New Release | The Gate to Oblivion

Greetings, All!

I’m thrilled to announce the release of The Gate to Oblivion, Book 3 of the Temporal Armistice series! (Available now on Kindle. Paperback should be live within a day or two).


Brooklyn Amari doesn’t ask for much, only the ability to make it through life without destroying the universe.

Working as a firefighter is her true calling, satisfying her deep, primal draw to the flames. Immunity to burning courtesy of her half-extraplanar ancestry makes her the city’s best weapon against disaster of the incendiary kind—not that anyone knows about it. She’s trying to keep her nature a secret, since magical creatures aren’t allowed inside major population centers… and most people probably wouldn’t react well to a demon.

Even a half-demon.

Since her psychic abilities are out of the bag, the Arson Investigation Unit calls on her for all the ‘weird ones’ no one else wants to touch. When they can’t explain an apparent case of spontaneous human combustion, they bring her in to track a deadly arcane arsonist.

She’s happy to help, but unfortunately, some not-quite-angels abduct someone she cares for. They need Brooklyn to destroy the mortal world as it’s in the way of their interdimensional war—but even if she does what they want, everyone she loves will die.


Temporal Armistice Series

Princess Oona’s Diary

An excerpt from the diary of Princess Oona Talomir.


Dear Diary,

Another day has passed, and still I am no closer to understanding what I am supposed to do in order to end this damnable war. I fear I am not as everyone believes me to be, and to have them all hanging their hopes upon my crown is a weight I am surely incapable of bearing. I dare not venture a guess as to what manner of alchemical concoction the seers must have inhaled in order to predict I would matter in this conflict.

Father has kept me shut up in this castle for years now. I barely remember what the city outside is like. Assassins, he says. Always, talk of assassins, yet not once have I seen anything. I’m sure he’s being overprotective… or maybe he knows about Kitlyn?

We passed again along the garden walk this afternoon. She looked so miserable, yet she refused to admit her unhappiness. I think she looked at me a certain way, but I cannot be sure. Oh, the price of assumption would be great if she shares not my feelings.

Lucen demands purity, yet I feel nothing purer than my love for her… but it is against the teachings. I know the priests have misinterpreted the will of the gods, yet dare I risk confessing to her? The plea in her eyes may well be only sorrow at the horrible way Fauhurst treats her, and all the drudgery she must endure.

Oh, how I hate that man! He treats her like an animal, and he of middling birth! What nerve! Why does father refuse to hear me on the matter of her station?

I must tell her. It is cruel to my heart to keep such a thing inside, yet if I am mistaken, she would regard me as an abomination. My closest friend, my love, would recoil in disgust. The mere thought of her face in that moment drives me to tears. Damn this war, and damn the seers, and damn Evermoor and all their savages!

Tonight, I shall visit the temple and beseech Lucen for wisdom. I shall ask him to free me of this burdensome crown. I know it is impossible, but I long to return to the days of our youth, when we had been left to ourselves and I could spend all day with her. Before that wretch Fauhurst fell upon her like a plague of tedium and drudgery. I shall have him reduced to a groundskeeper! Hah! To see the look on his face.

If only I am to live up to the Foretelling, but I do not see how. I would end the war, if only to be able to confess my love. Perhaps I shall at that. This silence is more terrible than death. I am a coward. In front of Lucen, I am a coward unworthy of this crown if I cannot tell her how I feel.

I will tell her. And if Kitlyn can no longer bear to be in my presence after that, I shall have nothing left to fear, and nothing left at all. And so shall come to pass the Foretelling. I will lead the forces of Lucernia to victory, and find solace in death.


Convergence .99 sale

Starting tomorrow (9/12/17), Convergence (Book 1 of the Winter Solstice series) will be on sale for .99!


From J.R. Rain, the international bestselling author of over seventy novels, and bestselling author Matthew S. Cox, comes their first co-written fantasy thriller, CONVERGENCE!

Solstice Winters has spent most of her life halfway between normal society and the world of her magical parents. However, when getting caught between two worlds becomes more than metaphorical, being able to summon light or open locks might not be enough.

Neither her love life nor her professional life are going anywhere in a hurry. Her boyfriend is successful and handsome, but she constantly has to compete with his job for affection. At thirty-two, she works as a photojournalist for The Spiritualist, a small paper dedicated to magic and the supernatural – that most people regard as a tabloid. Desperate for that ‘one break,’ she’ll do almost anything to get that big story and get into a ‘real’ media outlet.

Years of always not quite fitting in begin to make sense after an error at a particle physics laboratory alters the dimensional alignment of the world, strengthening magic and revealing an unexpected truth to Solstice.

She’s not even human.

In the wake of an event her boss at the paper is calling The Convergence, magical beings are appearing all over the Earth. Solstice doesn’t hesitate, racing to be the first to capture indisputable evidence of mythical beasts. Alas, being a magical creature herself, she soon winds up in the cross-hairs of not only a three-letter government agency, but an ancient sect of mages with dark intentions.

 

Grab it here:

Also in paperback:

So… I wrote an LGBT YA Fantasy.

So… I wrote an LGBT love story.

A YA fantasy where two girls fall in love in a kingdom where such relationships are frowned on.

I’ve written quite a few novels now as well as a bunch of short stories, and I can’t say I’ve been as excited (or as nervous) about any of them as I am about The Eldritch Heart.

Two or so years ago, I was at the day job and I overheard someone (I still don’t know who it was, merely a voice floating over cubicle walls) complaining in earnest about how “disgraceful” it was that Disney put out a movie with two girls “doing lesbian stuff.” Of course, this particular example of genius was talking about Frozen, which has nothing whatsoever to do with two girls in love. (I didn’t bother to insert myself into the discussion to point out that they are sisters in that story.) However, hearing that did get me thinking about the lack of those kinds of stories. I got the idea to write a “princess story” where the princess falls in love with another girl instead of the handsome prince everyone expects her to marry. I jotted down a couple of early ideas for a plot – arranged marriage the princess doesn’t want any part of, a servant girl she’s close friends with, running away, some magic going on, etc. I had a bunch of other projects on the table at the time (writing and editing) so I set this file aside.

Eventually, my writing schedule opened and I found myself staring at this file again. And I’m thinking to myself: How would people react to a cis man writing a princess story where two girls fall in love? I hesitated, unsure if I could do it justice.

Enter a beta reader.

At request, I’m going to be anonymous here… but there is a woman who has done a fair amount of beta reading for me. As we exchanged more and more emails and got to know each other as “internet friends” tend to do, she mentioned that her eldest daughter had recently come out to her after a long period of being terrified to tell anyone. There are still people in their circle who don’t know, and that is the reason for the vagueness here. Anyway, when I heard how the daughter had such a harrowing path to walk leading up to her decision to finally tell her mother the truth – all the fear involved… that made me decide that I needed to at least try to write this book.

So, I pulled open that little list of notes and added to it, fleshed out the characters and their motivations, the kingdom, and the storyline.

Magic… check.

Fantasy creatures… check.

Two kingdoms at war… check.

Once I had the chapter outline done and revised a few times, I sat down and started writing.

And something happened… for a while, I stopped worrying how people would react to me trying to tell this kind of story and got engrossed in it. Eldritch Heart became a tale of two people deeply in love with each other but so afraid of losing the person they love to hatred they can’t bring themselves to speak their true feelings. When, finally, the moment comes for the characters to be in a position where they can no longer keep silent, that scene where they admit their feelings for each other got me misty-eyed. Every time I read over the draft during self-edits, publisher edits, and final proofread, that scene gets me.

Something even cooler followed. When I finished writing the story, and finished polishing it up enough to let beta readers have at it, I sent it to the woman who I mentioned before. I admit, I was a bit mischievous about it as I did not tell her what kind of story it was. She figured it out pretty quick and I could practically feel her grin over the internet. She asked if the daughter could read it too, and of course (while biting my nails) I said yes of course – she’s the whole reason I decided to write it.

A week or two later, I hear back that the girl adored it… even read it twice (a rare thing according to her mother). The best part, she said she “could totally relate” to several parts of the story.

Feeling like a million bucks… check.

Still nervous… yeah.

Why? Because some people are assholes.

But, I’ve realized… I have no right to be worried about how people might react to a book with LGBT characters written by a straight guy. There are people out there who LIVE that, and they don’t have the separation from the hate of ‘just writing a book.’ It’s their identity, who they are, and who they’ve been afraid to show the world.

So, I am no longer nervous about this book.

I’m excited.

And if it resonates with even one person in that situation, I will be grateful for having reached them.

Happy reading,

-Matt


Eldritch Heart page (goodreads link here)

#Fantasy #Young-Adult #LGBT