Surprise! Announcing a brand new winter-themed climate sci-fi short story for you to enjoy.
I know, I know. You were expecting Legacy of the Gods or Sins of a Shattered Empire. But the way of the writer is frequently to have multiple WIPs and sometimes even to drop everything and write something completely different for no reason whatsoever. This is most certainly an example of the latter.
Well, not for no reason, but the reason sounds kind of stupid when you say it out loud.
Recently I had the privilege to be involved in a rather successful Itch-io bundle for Halloween and, soon after it ended, the organiser announced a winter-themed bundle, giving only one week to sign up. I didn’t have anything ready that fit the theme but this represented a great opportunity to dust off and expand upon a piece of winter-themed sci-fi micro-fiction I wrote some years back.
The micro-fiction in question was titled: Snowfall.
Getting a short story written out in a single week was a significant challenge, but I got down to it and made it in time to submit for the bundle. The result is that I now have a new short story that I can share with you all! The bundle goes live on 22 November and is linked below, so that’s also going to be the wider release date for the story.
You can also pre-order it now if you wish—link below.
Coming in at just about 3670 words, it’s shorter than a typical chapter for one of my longer books but, unlike The God Sun, this puts it very squarely in short story territory. In the process of expanding the original story of Snowfall, I was able to set it in the universe of the Augment Saga—not by design but by necessity. I needed an alien species and some background world-building to flesh out the story with, so with the time constraint I naturally reached for things I had already established.
This expanded version of Snowfall is set in the far future of the Augment Saga and has almost nothing to do with the events of the main series. This means it can be enjoyed as a standalone story but keen readers of the series will get a sprinkling of extra background lore as a bonus.
Cover Reveal & Blurb
The ruins and artefacts of an ancient lost empire lie scattered all over space. Samara, an exo-archaeologist by trade, ekes out a lonely living investigating these strange and remote worlds.
She loves what she does. The only trouble is: It doesn't pay well and her ship is in dire need of an upgrade.
Could a frigid, lifeless planet where icy winds and cold desert plains make for treacherous exploration offer her the chance to change her fortunes?
Release Date: 22 November 2026
