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Monday, November 27, 2023

First Look at Alien Fury

 My new release is now available.

Alien Fury is the eighth book in Chronicles of Arcon. 


The Arcon, Thorn Grindstone, finds himself alone and injured, thawing in a disabled cryogenics tank. Making an impulsive deal for a fighter, he launches into a battle with a pirate ship before beginning his search for his people.

After Thorn crash-lands in the widow Roxie Carson’s corn field. Roxie nurses the injured Arcon. As tension worsens between Roxie and her brother-in-law, Thorn turns out to be an unexpected ally.

Roxie is grateful to the handsome alien, but what will happen when the Arcon government finally shows up and takes Thorn away? What will her brother-in-law do then?




Alien Fury: Chronicles of Arcon: Seagraves, Janice: 9798864319413: Amazon.com: Books

First Look:

Something screamed over the roof of the house, and an orange glow lit up the bedroom windows—a crash sounded close by. Roxie Carson sat up in bed with her heart hammering. “What’s that?”

Kit Carson, Roxie’s German Shepard, started to give a continuous, rapid bark.

She glanced at the empty side of the bed with her mouth half open to say something to her husband. Roxie bit her lip against the sting of tears. Her sorrow caused a huge, painful knot inside her chest. I have to do things by myself now which includes investigating the scary noises.

Roxie trudged out of her warm bedroom. She pulled on her coat, winter gloves, and knee-high rubber boots over her pajamas.

When she stepped outside, she spotted flecks of fire out in her north acreage. Damn, I just plowed that field, too.

Kit Carson ran to her, wagging his tail.

She patted his side. “Hey, boy, are you ready to go see what that was?”

He barked once, which she took as a yes. But then he was always ready to go at a moment’s notice.

The rains had made everything a muddy mess. Especially the land she so carefully plowed. Her life had become a bitter battle. She had planted corn, but then the monsoon season came and drowned the tender seedlings. The drought that had plagued the farmlands had finally ended but at a cost. One rainstorm after another brought by several Atmospheric Rivers had kept the fields flooded. Great, just great. I should plant rice. That’s a crop needing a lot of water.

She hurried over to the compact utility tractor. Her husband’s last extravagant purchase. At the thought of her husband, her heart squeezed. The backhoe was still attached from digging drainage ditches the day before. Not that anything she tried helped.

Turning the key, the engine hesitated. “Come on, baby. Turn over for Momma.” The tractor finally started, belching out a cloud of diesel smelling smoke. She flipped on the headlights.

Kit Carson ran ahead, leading the way toward whatever it was.

Her dog soon trotted next to a furrow scraped into the muddy earth. Roxie steered the tractor just behind her German Shepard, studying the furrow.

What did this?

The further she drove, the deeper into the earth it extended, going from groove to trench. What the hell hit my field? Maybe it’s a meteor, and I can sell it on eBay for a thousand dollars. That thought cheered Roxie up a bit. I could pay a few overdue bills with that amount.

The ditch abruptly ended, and became a hole filled with something black and gray. Steam rose, filling the air. Roxie parked the tractor next to it then climbed out.

Her boots skidded on the muddy ground, she pinwheeled her arms and slid right into the hole. Roxie fetched up against hot metal. “Oof.”

Fins were attached to the back end, but the nose was buried under the mud.

So, it’s something man made. The big eBay sale she planned winged away.

Kit shifted from foot to foot, whining down at her.

Roxie glanced sharply up at her dog. “No-no, you stay up there. We don’t both need to be down in this mud hole.”

The trench continued to fill up with water.

If it’s a rocket, I’ll need to report this to someone. But if it’s a jet there could be someone trapped inside. One way to find out.

She knocked on the side three times and got a knock back in the same sequence.

Dios mío! There’s someone in there.” With adrenaline filling her system, Roxie scrambled out of the trench. She climbed into the tractor. Not wanting the mud to make her steering wheel slippery, she tossed her filthy gloves out the door. Turning the tractor around, she set the stabilizers down, fitted the backhoe’s bucket down the hole. She started moving mud, one scoop at a time, flinging it out faster than she’d ever made the tractor move before.

Kit Carson barked encouragement.

She finally unburied the front end of the black jet. With the rain pouring down on the muddy top, she could just make out a man-sized shape inside.

“Don’t worry, I’ll get you out!” She lifted the stabilizers and drove around to the back end of the jet. She reset the stabilizers then stretched the scoop out to its fullest length. Climbing out, she looped a lasso strap around the tail of the jet, and at the other end, she hooked onto the backhoe’s lifting ring. That done, she climbed back inside and began to lift the scoop. The mechanism squealed and smoked. She shut it down. “Please, don’t mess up on me. I can’t afford to have you fixed.”

The jet hadn’t moved.

She tried again, but the mechanism squealed and smoked again. She shut it down. “Darn wings, they’re keeping the jet in place. Too bad there isn’t a way to take them off.”

A whirling noise caught her attention. She rose up to get a better look. The wings withdrew inside the body of the jet.

The poor guy inside must have seen my problem.

“That helps a lot. Gracias,” she called out, hoping he could hear her. Must be an experimental type with retractable wings.

She tried again.

Finally, the sleek torpedo shaped jet came out of the hole. It had skids like landing gear. That would make it easier to bring it back to the house.

She hoped the jet wasn’t broken. Well, it probably won’t fly again after crashing into my field. The pilot better have good insurance to cover it.

Enough mud still covered the windows of the cockpit that she couldn’t make out whether the pilot was a man or woman. The dark clouds obscuring the moon didn’t help either.

“I’m taking you back to the house, so I can get you out of there!” Roxie yelled and changed the scoop position so it would pull without lifting the jet in the air. She drove carefully toward her driveway, with its large concrete parking area. The jet dragged along behind her.

Kit Carson led the way, as usual.

A cloud burst overhead, and it rained harder. She turned on the windshield wipers and heater. The bright lights of the single-story, rambling farmhouse with tan wood siding was a welcome beacon guiding her back.

As she drove, she prayed the person inside wasn’t badly hurt.

She performed a U-turn, dragging the jet onto the oversized cement parking lot and turned off the tractor. After stepping out, she took the lasso towing strap off the black jet and stared at one of the bent runners.

The jet’s door retracted up, and the pilot peered out at her.

As their gazes met, the shock of utter astonishment flew through her.

“Dios mío!” He’s not human.

Amazon: Alien Fury: Chronicles of Arcon: Seagraves, Janice: 9798864319413: Amazon.com: Books

Barnes and NobleAlien Fury Chronicles of Arcon Book 8 by Janice Seagraves | eBook | Barnes & Noble® (barnesandnoble.com)

Apple Books: Alien Fury Chronicles of Arcon Book 8 on Apple Books


Saturday, November 18, 2023

Getting It Together

I love books! I’d rather buy books than shoes. Yet, I have a horrible confession to make. My bookcase is a disorganized mess. There are my research books for my writing then there are my pleasure books. Each book is haphazardly shoved on a shelf with no order or reason.  I cringe every time I glance at my four bookcases, which are crammed two rows deep on each shelf. 

That mess needs to be tackled. 


And I’ve been trying to decide how to organize the books. Do I arrange it by color? Subject? Or just size (smallest to largest)? 


So many options are available to me and each one a is viable choice.


My first option is color. This one works for two reasons. Reason A is because I may not always remember the title of a book but my mind does retain the color of it. A couple of months ago, I had to find a piece of information and knew I could find it in the pages of a green book. And when I scanned the shelves, I found the book, which was entitled The Georgian Gentleman. 


Reason B is that a color-arranged bookcase will look pretty and pretty is always nice. 


The second organizational option is by subject.  My fiction books could be gathered together and wouldn’t be mixed up with my research and other such books. Yet, when it comes to my nonfiction books (research books mainly) that causes the greatest problem. So would a head subject be Scotland then its history, geography, and costume. And what about subjects that overlap? Like Scotland in the Regency Era. I can feel my head throbbing already. 


The final option is to arrange the books by size. Just go from smallest to largest. I could put the smallest at the top and the largest, which are usually the heaviest, on the bottom. Maybe.


Are your shelves organized or do you just shove books where they fit? 

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