Samsara Byron is back in Seattle, working to save the world. A murder in a Seattle coffee house. A murder on her father’s decaying boat dock on Puget Sound. All of this has nothing to do with Sam, she insists. She’s heroically fending off a criminal attack on the world’s cyber infrastructure—if she could only get anyone to answer the phone on Christmas day. After escaping exurban life on Limberlost Island a decade earlier, Sam became a rockstar among anti-hacker security programmers: appearing at BlackHat conferences in vintage t-shirts and combat boots; investigating international security conspiracies with the FBI and NSA. Now Sam is dragged sideways by chaos back on Limberlost Island: her brother accidentally embroiled her flakey father with gun runners; the boy next door came home as prodigal son, hiding from Eastern European gangsters; a porn farmer thinks he’s in love. Meanwhile, the local weather guru promises that the large cold air mass headed for the Puget Sound Conversion Zone will dump record snow. Seattle is always paralyzed when it snows. The Grrrl of Limberlost follows three self-absorbed voices through the frenzy and terror in their daily lives, mired in family losses and betrayals, while weaponized malware threatens to ruin Christmas. The key mystery: which voice is the unreliable narrator? This light comedic suspense novel tries to include romance, but hardly anyone has time for it. It does contain inexplicit sex scenes and the sort of language you’d expect from gangsters, porn-farmers, and retro Riot Grrrls. Annie Pearson’s Rain City Comedy of Manners series explores misadventures in contemporary Seattle among people whose work drives their hearts’ desires, often in conflict with other love affairs. When bad things happen to quirky people, can they survive the wretched comedy of romance under grey skies?

A drawing-room courtship on motorcycles in sage country … A second chance at love? Or a soggy motorcycle journey from Tumalo to Denio to Winnemucca to Zion, while the White-Bone Demon seeks to destroy hope? Sean Frederick Wentworth, the manga artist, has the artistic career he dreamed of. He’s producing a new mini-series that tells his mythic story backwards: the journey through the U.S. West that was the creative genesis of his infamous steampunk characters. The only catch: a demonic ex-partner who seeks to destroy Sean’s new project. Eliot Arden is a Seattle artisan and handywoman. Her put-together life worked well until she met Destiny, a teenage orphan who needs stability and mentoring as an artist. Eliot needs cash, right now, to secure Destiny’s future. A short-term job slams Eliot back a decade, riding her rebuilt BMW R100RS down the path not taken. Ten years ago, Eliot and Sean enjoyed a brief affair of the heart. But they couldn’t conquer the contradictions: artist versus artisan, East Coast versus West Coast, fame versus solitude. On the new journey to the West, it seems there’s still too much to overcome, including Sean Wentworth’s penchant for living inside his own myths. But this time, dreams and desires might heat up like red slickrock in the sun. Or is that fire sparked by a 900cc bike sliding sideways down a backcountry highway? Artemis in the Desert is a workplace adventure story—where the workplace is a motorcycle journey across the Great Basin. This story includes colorful language and sexual situations, plus as few motorcycles dropped by the riders. A He Said/She Said story, Artemis in the Desert is recommended for readers 18+. Rain City Comedy of Manners Series: #1 The Grrrl of Limberlost (Sam and Matt: cyber-thriller on Puget Sound) #2 Artemis in the Desert (Eliot and Sean: adventure on two wheels) #3 Nine Volt Heart (Jason and Susi: musical ride through Seattle’s backstreets) Each book can be read as a standalone story, with no cliffhangers. Later books do not reveal the stories of earlier books.

Can you find true love without a non-disclosure agreement after your picture is on the cover of Rolling Stone? Two musicians meet by accident in Seattle: Jason, the now infamous singer-songwriter, is at odds with the world because of falsehoods spread on the Internet. Susi, a classical musician whose previous life came off the rails, is building a new career as a music teacher, focusing on early Americana. Their separate worlds and professional yearnings quickly become entwined in unexpected ways. Jason wants Susi to sing the haunting songs he’s written for her—if he can just get his ex-wife out of his recording contracts. Susi doesn’t want to sing in public—and complains that Jason disturbs her hard-won serenity. Each tries to hide deep secrets from the other. Yet in love—and on the Internet—who really has secrets? Passion, mistaken identities, and a menacing stalker twist a love-at-first-sight story into a roller-coaster ride through the backstreets of Seattle, where tourists never go. Where both karma and sunshine can be so unpredictable in April. This light-suspense romantic serio-comedy contains explicit sex scenes and the undeleted expletives you’d expect at rock recording sessions in Seattle. Annie Pearson’s Rain City Comedy of Manners series explores misadventures in contemporary Seattle among people whose work drives their hearts’ desires, often in conflict with other love affairs. When bad things happen to quirky people, can they survive the wretched comedy of romance under grey skies? Reviewers say: Get some sleep aids before you start reading Nine Volt Heart, Annie Pearson’s rock music romance AND thriller. You’ll find yourself rooting for a pair of unlikely lovers who must navigate Seattle’s tangled indie music scene to stay together. Then there’s the anonymous cyber-stalker who becomes oh too real. Pearson masterfully mixes suspense and love into a riveting read. — Emily Warn, Shadow Architect