A Genocidal Cult, A Capricious Empress, and a Naive Magical Scholar: Mind Crafter

To be a crafter is to control the essences of the world. To be a crafter of House Lran is to control the very essence of being, the mind. Feared by others for their ability to read and alter minds, the Lrani are known across the Larangian Empire for both their powers and mental discipline.

Shala, a talented young Lrani scholar, is obsessed with her research and has little concern for the mundane banalities of the outside world. A chance trip to a market rips the woman out of her isolated life after she chooses to use her crafting to stop a massacre. When the eccentric Empress Tua Van orders Shala to investigate the involvement of the mysterious Cult of the Cleansing Gods, the scholar doesn't know if she’s looking into a centuries-old conspiracy or just the paranoid delusions of an unstable woman.

With an unpredictable empress, suspicious palace officials, and strange nightmares all wearing her down, Shala is determined to find the truth before she ends up disgraced or killed.

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Mind Crafter is now available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, and Smashwords.

It will soon also be available at Apple/iBookStore and Sony.

Science Fiction Fantasy Saturday #1: Reading someone's mind isn't always fun--for them

Welcome to #SFFSat – Science Fiction Fantasy Saturday -  a chance to post six sentences from a piece of speculative fiction. Want to join in? Check out the site at Science Fiction Fantasy Saturday and follow the hashtag #SFFSat on Twitter.


This six is from my fantasy WIP Mind Crafter.


In this scene, the protagonist, a type of crafter (mage) specializing in mind magic is about to be interrogated telepathically by her superior about a massacre she witnessed. Here we see just why this type of mind magic isn't casually used as he begins to probe her thoughts:


The small tap grew into the prick of a needle. Shala quashed her defenses and instead concentrated on the Cleanser incident. Again, the bodies, the wailing, and the blood filled her mind. The prick of the needle became the throb of a dull ache. A long moment later, the pain coalesced into a ball of fire. Her breathing quickened and she dug her nails into her palms.