhonda Parrish’s descriptive and action-packed prose grabs you by the hands and doesn’t let go. This is the kind of story that’s so good you clutch right back because you don’t ever want it to end.” ~ Carrie Jones, New York Times Bestselling author of NEED

Call it a Black Friday sale.

Call it a Cyber Monday sale.

Call it whatever you want, but for a limited time only Aphanasian Stories is on sale for less than a dollar!

Three of Rhonda Parrish’s beloved Aphanasian stories brought together in one collection for the first time!

A Love Story: Z’thandra, a swamp elf living with the Reptar, discovers a human near the village. When she falls in love with him, she faces the most difficult choice of her life, one that will change the Reptar for generations.

Lost and Found: Xavier, the escaped subject of a madman’s experiments, and Colby, a young lady on a mission to save her brother, must combine their efforts to elude capture and recover the magical artifact that will save Colby’s brother before it’s too late.

Sister Margaret: A vampire hunter and a half-incubus swordsman are hired by a priestess to kill the undead pimp that is extorting, torturing and murdering vulnerable girls.

On Sale Now!

Amazon
Kobo
Smashwords

2015 Giftmas Blog Tour, A is for Apocalypse, Aphanasian Stories, B is for Broken, Books, Corvidae, Fae, Giveaway, Metastasis, Scarecrow, White Noise

Giftmas Giveaway Prize List

November 23, 2015 R. Parrish 3 Comments

This year’s Giftmas Blog Tour contains a giveaway. A pretty freaking big giveaway. We’ll be using Rafflecopter to get entries into the draw and choose our winners, but there are so many prizes I didn’t want to have to try and list them on the Rafflecopter widget. That’s where this post comes into play–it gives me a single URL I can use to link to and list all the prizes 🙂

2015 Giftmas Giveaway Prizes

Grand Prize (shipped anywhere)

Slay Ride* by Simon Kewin
Seeing The Light by E.C. Bell
Language of the Bear by Nathanael Green
Through the Narrows by Nathanael Green
ARC of The Fall and Rise of Peter Stoller* by Manda Pepper
The K-Pro by Manda Pepper
Odd Little Miracles by Fred Warren
Knitted Coffee Cup Cozy from Brenda Stokes Barron
Grim Crush* by S.L. Bynum
Dream Vision* by S.L. Bynum
Vitality Magazine subscription* from Jaylee James
Choosing You* by Jaylee James
The Naughty List edited by Cori Vidae
I Heart Robot by Suzanne van Rooyen
Touching Spirits by Kevin R. Hill
Art Print from Barbara Tomporowski
So To Honor Him* by Laura VanArendonk Baugh
Con Job* by Laura VanArendonk Baugh
Guarding Angel* by S.L. Saboviec
Set of 4 Bookmarks from Joselyn
Fossil Lake (featuring Doug Blakeslee)
Fossil Lake 2: The Refossiling (featuring Doug Blakeslee)
Signed copy of Fae edited by Rhonda Parrish
Signed copy of Corvidae edited by Rhonda Parrish
Signed copy of Scarecrow edited by Rhonda Parrish

Second Prize (shipped anywhere)

Slay Ride* by Simon Kewin
Seeing the Light by E.C. Bell
Touching Spirits by Kevin R. Hill
Guarding Angel* by S.L. Saboviec
Aphanasian Stories by Rhonda Parrish
Signed copy of Metastasis edited by Rhonda Parrish
A is for Apocalypse edited by Rhonda Parrish
B is for Broken edited by Rhonda Parrish

Third Prize (shipped to US)

Slay Ride* by Simon Kewin
Guarding Angel* by S.L. Saboviec
The First Bite of the Apple by Jennifer Crow
Touching Spirits by Kevin R. Hill
Book 1 of the Dead Song series by Jay Wilburn
White Noise* by Rhonda Parrish
Waste Not* by Rhonda Parrish

*these are electronic copies

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Opens to entries December 1st!

Aphanasian Stories, Books, Sale, Writing

Women in Practical Armor

August 6, 2015 R. Parrish 2 Comments

I have a story in this anthology!!!

Dudes.

I’m so excited I can barely speak in sentences, forget about paragraphs. So. To elaborate:

It’s an Aphanasian story featuring Bayne.

It’s my first pro-rate story.

I’m sharing a table of contents with amazing people.

It’s got that a-freaking-mazing cover.

And it’s edited by Ed Greenwood and Gabrielle Harbowy.

!!!

I’ve had the pleasure of working with Gabrielle before, and she’s awesome and I adore her. And Ed Freaking Greenwood?

Guys. C’mon. That’s just freaking nuts.

Playing D&D in the Forgotten Realms setting has consumed years of my life and Ed Freaking Greenwood read and liked my story.

I could just die.

In the meantime, while I flail and squee you should pop over to the Kickstarter, take a look at the perks and see if there’s anything there that tickles your fancy because I’m 1000% sure this anthology is gonna kick ass.

*flails*

A is for Apocalypse, Aphanasian Stories, Books, Corvidae, Fae, Interview, Lost and Found, Scarecrow, Shadows, Sirens, Sister Margaret, Stream of Consciousness

All. The. Things.

October 27, 2014 R. Parrish Leave a comment

When I looked at the list of things I wanted to signal boost this week I actually felt a little dizzy. “How the hell am I going to fit Twitter, Facebook and blog posts for all those things in without sounding like a social media spam-bot?” I wondered.

Then I got smart and decided to just put all the things into one big blog post. Yay!

Firstly, check out this character portrait:

This is Bayne.

He’s a half-incubus swordsman who figures prominently in many of the stories I’ve written set in Aphanasia (Sister Margaret, Lost and Found and the forthcoming Shadows — which is subject to re-naming LoL).

Bayne is also the character I will be playing with at the Character Death Matches at Pure Spec next month and he’s also the only character from those stories who hasn’t been on a book cover… so didn’t have a portrait.

My daughter, Danica, felt bad for me as she watched me struggle to find a stock image I could crop, Photoshop or otherwise fake to fit my character and she drew this portrait for me 🙂 He looks a little younger in this than he is in the stories I’ve written about him thus far… but I’m taking this as a sign that perhaps I ought to write some stories about a younger Bayne… someday.

Anyway, I’m super lucky to have such a talented kid who is willing to draw character portraits for me. Thank you, Danica! He’s awesome and I love it 🙂

As I mentioned, Bayne features strongly in Aphanasian Stories. If you haven’t read Aphanasian Stories and you like straight-up fantasy, have I got good news for you.

This week I’m participating in #CreepyFreebies. As part of that I am giving away copies of the most recent issue of Niteblade and I’m running a raffle to win a copy of Aphanasian Stories.

However… there’s this t-shirt I wanted (Roots of Remedy) but my Paypal account was a bit short, so I spontaneously decided to put Aphanasian Stories on a super big sale — 70% off (Coupon code: VG96R at Smashwords — click here) to try to top it up a bit*.

That made me feel bad for having Aphanasian Stories as the raffled off item, so I’ll also be throwing in a copy of White Noise for whoever wins. And if you win and you already own a copy of Aphanasian Stories, I’ll give you something else instead. Because.

I’m not just doing CreepyFreebies though. I’m also taking part in #CoffinHop2014 🙂 This is a super fun little system where rather than interviewing one zombie author a day, Julianne instead asks several of us one question each day. The posts are pretty short too, which in today’s world full of constant distractions, seems like a good thing. So far the posts have included:

But wait! There’s more!

I was interviewed by Virginia from StarkLight Press recently to celebrate the launch of White Noise. It’s not a very long interview, only about six questions worth, but I really think it gives a lot of insight into what’s going on in my skull. If you’re even a little intrigued, it’s a quick read that ought to satisfy some of your curiosity. You can check it out here:

An Interview with Rhonda Parrish | Starklight Press

Annnnnnd there’s only a few days left to get your submissions in for Scarecrow and Corvidae. Our deadline is Halloween, which is my 10 year anniversary so you can bet I won’t be sitting at my computer watching midnight come around so I can officially cut off submissions, BUT if your work isn’t in my inbox by the time I get up on Saturday I won’t be able to consider it.

Related to anthologies, at the World Weaver Press hosted #SFFLunch last week we announced the subject matter for my next WWP anthology:

Sirens

When submissions open (in 2015) I’ll be looking for siren stories to fill its pages 🙂

Lastly, I think. I will be attending World Fantasy Convention next month, as will several of the authors from Fae and A is for Apocalypse. I’ll post another reminder nearly the time, but just as a head’s up, C.S. MacCath will be having a reading where she’ll be reading from her A is for Apocalypse story, N is for… on Thursday afternoon (plus I’ll be reading part of it with her, so be sure to come by to watch me shake in my boots) AND Adria Laycraft will have a reading Saturday evening which will feature her story from Fae, Water Sense.

Whoot!

Unrelated to this post at all, but I have noticed that my website is running slowly these days. I’m in the process of moving domains over to a new host as they come up for renewal so please bear with me until that process is done at which time things should speed up significantly.

*Great plan except that the Smashwords quarter comes at the end of December LOL Oops. #brainfart

Aphanasian Stories, Niteblade

#CreepyFreebies 2014

October 26, 2014 R. Parrish 5 Comments

Each year Milo James Fowler hosts an event he calls Creepy Freebies where he invites horror writers to join together and give readers a little taste of what we do for free. Last year I joined in, and this year I’m going to as well 🙂

In honor of the season, and Creepy Freebies, please download a free copy of the latest issue of Niteblade, Porcelain Doll:

Click here (or on the cover image above) to go to the Smashwords page for Issue #29 of Niteblade and use coupon code GJ48A to download it for free.

This coupon will only work until November 1st, so don’t hesitate.

But wait! There’s more!

You can also enter to win a copy of my collection of straight-up fantasy stories (set in, as you might guess from the title, Aphanasia), Aphanasian Stories:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

If we get lots of entries I’ll give away more than one copy, so please help me spread the word.

Aphanasian Stories isn’t creepy… not really, but it IS a fantastic collection that deserves a bigger audience than it’s had to date and I am offering a copy as a freebie so… there’s that 😉

ETA: Several days after I scheduled this I spontaneously decided to put Aphanasian Stories on sale at Smashwords (75% off using coupon code VG96R – Click here) Soooooo I’ll also give the winner(s) of the Rafflecopter draw a copy of White Noise.

Aphanasian Stories, Sale, Shadows

Sale: Shadows

July 10, 2014 R. Parrish 16 Comments

About couple years ago I made the very difficult decision to shelve my novel, Shadows. Not because I didn’t love it (I did) but because while it still needed work I was far too close to it to be able to see exactly what direction that would should take, and how to fix it. Then, not so long ago, I dusted it off a little in my “spare” time and tweeked it a bit. After two years away from it I was much more able to see what needed to be changed. So I made the changes, got it as good as I could on my own and then submitted it to World Weaver Press.

They liked it!

In fact, they bought it 🙂

I’m super stoked. My novel, Shadows*, has been accepted for publication by World Weaver Press in 2015!

I’ve got my editorial letter for it, and the manuscript is due in November so between editing Shadows, transcribing Hollow, promoting Fae & A is for Apocalypse and reading for Corvidae and Scarecrow I am going to be freaking busy for the next few months, but I can’t even begin to tell you how happy I am about it. It’s a good kind of swamped. The best kind of stressed.

Also, did I mention I’ve already received my editorial letter? It’s my very first one ever, which makes me a little giddy and the suggestions are dead on. Just reading it got me totally excited about working on Shadows again and making it even more amazing than it already is 🙂

For those of you who are familiar with my Aphanasian stories, you’ll be pleased to hear this book includes all your favourites (Colby, Xavier, Shadow, Bayne & Teyat). Michael (from Sister Margaret) is back, and there are some characters who may become new favourites as well. You’re going to love it. But you don’t get to read it until sometime in 2015. In the meantime, just be very happy for me… and forgive me if I’m even slower than usual at replying to emails. It’s gonna be crazy around here for a bit LoL

🙂

*We’re looking at changing the title to better reflect the changes in the story. I’ll keep you updated 😉

**The art for this post is ‘Long Journey of a Girl’ by Darek Zabrocki. I commissioned it to use for the cover of Lost and Found. Once he was done Darek put up a tutorial on how he created it, which you can see here if you’re curious to see how the artwork was developed 🙂

Prairie Starport: Stories in Celebration of Candas Jane Dorsey

Aphanasian Stories is on sale for $0.99!

2015 Giftmas Giveaway Prizes

Opens to entries December 1st!

Sirens

I’m super stoked. My novel, Shadows*, has been accepted for publication by World Weaver Press in 2015!

I write, I edit and I take a lot of naps.