Almost Over, Never Done: A Reluctant American’s Pandemic Tragicomedy

Post-apocalyptic survival meets a good laugh in this oddball adventure of suitcases, sarcasm, and life after loss. Then the really tough part starts.

Alone, sick, and unemployed in a pandemic, a fed-up nobody hatches an international plan to reboot her chances. There’s been too many decades of crazy already, and now the world is falling apart at a pace she can’t keep up with.

A gladiatorial combat of person-versus-policy begins. Stretching from sea shanty lyrics to the shores of a different republic, irreverent skits and tart objections to typical answers spit fire at a life that has always teetered on the edge of the American dream.

Current events, pop culture, and medical horror collide in an ongoing open mic night of unconventional takedowns. History gets hysterical on a snarky heroine’s double-edged quest for redemption and revenge. Or, at least, some toilet paper.

As plans become jokes and jokes become reality, can a dubiously-cast protagonist escape the dystopian parody of a country she’s sure will kill her?


Meet Amy A. DeCew

The saucy author’s backpages include stints in academic and research work, the fashion industry, and the eternal nonexistence of freelance writing. Her roles on stage and screen span many airline miles, from Bollywood extra to Vietnamese-British musicals. And if that sounds far-flung, just imagine what her books reveal!

Helen’s Melons Fly South

Helen has a dilemma when it comes to her melons. Along with her friend Ellen, they discreetly divulge their problem, that makes you question whether there may be a subtle undercurrent of satirical naughtiness. This book is clean for children, but I would advise parental guidance for sake of anybody that may be sensitive to this form of word play. Suffering from a bad bout of gardening, Helen is unable to grow perfect melons, unlike her friend Ellen, and takes matters into her own hands to rectify the matter. In a sensational series of events, can Helen sort out her melons, or will Ellen reign supreme? Read on and find out. Inspired by completely untrue events, the title says it all, whilst also saying precisely zero or less. I hope this book makes you laugh, as the pilot copy we created went down a storm, and had people bent double with laughter.

Meet Jamie Greenlees

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations. Follow Jamie Greenlees I, Jamie Greenlees, have been involved with crass parody in one form or another since I can remember. I am an old soul, and ‘Curseanova’ is my first self-published book, having written numerous satirical articles for ‘Figure 8 media’. I have mapped out an idea for a second novel, so get ready to not buy it. I currently work full time for a North American Insurance Company, and despite the content of this book, I live happily with my girlfriend of five years now in South East Essex. My favourite saying is ‘morons take a knife and stab people in the back, whereas the wise take a knife, cut the cord, and set themselves free from the morons’. I listen to and DJ vinyl only jungle and drum and bass music, and often carve a face into jacket potatoes before I stick them in the oven, as It’s always nice to have some company for dinner. My pipeline dream is to have enough money to build a modern and self-sufficient off grid home in a remote part of the World, such as Alaska, and my best friend at work is whichever one brings cake and sausage rolls in to the office for sharing, which today was Brenda – I love that old trout. I am a firm believer that Zombies DO exist, having once looked at myself in the mirror before my breakfast Red Bull. Finally, I find it strange that when a cat licks its bottom people find it ‘cute’, yet when I do it, everybody on the train refers to me as a ‘weirdo’.

Beast Be Gone

Creatures in your basement? Undead spooking your castle? Infestation of goblins? Beast Be Gone will clear out those pesky pests and save your health and business – (no dragons)

Adventurers rampage across the land, stealing everything from bread rolls to ancient heirlooms, slaughtering countless innocent monsters in their hunt for glory.

Eric, the owner of Beast Be Gone pest control, knows that most creatures can be removed with a bit of repellent, however the adventurers want to do things the flashy way; blowing up half of the dungeon with fireballs in the process.

With no work left, Eric is broke and desperate. That is until a young woman equipped with mechanical gadgets becomes his apprentice. Together they uncover the mystery of a diabolical plot that answers the timeless questions about adventuring…

Why are there so many Chosen Ones? Are goblins inherently evil or are they just misunderstood? Why do all the shopkeepers say they have the best swords in the land? What are the socio-economic implications of all these sword merchants?

Somebody wants a world full of adventurers, but why…?

Terry Pratchett meets Ghostbusters in an RPG world.

Beast Be Gone is a new fantasy comedy novel, which explores the stories of the underdogs of fantasy tales, sometimes known as NPC’s. They’re normal folk just wanting to go to the shops without getting stabbed by a sneaky guy in a cape who got bored of hunting goblins.

A must-read for anyone who loves Dungeons & Dragons, RPG’s and online games (although you’ll never be able to play them again without feeling bad for the men who have to clear up the mess you left behind in dungeons).

Suitable for adults, YA and teens. Available in hardcover (hardback), kindle, ebook and paperback. First published August 2021.


Meet A L Billington

Who is A L Billington? Some say he is just a myth, a phantom, a whisper on the lips of a kindly gentleman. Or maybe he’s just some bloke with access to a word processor and too much time on his hands. Who calls them word processors these days anyway? Turns out A L Billington is old enough to use the term ‘word processor’, yet only ironically, which should tell you exactly how old he is. He’s also the one writing this bit, so it’s very strange that it’s in the third person.

In case you were wondering, the ‘A’ stands for Arthur, and the ‘L’ stands for a secret that he’ll never tell you unless you get him drunk at an awkward party.

Anyway, you all have access to your own word processors, so you can look him up using the magic of the internet. He’s the cheeky chap who set up ‘Billington Publishing’ (in case you hadn’t made that connection based on the narcissistic naming)

Hexed in Texas: A Humorous Fantasy

A Russian witch steps through her magic mirror. The heir of a voodoo queen makes more conventional travel plans. But why are they headed for Texas?

“Lighthearted with a plot that is fun from beginning to end and characters that are charming . . . the perfect read.”–Readers’ Favorite

Once upon a time (a year ago, if you’re a stickler for details), chaotic magic leaking from Alamo excavations triggered an improbable event, drawing the attention of two unlikely rivals in search of a rare prize.

The Russian witch Baba Yaga and her two sisters have been around since–even she can’t remember when. She normally stays at home in her chicken-legged hut, grumpily aiding those who come to her for help or . . . otherwise.

M. C. Laveau, the CEO of Laveau Pharmaceuticals, merchandizes products that exploit the magic of her grandmother Marie (yes, that Marie).

Unfortunate bystander Rachel Vargas is caught between the dueling rivals as the bizarre effects of the magic become increasingly drastic: something’s gotta give.

Book 1 of the Baba Yaga Chronicles, in which she and her sisters confront the modern world, with unexpected, alarming, and comical results.

“Fun and engaging”
“A timely and delightful distraction”
“Unexpected and satisfying”
(Amazon reviews)

If you like lighthearted fantasy with offbeat humor, clever plot twists, and quirky characters, read the Baba Yaga Chronicles!


Meet Kathy Burford

Kathy Burford studied Russian and comparative literature and works as a freelance editor for university presses. She loves fairy tales and humorous fantasies, such as the works of Terry Pratchett, Diana Wynne Jones, Mark Cain, and A. Lee Martinez. She and her husband lived in Austin, Texas, for many years and now live in Iowa City.

L.I.F.E. in the 23rd Century

“A laudable sci-fi yarn that’s both irreverent and relevant.”Kirkus Reviews
Meet Pat McGewan-X04. Pat is a Patriot who spends his days watching robots build cubicles for corporations that keep getting blown up by those pesky terrorists in the soon to be won, we’ve got them on the ropes, 232nd year of the War on Terror. He’s content in his world of mediocre corporate coffee, vid-link chats with his wife who the government discourages him from ever meeting in person, and an endless barrage of travel bans, terrorist attacks, and never-ending nightly news emergency broadcasts.
But everything changes when a freak car accident puts Pat in the national spotlight. One minute he’s a hero for being the sole survivor of this week’s most recent terrorist attack, (but not long enough to get a commemorative coffee cup with his face on it before the next attack happens). In the next minute, the nation’s most vitriolic talking head has branded Pat the greatest threat to truth, justice, and stockholder profits — and the manhunt begins!
Pat has to decide between fighting the corporate-controlled media and possibly losing his life or giving in to his Academy training and lose his soul and possibly any hope of ever getting a decent cup of coffee. Welcome to LIFE in the 23rd Century: an absurd, light-hearted dystopian future to distract you from your horrific dystopian present. Brought to you by the makers of prescription Chillaxafed.
Jason R. Richter writes humorous dystopian adventures with a touch of real-world cynicism.


Meet Jason R. Richter

Jason R. Richter is a perennial runner-up in Jason R. Richter look-alike contests. The orphaned love child of Kilgore Trout and Margaret Dumont, he was raised by marauding gypsy accountants. When the bottom fell out of the interplanetary death ray market at the dawn of the new millennium, he turned his hobby (a game he calls “Lies to Strangers”) into a career. He currently lives. His novella “I am Leonard and other stories” is free to download at his website: diskordianpress.com/newsletter/

OOF: An Online Outrage Fiesta for the Ages

Award-winning novelist and cultural critic Strobe Witherspoon interrogates his own profession. It goes terribly.

“Wildly entertaining …Sometimes sad and sometimes hilarious, Witherspoon’s timely metafictional novel explores the ways (mis)information can shape public discourse in the digital media age.” – Booklife by Publishers Weekly

”Strikingly original …an innovative literary experiment that supplies a thoughtful commentary on the ‘discourse virus’ of our age …Witherspoon tackles a broad spectrum of media, including comically scathing excerpts from tweets, podcasts, blogs, and even academic journals and also keenly exposes the ways in which Strobe, the character, is implicated in his own online assault, due to his obsessive attachment to public life.” – Kirkus Reviews

OOF explores the role of satire in a society lurching from one ridiculous crisis to the next, where media outlets rely on clicks to stay alive and everything is filtered through a lens of anger and misinformation.

————
Strobe Witherspoon just sold his latest satirical novel for a lot of money. The book in question, FLOTUS: A Memoir, is a fictitious autobiography about a former first lady of the United States reflecting on years of misery at the hands of her much older POTUS husband. When a chapter is leaked in advance of the book’s publication, an Online Outrage Fiesta (OOF) ensues via news outlets, blogs, Twitter, troll farms, and everything in between. Witherspoon has his life placed under a microscope. Family secrets are exposed. Now, an anthology has been put together to document Witherspoon’s downfall—and settle the score.
————

”an impressive achievement of unflinching honesty from a noteworthy talent, as resonant and relevant as it is entertaining …OOF tugs at the threads that connect American cynicism with radical extremism and weaves a character-rich tapestry of insight …Each voice, whether of a New Yorker journalist or an Internet influencer, is rendered with uncanny fidelity. Perhaps most masterful is that key events are not depicted but merely alluded to, allowing the text to provide an elegant framework for a more personal story painted almost invisibly in the negative space.”– BlueInk Review


Meet Strobe Witherspoon

Witherspoon’s first novel, furtl, was a 2014 Kirkus Reviews book of the year selection. The absurd near future of that novel became not-so-absurd one year later.

Pianist in a Bordello (Bargain Book)

Pianist in a Bordello

What would happen if a politician decided to tell the truth—the whole truth? 
Richard Youngblood, aspiring Congressman, is about to find out. He’s running on a platform of honesty and transparency—and against the advice of his friends and advisers he’s decided to start with himself. His autobiography will lay his entire life bare before voters just days before the election.
And what a life he’s had. Born in a commune and named Richard Milhous Nixon Youngblood as an angry shot at his absent father, Richard grows up in the spotlight, the son of an enigmatic fugitive and the grandson of a Republican senator. He’s kidnapped and rescued, kicked out of college for a prank involving turkeys, arrested in Hawaii while trying to deliver secrets to the CIA…Dick Nixon Youngblood’s ready to tell all. 
He’ll even tell his readers about the Amandas—three women who share a name but not much else, and who each have helped shape and define the man he’s become. 
Are voters really ready for the whole truth?
Are you?
Pianist in a Bordello is a hilarious political romp through the last four decades of American history, from a narrator who is full of surprises.


Meet Mike C. Erickson

Mike C. Erickson grew up in the idyllic college town of Logan, Utah, but because of a twist of fate he graduated from high school in Honolulu. He left Hawaii brimming with aloha and enrolled at Utah State, where he was awarded two degrees and self-proclaimed minor intellectual status, which was of dubious value when the US Army invited him to vacation in South-East Asia. Ten days after leaving Vietnam, he began decades of dispensing pearls of wisdom as a high school history teacher, academic decathlon coach, and on occasion, as a community college instructor in the Sacramento area. Mike and his wife Trudy, have two grown sons and a grandson born soon after this novel is published. When not in Hawaii or another exotic locale, they live in Gold River, California. This is his first novel.

Pandora’s Gardener

There’s a war being waged between two secret factions. At stake is the heart of democracy itself.

The key to victory is a small, seemingly harmless, piece of computer hardware, which in the wrong hands, could bring about a technological Dark Age. The race is on to find it as a trail of death is left in its path.

John Cranston is a gardener. He’s not really interested in global domination, he’d much rather mow a lawn. He’s the current keeper of that harmless looking thing.

The problem is – he’s the last person to know.

Meanwhile, Detective Inspector Sutherland and his sidekick Sergeant Bludgeon are working on the mystery of the missing accountants, little knowing that this will lead them into something darker and more sinister, as their paths cross and diverge from the gardener on the run.


Meet D Charles Mason

Bexhill-on-Sea photographer and writer David C Mason is the author of the new novel Pandora’s Gardener, an adventure thriller with added humour.

Originally from London’s East End he “escaped” to the seaside to see out his last years of climbing the corporate greased pole, before giving up to do something more interesting.

After thirty odd years of writing plans, outlines, proposals, strategies, business cases, most of which could have passed as works of fiction (or “scenarios” as they were known), he is no stranger to making things up. He thought it would be a shame to let all that experience go to waste.

When he’s not writing, thinking about writing, or out with his camera, he can sometimes be found telling people that “no, Bexhill-on-Sea is nothing to do with Southend-on-Sea…”

General Jack and the Battle of the Five Kingdoms

The times were hopelessly dark.
In a green land before time, all animals of the world laboured under the repressive rule of King Roar the Lion and the fierce Felines.
Miaow, the timid and inconsequential chief of the cats befriends a fourteen-year-old mysterious explorer, Jack. These two unlikely heroes engage in the impossible struggle for liberty of the repressed animals. The conflict reaches its apogee with an epic but disastrous battle.
Although the two protagonists were aware their survival was at stake, little did they know their enduring friendship would radically alter the destiny of the Animal World forever.
This book will appeal to fans of “The Hobbit” and “The Chronicles of Narnia.”


Meet David Bush

avid Bush is a medical doctor specialized in haematology. He was born in Malta but left for the UK when he was in his early twenties. He returned to his first home in 2003 where he still practices hospital medicine. He is the co-founder of a support group for patients with blood cancers. Since he gave up his private practice, he has had more time to spend with the family. He enjoys reading, swimming, travelling and doing any type of DIY job. Most of all, though, he cherishes the time he spends with his young great-nephews Jack and Luke.
He has published many papers in international peer-reviewed medical journals. He also writes analytical opinion articles for a satirical political blog.

Shadow Vanguard Boxed Set (Books 1-4)

Now’s your chance to grab the entire completed series in one boxed set of almost 1000 pages of action packed space opera excitement!

Don’t dump the cargo – I paid for it fair and square with money I stole!

And so begins the saga of Jack Marber, former Special Assault Marine and his alien band of traders as they cross the galaxy doing the only job that doesn’t leave them homeless.

Gravity Storm:

“I need eyes and ears in every system that would benefit the Federation. One way to do that is for the Free Traders of this universe to work for me…”Nathan Lowell

Nathan has a mission and is willing to pay handsomely for Jack’s time. If only Jack will represent the Federation that kicked him out of the service for what was Jack’s fault.

He’s not sure they should trust him, although he likes it.

His two-legged Yollin partner is trying to learn the English side of the Galactic Common language, but that doesn’t always work out so well.

Adina is a member who Nathan wants on the team. No one is sure of her, not even Adina.

A storm is rising and the misfits of the Fortitude have no choice but to fight it.

Lunar Crisis:

The Shadows have been blooded and survived. There was no time for celebration as their next mission came upon them like a gangster in the night.

Or missiles out of the blue.

Captain Jack Marber, the Yollin Tc’aarlat, and Adina Choudhury take the ICS Fortitude to the moons of Taglen. They have to figure out what’s going on before they can fix it, all the while they are the target of an unknown entity who wants them dead.

No matter the cost. As Tc’aarlat might say, “Don’t put all your eggs in one bastard.”

Slave traders, murderers, thieves, and con men find themselves in the crosshairs of the Shadows. Join the misfits as their intelligent ship rockets them into the middle of it all.

Immortality Curse:

Following a slew of dangerous missions, the Shadows are looking forward to an easier assignment – conveying official condolences to the mourning monarch of an allied planet.

They should be so lucky.

How far would you go to mourn a lost love?

Twisted by grief, the queen has tasked her top scientists with finding a cure for death itself, so that no one else must suffer like she has. But, when the cure is accidentally unleashed upon the world, her subjects discover there are some fates worse than death.

Add to the mix a trio of unruly hawk chicks, a movie-mad android, and a stonemason with an unhealthy obsession with sledgehammers – and you’ve got a mission the team would gladly exchange for a return to the front line.

Ultimate Payback:

The Shadows are back and on a personal mission to clear Tc’aarlat’s name.

A two-legged Yollin, a pariah to his parents. The Gan’barlo crime family has been a thorn in his side since he came of age and tried to make his own way. When he was forced to choose one family over the other, he found that he didn’t like either and left the planet Yoll.

But you can’t ghost your family. It’s time to go home and deal with both. Captain Jack Marber is behind Tc’aarlat all the way as they return to their crewmember’s home to set things right.

On a sad note, Tom Dublin passed away before he finished book 4, but he was able to produce the outline for Book 4 which we wrote for him. We (LMBPN Publishing) are donating one hundred percent of the profit from these books to Tommy’s family.

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— PLEASE NOTE —

*NOTE: If cursing is a problem, even humorous cursing, then this might not be for you.