Find your next favorite read and celebrate Broad Releases for February, 2025!

Title: Immortal Gifts

Author: Katherine Villyard

Prussia, 1841. Abraham only ever wanted to play violin. Hiding his Jewish status so he can study at the prestigious Berlin Academy of Music, the eager young man is delighted to find a patron who believes in him.

But he’s mortified when his new friend turns him into a vampire … and Abraham earns the fury of an ancient antisemite who vows to see him permanently dead.

Fleeing the hate-mongering fiend across the decades, the sensitive violinist at last settles in twenty-first-century New Jersey with a mortal woman.But when he discovers his relentless tormentor has tracked him down yet again, Abraham despairs he’ll never find true happiness.

With everyone he’s ever loved at risk, can he escape the rage of a ruthless bigot?

In a complex tale woven through history, Katherine Villyard delivers a fresh and insightful twist on the vampire novel. Infusing the narrative with profound themes of love, betrayal, and the nature of monsters, she crafts an unforgettable saga of surviving prejudice that will keep readers turning pages deep into the night.

Immortal Gifts is the thoughtful first book in the Immortal Vampires contemporary fantasy series. If you like well-drawn characters, dual-timeline storytelling, and pulse-pounding suspense, then you’ll adore Katherine Villyard’s compelling read.

Buy Immortal Gifts to tap a vein of devotion today!

Praise for Immortal Gifts:

“One of Villyard’s strengths as a storyteller is her skill in using vampire mythology to explore themes of otherness and persecution … (and) … use of supernatural elements to explore very real historical patterns of religious persecution.
– Edward Sung for IndieReader

“Immortal Gifts invites readers to re-evaluate the meanings of things such as life, death, freedom, hate and love from the first page. Katherine Villyard manages to capture some of the most poignant questions we ask ourselves as we go through our individual lives. Is it worth being able to live forever if, in the end, we’ll lose the ones we love to mortality? Is Death really the ultimate enemy to life, or is death just life’s misunderstood old friend? To stop hate, do we need to restrict our freedoms? This book makes readers ask and answer tough questions not only about the characters and plotline, but about their own beliefs, understandings, and dreams.”
–Megan Weiss on Reedsy Discovery

“...Immortal Gifts defies the usual formulaic writing of the genre to return to the meat of a superior vampire novel: good tension, wry humor, psychologically deep characters, and the allure, promises, and pitfalls of immortality.”–D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer, Midwest Book Review

About Katherine Villyard: 

Katherine’s parents met singing opera and started taking her to choir practice when she was six weeks old. She attended four elementary schools and four high schools before getting master’s degrees in art and library science. Naturally she works in IT, abusing SQL Server for fun and profit. When she’s not working or writing, she’s probably playing the Sims or spoiling cats. Her greatest ambition is to rule the world.

To learn more, visit: www.katherinevillyard.com

Find your next favorite read and celebrate Broad Releases for February, 2025!

Title: Bittersweetness & Light 

Author: Anne E.G. Nydam

If you crave a little sweetness and light in a time that feels bitter and dark, explore Bittersweetness & Light, Anne E.G. Nydam’s latest collection of luminous short stories, poems, and artwork.In this book, you will visit a hidden mushroom world with an asteroid scanner, spelunk into a book with a librarian, study the Rainlings and their delicate raindrop homes, or spend a week in the Home for Dispossessed Familiars. 

Without denying the pain in the world, this beautiful book invites you to embrace the possibility of joy. From love potions to alien spores, and from dream fish to a puzzled ghost, you can find magic that can be knitted, glimpsed from the kitchen window, or assembled from a flat-pack kit. 

Spanning a range of fantasy and science fiction settings, the twelve fantastical short stories, ten evocative poems, and dozens of whimsical relief block prints are by turns poignant, humorous, and always warm-hearted. This enchanting full-color collection invites you to look for goodness and share reasons for hope.

About Anne E.G. Nydam:

Anne Nydam has written and illustrated numerous books including On the Virtues of Beasts of the Realms of Imagination. She serves as the poet laureate of Needham, MA, USA, where she teaches block printmaking workshops.

Nydam believes that refusing to succumb to cynicism and finding joy is an act of fierce defiance.

To learn more, visit NydamPrints.com. Pre-order at nydamprints.com/books

Find your next favorite read and celebrate Broad Releases for February, 2025!

Title: Litany for a Broken World

Author: LJ Cohen

A young girl's disastrous first foray through the multiverse cleaves her from her family and abandons her in a homeless encampment, adrift in a world and a body not her own.

A doctor struggling with grief volunteers for the annual Boston homeless census and is confronted by the impossible and her deeply buried childhood trauma.

A lonely, disaffected seer rejected by those he seeks to help is drawn from his home by a desperate call across the world walls.

When the three strangers, each broken in some way, are drawn together in a conflict between those with the ability to travel the multiverse and the organization seeking to exploit them, they must risk everything that matters to heal the fractured places in themselves and throughout reality.

First in the Entangled Realities trilogy, Litany for a Broken World is an adult reworking of The Wizard of Oz that takes place in the very real world of a Boston homeless encampment and releases Feb. 10, 2025. eBook pre-orders are live now at www.ljcohen.net/litany.html. 

Praise for the novels of LJ Cohen:

“Cohen has real talent with character development and interaction, and prickly, defensive Ro is a sympathetic and interesting heroine.” 

—Publishers Weekly on Derelict

"Parallax is an adrenaline rush, ripping you across the galaxy at the speed of light. LJ Cohen's seemingly effortless narrative about a galaxy drowning in corruption and rebellion features a group of teens struggling to protect not only themselves but those they love. It will take hold of you at page one and never let go.” 

— K. B. Wagers, author of Behind the Throne, The Indranan War Book 1

Celebrate Broad Releases: Summer 2024!

Hail the Feminist Witches! 

Meet the coven in BrightFlame’s speculative, solarpunk debut. 

Title: The Working

Author: BrightFlame

A modern coven must thwart a looming eco-cataclysm and find the key to the bright future we need.

Betsy is a modern-day Witch with an ageless problem: She's worried about screwing up her coven's ritual. Again. 

But the coven has a bigger issue to face—the destruction of their home thanks to a fracked gas pipeline. And then an even bigger problem—a greed-fueled entity will soon obliterate Earth’s ability to support life.

Tarot cards indicate the coven must sort among allies and threats, human and ethereal. Follow Betsy, Sail, Fire, Mari, and Tal as they disentangle the truth and seek the magic to avert the cataclysm.

Fans of The Once and Future Witches and The City We Became will love The Working for its feminist, justice-seeking, ensemble cast. 

"A heady mix of magic and environmental activism, written by a real Witch who knows her stuff and has a gift for embedding knowledge of trance and ritual into fiction.”

—Starhawk, bestselling author of 13 books including The Fifth Sacred Thing

"In The Working, BrightFlame shows us why she's a master of climate fiction and lunarpunk. Her novel is a compelling narrative following five witches seeking to repair what's wrong with the world. I was left wanting to have a meeting with this coven. Highly recommended!"

—Renan Bernardo, Nebula and Ignyte finalist author of Different Kinds of Defiance

"BrightFlame’s writing is a joy and a gift. The Working stays grounded in actionable solutions to the existential threats of corporate greed and climate change, with the characters fighting for better futures on both the physical and metaphysical planes." 

—Sarena Ulibarri, author of Another Life.

BrightFlame (she/they) writes, teaches, and makes magic towards a just, regenerating world. She’s a member of the Climate Fiction Writers League, and her short fiction is featured in Solarpunk Creatures, Bioluminescent, and Solarpunk Magazine. Her globally acclaimed workshops for magical and mainstream audiences foster interconnection and resilience, and help us expand our notion of what is possible. She co-founded the Center for Sustainable Futures at Columbia University that features her workshops and nonfiction. She lives on Lenape territory (Turtle Island/U.S.) with a human, a forest, a labyrinth, the Fey, bees, turtles, fungi, rocks, and many other nonhumans. Visit brightflame.com for musings, doodles, workshops, and more.

Close calls, secrets, and a do-or-die heroine! 

Julia Xero is back and she's in shock. 

Title: The Secret Aftermath 

Author: Gloria Oliver

A twenty-year-old secret lies revealed. Someone wants it reburied at any cost.

Julia Xero is now marked for termination with extreme prejudice.

At twenty-two, the introverted orphan found her dream job cleaning up after the dead and even acquired a family worth staying and fighting for.

The semi-stuck-up hidden race she works for doesn't take the news that she's not entirely human well, but Julia stubbornly stands her ground despite one of them "shockingly" trying to kill her outright.

Remanded into her employer's custody, Julia is desperate to skip past these inane distractions so she can concentrate on stopping the true danger—a plot to neuter a large portion of humanity without their consent. 

The Secret Aftermath is the second book in the Discoveries of Julia Xero urban fantasy thrillers. 

More than willing to kick ass and take names, Julia obstinately pushes forward despite the realization that someone can't abide her very existence. Can Julia stay alive long enough to discover and stop her new nemesis while keeping her newfound family from becoming collateral damage?

Gloria Oliver lives in Texas, making sure she stays away from rolling tumbleweeds and freak storms, while bowing to the wishes of her feline and canine masters. She is the author of nine fantasy, science fiction, and cozy mystery novels. Visit: www.gloriaoliver.com. 

Celebrate Broads' Spring 2024 Releases!

Dive in and “Be the Sea!” with Clara Ward's newest novel

Title: Be the Sea
Author: Clara Ward

In the near future, marine scientist Wend Taylor heaves themself aboard a zero-emissions boat skippered by the elusive nature photographer Viola Yang and crewed by Viola’s younger cousin, Aljon.

Guided by instinct, ocean dreams, and a shared birthday in 1972, they barter stories for passage across the Pacific.

Story by story, the trio rethink secrets, flying dreams, and how they experience their own minds.

When they reach Hawaiʻi and prepare to part ways, opportunity and mystery pull them closer together as Wend navigates an ever-shifting future, complicated by bioengineered microbes and a plot to silence scientists, entangled with inexplicable dreams and a calling to Be the Sea.

“Be the Sea is a significant book in the way it talks about communication, community, and neurodiversity.” 

— Nebula-winning writer Cat Rambo

Clara will appear at:

March 28-31: Norwescon in Seattle, WA as a panelist 

April 7 at 2 pm: author event at Capital Books in Sacramento, CA

Clara Ward lives in Silicon Valley on the border between reality and speculative fiction. When not using words to teach or tell stories, Clara uses wood, fiber, and glass to make practical or completely impractical objects. Their short fiction has appeared in Strange Horizons, Decoded Pride, Small Wonders, and as a postcard from Thinking Ink Press. Discover more about them at clarawardauthor.wordpress.com

Celebrate Broad Releases: Fall 2023!

Kepner goes "Out Far Enough"   

Linda Tiernan Kepner has released "Out Far Enough," a science fiction novel with romantic elements set about 250 years in the future.

The Comte de Bourriac, an exiled nobleman  managing an agricultural space station, and Police Officer Jem Grayson race to investigate a possible homicide and preserve a lost paradise before the answers kill them.

For more information, vist: www.LindaTKepner.com.

Celebrate Broad Releases: Spring 2023!

Title: Avelune: Book III of the Sky Seekers

Author: Larissa N. N. Davila 

Celebrate the upcoming release of Avelune, the third book in the epic fantasy series The Sky Seekers by Larissa N. N. Davila! Fans of Robin Hobb and N. K. Jemisin will fall hard for Avelune.

Fans of Robin Hobb and N. K. Jemisin will fall hard for Avelune.

Shorn soldier Jhared Denaban flees his country, seeking a new purpose and a place to belong. Lady Nemiah wins a chance to end ages of violence, if she will sacrifice herself. In this gripping third book of The Sky Seekers, alliances deepen, passions are awakened, and the consequences of a legacy of oppression rip the very fabric of the world.

“Larissa N. N. Davila paints a compelling portrait of a world and an individual teetering on the edge of chaos. . . . Jhared's journey is a compelling search for discovery and redemption that leads readers on another breathtaking flight of fantasy.”

—Midwest Book Review

The release party will be at George R.R. Martin's Beastly Books in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Friday, June 2 at 5 pm and feature Davila signing books and answering questions, as well as tasty food and beverages. Find more of Davila book tour events, including virtual talks, at Stone Raven Press.

Celebrate Broad Releases: Winter 2023!

Title: A Wreck of Dragons 

Author: Elaine Isaak

“Pacific Rim” meets "How to Train Your Dragon" in this young adult science fiction adventure from Waterdragon Publishing. Giant Robots meet Dragons in this new adventure from Elaine Isaak.

With his giant robot, Norgay, teenage orphan Johari leads a team of scouts to find a new planet for mankind. The prospective world has it all: a great climate, nearly perfect air, and no signs of civilization. As the team dives in, Johari's best friend risks exposure to the alien world to claim biological samples that might be the salvation of their own species. Then the sample he shatters draws the wrath of angry, flying reptiles, and his own robot companion sacrifices itself to shield the fragile humans. Johari races to save his friend and raise one of their precious bots from beneath an alien sea—only to find he's being hunted by dragons.

As he's cast into a world of doubts, Johari suspects that these monsters are more than they seem. Will he claim a new world for mankind—and allow them to destroy their own humanity?

Purchase your copy of this “thought-provoking” and “breath-taking” novel in paperback, hardcover or electronic formats at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop, IndieBound. For more purchase options, visit Waterdragon Publishing.

Title: Love Stories, a short fiction collection

Author: Katherine Villyard 

What is love? What can love drive us to do? In Katherine Villyard’s collection of seven previously published and five previously unpublished stories, love pushes her characters to revenge, to reach beyond the boundaries of life and death. To rescue a family member. To fight the good fight without even knowing it, or to risk everyone and everything to save someone who may or may not be worthy. To make the wrong decisions and walk into hell. To transcend who we are. 

Love Stories is IndieReader Approved" (4.8 stars,) a Booklife Editor's pick, and was favorably reviewed by Kirkus. Learn more about Love Stories in IndieReader’s interview with Villyard, where she answers questions like "What is the main reason someone should really read this book?" and "When did you first decide to become an author?" and “Are you a toad sister or a rose sister?"

Purchase your ebook or print book at books2read.com/kvlovestories. For more news from Katherine Villyard, sign up for her newsletter. 

Hop into Spring and win a FREE copyedit! 

Do you have a fiction manuscript in need of editing love this spring, but can’t find an editor or maybe don’t have the funds to get the quality edit you dream of? Enter the MANUSCRIPT LOVE contest to win one of two full copy edits from editors Ripley Patton and Roxanne Bland, who is a Supporter of Broad Universe.

Submissions accepted until March 14, 2023.

For more information, visit ripley-patton.com/manuscript-love-contest 

Celebrate Broad Releases: July 2022!

Title: The JOY of Murder, A Daiyu Wu Mystery 

Author: Gloria Oliver 

When a highly respected member of the Little Mexico community is killed in 1930s Dallas, all the evidence points towards socialite Grace Pierce, wife of a local businessman and a former member of the Ku Klux Klan. Grace's son Truman turns to Daiyu Wu and her unique detective skills for help, but Dai, who is blind, quickly discovers that nothing about this case is what it seems. With her companion Jacques and canine bodyguard Prince Razor, Dai must navigate a family in turmoil, racial tensions, and shady business deals to find the actual killer before Truman's mother is sentenced to death. 

Second in A Daiyu Wu Mystery series. Pre-order for this July release. 

For free fiction and The JOY of Murder Release Celebration Giveaway, visit the author's website.