In 2023 I published Fire in the Belt, the first novel in the Worlds of Sol series. Technically the first novel in the saeries was Asteroid Gambit, published in April 2022, but Fire in the Belt is a prequel that happens two generations before AG.
Since Asteroid Gambit was published, I have also published numerous Kindle short stories in the Worlds of Sol Universe. These include:
Laurent Bernard’s estranged father is dying. Laurent returns to his isolated family farm in the Martian outback to heal the rift.
He thought he’d just say goodbye. Instead, a surprise in his father’s will puts him in the center of a long-brewing conflict about annexation of the farm by Tharsis City.
As a terraforming manager, he should let the growing Martian settlement absorb the farm. But Marianne Levesque, a girl when he left and now a beautiful young woman, wants something more. So, to his surprise, does Laurent.
As his father fails, the conflict between Laurent’s job and his heart grows.
Martian Requiem won Honorable Mention in the 2020 Writers of the Future contest.
Jill, captain of asteroid freighter Sleipner on a routine cargo run from Mars to Ceres, is shocked out of boredom when Odin, the ship’s AI, detects an unknown ship on an interception course.
Odin informs Jill they are not carrying innocuous Earth soil for the gardens of Ceres declared on the manifest. Instead, the cargo hold contains nuclear warheads for deorbiting asteroids.
The approaching ship radios Sleipner to prepare to be boarded. Jill and Jimmy, Sleipner’s pilot, take refuge in a hidden safe room.
When the pirates blow the airlock, evacuating the ship’s atmosphere, they know their lives are on the line.
With four pirates systematically searching the ship for cargo and crew, and time running out, Jill and Jimmy must find a way to neutralize the invaders and retake Sleipner—if they want to survive.
Marc and Sophie dream of a future on Mars away from Acadia, the independent farm in eastern Mariner Valley where they grew up. When Sophie’s abusive father threatens them, they flee Acadia in a stolen vacuum tractor through the fractured terrain of Eos Chaos — at night. Her father learns they left and pursues them. When her father’s tractor breaks down, they have to choose — get away or jeopardize their future to save Sophie’s father.
UNS Marine Sergeant Pat Ryan owes his life to Sergeant Angelique Fouchet, his fellow Marine and lover, who threw herself on a grenade to save him during a fight on Ganymede.
Before she dies, Angelique tells him she has a daughter, Alice, in Gabriel Farm, an independent farm in the Martian outback. She asks him to go back to help Alice. He’ll know what to do when he gets there.
He musters out of the Corps and finds his way to Mars. But when he arrives at Gabriel, he doesn’t have a clue what he’s supposed to do.
He convinces Angélique’s father to let him stay to find out why she wanted him there. What he discovers means his fighting days are far from over.
Ryan’s Debt also appears in the 2024 anthology from the Science Fiction Novelists’ Facebook group.
Vintage Mars
A priest visits a monastery on Mars that has been all but abandoned by its order. Only single monk remains to tend the grapevines the order brought from Earth. Over a bottle of the monastery’s best vintage, the two discuss how the monastery might be saved.
On the first day of the Mars Centennial (8/17/2153 on Earth) Marc Forcier and Sophie Courtois are driving a vacuum tractor over the Northern Highlands of Mars in search of thorium deposits. Their tractor has been disabled and they were far ahead of their compatriots, scouting the way forward.
Due to an unexpected rockfall, their tractor is badly damaged and has extremely limited battery reserve. They fear they won’t be rescued and talk about their lives, lived and yet to live, perhaps never.
Martian New Year will be a chapter in my WiP Worlds of Sol novel Thorium Blues.