I have no idea how long this will last [Edit: runs through December], but Amazon has put the Kindle editions of both The Red and The Trials on sale for $1.99 each. Tell your friends! Tell everyone! Don’t say I didn’t tell you. 😉

By the way, neither book has ever been discounted before.

Oh, and the math works out so that you can get the entire trilogy for $12.97 + tax.

Edit: The $1.99 price is also available at both iBooks and Barnes & Noble and Kobo! Sale applies to the Saga edition.

Edit 2: The United Kingdom edition is also on sale. It’s £1.99 at Amazon. Hopefully it’s priced the same at Kobo, though I can’t actually see the page from within the USA.

Follow up:
November 12, 2015
This was a fun giveaway that brought a lot of visitors to the blog, though most of you decided not to comment! ::sigh:: But that’s all right. Since there were just six active participants, it was easy for me to give a code to all of them. The emails have already gone out to the address you used when you posted your comment. If you haven’t heard from me, check your spam folder. If you still can’t find the email, contact me at linda at mythicisland dot com (converted to regular email format of course) and I’ll re-send.

A big mahalo (thank you) to all participants, and to everyone who helped boost the signal!

Thank you to those who’ve served and who continue to serve our country this Veterans Day!

Because it’s Veterans Day, and because the audio-book edition of Going Dark has just been released TODAY, I thought I’d do an audio-book flash giveaway. Audible has provided me with download codes. So I’ll be giving away one code for each book in The Red Trilogy — and I want to have three different winners. So enter to win with a comment on this post, letting me know which book you’d like to win — either The Red, The Trials, or Going Dark — and if you’re willing to settle for your second or third choice.

My son-in-law, US Army veteran Edward White, will be selecting the winners. If you’ve got a veteran anecdote to share, he invites you to do so, but it’s not required to enter.

The Audible editions of books in The Red Trilogy are narrated by Kevin T. Collins, and they’re available worldwide where Audible books are sold. I haven’t been told there are any regional restrictions on the code, so do enter even if you’re outside of the United States. You do need to be registered at Audible/Amazon to redeem a code, but you do not need a paid membership plan.

Enter today! Winners will be announced tomorrow, November 12 (Hawaii time). Thanks for participating!

ALL THREE BOOKS IN THE RED TRILOGY ARE NOW OUT

GOING DARK:

“No Real Allies, No Fixed Enemies, No Certain Battlefields”

Presumed dead by those closest to him and with no intention of setting the record straight, former army Lt. James Shelley is recruited by a black ops outfit devoted to two things: guarding the Earth from existential threats, and the Red.

Operating for almost two years among soldiers who are enhanced, and controlled, just as he is, Shelley believes he’s learned a proper caution in working with the mysterious artificial intelligence—until the Red’s increasingly erratic behavior ignites an accidental war, and launches Shelley on a collision course with his old life.

In the final book of The Red Trilogy, Shelley must choose who—or what—to trust, while struggling to contain an escalating conflict that threatens to plunge the world into chaos, and destroy those he loves.

Some online booksellers (USA):
☆ Amazon
☆ Barnes & Noble
☆ Powell’s Books
☆ Mysterious Galaxy
☆ Tattered Cover

Or get the audio book, narrated by Kevin T. Collins, and available worldwide from Audible:
☆ Audible

Information on the United Kingdom ebook edition is here.

Yesterday I did my first solo Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything). I’m a Reddit neophyte — I’ve only been active there once, when I participated in a group AMA for the War Stories anthology — so I wasn’t sure what to expect.

The event turned out to be fairly quiet. I was hoping for more participation. That said, I did get some interesting questions, and then overnight a few more came in, so I went back this morning and answered those as well.

Click here if you want to check out the results.

Would I do it again? Sure! I’m looking forward to another round. Next time I’ll try not to schedule myself opposite Monday Night Football, a Star Wars trailer, and a Canadian election. 🙂

A few reviews have posted in September — two for The Trials and one for The Red.

At Tor.com, Stefan Raets had a few criticisms of The Trials, but he also says:

I really love these books most of all for what they are: some of the most action-packed and intelligent military science fiction to be released in years[…] I can confidently say that, if you loved The Red, chances are that you’ll love The Trials too.

Read the full review here.

* * *

Back in August, Sharon Browning at LitStack Review took a look at The Red. She’s now reviewed The Trials as well, saying:

The Trials aptly continues the terse and involving story begun in The Red: First Light. The action of The Trials is more closely contained than in the previous book; the focus is set more directly on Lt. Shelley and the affects of the Red in his life rather than on sweeping missions run by a larger military. But the stakes are just as high.

Like the best middle installments of trilogies, The Trials moves us deeper into the psyches and lives of the characters we have met, while still broadening the threat to the world and setting up a huge payoff.

Read the full review here.

* * *

And Sarah at Bookworm Blues, reviews The Red, saying:

First Light by Linda Nagata is… wow. Really, that’s all you need to know.

🙂 But there’s a lot more to the review!

Read it in full here.

Help!

Have you ever written a customer review of a book you’ve read at Amazon or at the Barnes & Noble website? Or at Powells.com?** Would you ever consider doing so?

Those reviews really do matter because they help to determine the perceived popularity of a book in Amazon’s algorithms, and the more popular a book, the more likely it is to be recommended to readers browsing the website — which means it’s more likely to be bought by other readers, who might in turn enjoy the book and recommend it. Ideally this turns into a cascade of recommendations that lets a writer stay in business.

I assume a similar system is at work on the B&N website.

So I’m asking for your help. If you enjoyed The Red or The Trials or both, consider posting a short review. You don’t have to actually review the books. Some people do, but many just post short reader comments — for example: “Great read. Looking forward to the next book.” — and that’s fine. That’s all it takes.

Oh, and this is not just about my books. Do consider leaving a customer review for any book you enjoy! Trust me on this: The author will appreciate it.

And THANK YOU to everyone who has already posted a review. 🙂

Okay, back to writing.

I’m just back from the mainland and much is going on. Here are two time sensitive happenings. (Act now! Deadlines are imminent!)

Tor.com is hosting a sweepstakes. They’re giving away five copies of The Red. Comment on the post to enter. Sweepstakes ends 12:00 PM ET on August 26th. Open to legal residents of 50 United States and D.C., and Canada (excluding Quebec).

The Women in Science Fiction Storybundle ends on August 27. This is a chance to buy a lot of ebooks for not much money, including my novel Memory. Follow the link for details.

And here are some links to posts of mine around the web:

At the Women In Science Fiction blog, run by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, I talk about my novel Memory. This is in relation to the Storybundle.

At John Scalzi’s blog Whatever I have a Big Idea post in which I talk about both The Red and its sequel The Trials.

At Tor.com, I have a post titled Wired Soldiers: The Technology Behind The Red.

At Charles Stross’s blog, Judith Tarr, Nicola Griffith, and I have each posted on women in science fiction, looking at things from different perspective. Here are links to all three posts.
• Where Have All the Women Gone? by Judith Tarr
• Data, books, and bias by Nicola Griffith
• Chilling Effects by Linda Nagata

And finally, one more review of The Red, this one at LitStack Review.

I can’t resist a countdown.

The Trials is book 2 of the Red Trilogy and its publication date is only ONE WEEK away.

You can order it from your local bookstore, or preorder online. Here are links to some US retailers:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Powell’s Books
Mysterious Galaxy
Tattered Cover

The Trials will be available in multiple formats: hard cover, paperback, ebook, and audio book.

Here’s the back cover copy:

Lieutenant James Shelley and his squad of US Army soldiers were on a quest for justice when they carried out the unauthorized mission known as First Light. They returned home to America to face a court-martial, determined to expose the corruption in the chain of command that compelled their actions. But in a country still reeling from the nuclear terrorism of Coma Day, the courtroom is just one battlefield of many.

A new cycle of violence ignites when rumors of the elusive, rogue AI known as the Red go publicand Shelley is, once again, pulled into the fray. Challenged by his enemies, driven by ideals, Shelley feels compelled to act. But are the harrowing choices he makes really his own, or are they made for him, by the Red? And with millions of lives at stake in a game of nuclear cat-and-mouse, does the answer even matter?

Another link round up, but these are more personal:

Over at SF Signal, I chat with Paul Weimer about the Red Trilogy, artificial intelligence, and my weird writing career:

LN: The problem with the term “artificial intelligence” is that it means different things in different contexts, and to different people. In science fiction the standard trope is a complex computer program that becomes self-aware and begins to act like a human, and thereby becomes a pain in the ass—which isn’t a very useful transformation, from a practical perspective.

If you missed it, I’ve also got another recent interview up at SFRevu. Ernest Lilley asks some insightful questions.

Linda: I tend not to use the term “soft science fiction” because the meaning seems to change depending on circumstance. In my own mind, I see science fiction as a continuum between hard science fiction and space fantasy. At the harder end of the spectrum, technology in a story is more or less plausible and attempts are made not to violate basic laws of nature. Some say hard SF is focused on the technology, but for me, that’s not the defining characteristic. My stories aren’t about the technology. They’re about the characters and how their lives are affected by that technology.

And Kristine Kathryn Rusch has a blog post just up explaining what inspired her to put together a Storybundle themed around women in science fiction.

Suffice it to say that it became apparent to me that from the young writer/reader point of view, women didn’t write science fiction, because by the year 2000, most of the sf by women had gone out of print and was almost impossible to find.

Yes, I’m excited!

The Trials is book 2 of the Red Trilogy and its publication date is only two weeks away.

You can order it from your local bookstore, or preorder online. Here are links to some US retailers:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Powell’s Books
Mysterious Galaxy
Tattered Cover

The Trials will be available in multiple formats: hard cover, paperback, ebook, and audio book.

Here’s the back cover copy:

Lieutenant James Shelley and his squad of US Army soldiers were on a quest for justice when they carried out the unauthorized mission known as First Light. They returned home to America to face a court-martial, determined to expose the corruption in the chain of command that compelled their actions. But in a country still reeling from the nuclear terrorism of Coma Day, the courtroom is just one battlefield of many.

A new cycle of violence ignites when rumors of the elusive, rogue AI known as the Red go publicand Shelley is, once again, pulled into the fray. Challenged by his enemies, driven by ideals, Shelley feels compelled to act. But are the harrowing choices he makes really his own, or are they made for him, by the Red? And with millions of lives at stake in a game of nuclear cat-and-mouse, does the answer even matter?