Patty Jansen has 29 audiobooks on Listento.it, narrated by 6 narrators, with an average listener rating of 5★ across 1 ratings. The most-rated is The Bastard Prince.
The Bastard Prince
Summary
She has a dragon, and she’s not afraid to use it. Nellie Dreessen is a kitchen maid in the palace of Regent Bernard of Saardam. She has worked for two kings and two regents, has seen two royal families murdered through magic, has seen ghosts and demons, and kept her head down like a good girl. On her 50th birthday, she receives her late father’s diary, which describes a magical item that is so evil it needs to be kept in the church crypt: a box that contains dragon. Problem is someone has stolen the box. Regent Bernard holds a banquet for his eldest son’s 60th birthday. Distinguished guests come from far and wide. Because she knows what the box looks like, Nellie discovers it in a nobleman's luggage. Removing the box from a thief’s room is not stealing, right? Not if you intend to return it to the rightful owner: the church. But someone poisons the nobleman, and everyone in the kitchen is a suspect. Nellie's friend in the church advises Nellie to flee with the dragon box. The Regent is on a mission to stamp out magic, and Nellie plans to do what she does best: Keep her head down and hide. Problem is the dragon has other ideas.
©2018 Patty Jansen (P)2018 Patty Jansen
Fire & Ice
Summary
Where magic is dark and gritty, characters are troubled and twisted, and victory comes at a heavy price.
Deep under the City of Glass in the frozen Southern land, an age-old machine called the Heart of the City radiates a power that locals call icefire. Most citizens are immune to it, but a few, always born with physical disabilities, can bend it to their will. For 50 years, the ruling Eagle Knights, who fly on the back of giant birds, have killed these Imperfects, fearing the return of the old royal family, who used icefire to cut out people's hearts, turning them into ghostly servitors.
The old king's grandson Tandor only sees the good things icefire brought: power and technology now forgotten while the people of the South live in dire poverty. He's had enough of seeing his fellow kinsfolk slaughtered by ignorant Knights, of Imperfect babies being abandoned on the ice floes to be eaten by wild animals. His grandfather's diary tells him how to increase the beat of the Heart, the first step to making the land glorious once more. Arrogant as he is, he sets the machine in motion. All he needs is an army of Imperfect servitors to control the resulting power.
Isandor is Imperfect, an ex-Knight apprentice, betrayed by his best friend and running for his life. Queen Jevaithi is Imperfect, living like a prisoner amidst leering Knights, surviving only because the common people would rebel if their beloved queen were harmed.
Both are young and desperate and should be grateful Tandor wants to rescue them from their hopeless situations. Or so he thinks. The youngsters, however, have no inclination to become heartless ghosts, but while they defy Tandor, the Heart beats, and he alone cannot control its power.
This will appeal to fans of Joe Abercrombie and George R.R. Martin.
©2012 Patty Jansen (P)2018 Patty Jansen
The Idiot King
Summary
Continued from book 2. Johanna, Roald, Nellie, and Loesie have come to Florisheim, finding many of their kinsmen there. The survivors from the burning of Saardam who have come here are the nobles who were never great supporters the old king, and it is likely that they won’t support his son either, even if he were normal. They support his marriage to Johanna even less, and Johanna’s position as the new king’s wife would be improved immensely if she produced an heir, but so far that’s not happening. Florisheim is alive with evil magic, and that magic is starting to affect the Saarlanders, who are unused to it. They suffer apparitions of ghosts, people driven to injure themselves, or taken prisoner to work in a mysterious hole in the ground. Johanna knows that they have to get out of that evil place, but where can they go when the violence covers the entire known world?
©2015 Patty Jansen (P)2018 Patty Jansen
Mailing Lists Unboxed
Summary
Self-published authors are coming to realize that a stable career is about a backlist of titles and keeping that backlist selling. But how do you do this? Invariably, advice given by other authors includes holding promotions and lowering the price of the first book in series, or even making it free. However, few people mention one of the most powerful ways to keep your backlist selling: the author mailing list. This is where Mailing Lists Unboxed comes in. It shows you: The different types of author mailing lists Ways how to recruit people to sign up Steps on what to do with your list once you have one Attitudes about mailing lists, including those that stand in your way Warnings and precautions And much more This is not a book for beginners. If you know little about self-publishing, listen to Self-Publishing Unboxed first.
©2019 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
Re-Entry: A Galactic Adventure
Summary
On the backwater world of Cayelle, Tina Freeman runs a shop with her son Rex, 15 years old, half-human, half-android with a massive chip on his shoulder about having been born without arms or legs. The shop makes a modest profit, but when a creditor turns up wanting his money back, everything goes pear-shaped. She needs money, and needs it fast. Another creditor is impossible to find. That leaves her one option: to return to the world she fled 15 years ago and Kelso Space Station, where her spaceship has languished for over 15 years, and finally sell the thing. Tina worked as scientific officer in the Federacy Force’s top secret Project Charon, and was forced out when she rang alarm bells about particles that escaped out of a rift to another universe. As it turns out, the alien dust has been infecting people in her absence, causing profound changes in human behavior. When Tina resurfaces at Kelso, her presence is a threat to those who still defend the project, including her ex-husband, and they want to shut her up, but her continued silence may well mean the end of civilization.
©2019 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
Permutation
Summary
En route to a job in the asteroid belt, the transport ship that Jonathan and Gaby are travelling on is required to give assistance to a space station in trouble. Astoria Station stopped responding to everything except automated messages. Jonathan and Gaby, familiar with disease and habitat collapse, offer to help. But not even they are prepared for what they find, or the efforts by some to sweep it under the carpet.
©2020 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
Charlotte's Army
Summary
An army of 7000 artificial soldiers accidentally received the same brain implant: they are all in love with the same woman. A space fleet with 7,000 artificial human marines hurtles through space at near-light-speed to an interstellar war... Dr. Charlotte West, the neuro-technologist responsible for the soldiers’ artificial brains, travels in the support fleet. Two months before the arrival at the war site, the marines start fighting each other and disobeying commands. When they are brought in for tests, Charlotte finds that someone has made a disastrous mistake that endangers the entire space fleet. They're all in love with her.
©2011 Patty Jansen (P)2019 Patty Jansen
Elevation
Summary
Verona Rupes, on the ice moon Miranda, is the tallest cliff in the solar system. If you jump off the top, it takes 700 seconds to reach the bottom. What can you do in the most important 700 seconds of your life? Jonathan and Gaby arrive at the ice moon Miranda to work with a local researcher and find that adventurists have snuck into an area infected with alien bacteria and have gotten themselves in trouble. Do these people have to be stopped because they're about to spread a bacterial infection to the human settlements or are there other factors at play? A tale of petty vindictiveness, competition and jealousy. Oh, and a wedding.
©2020 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
Fire Wizard
Summary
Johanna, Roald, Nellie, and Loesie return undercover to the devastated city of Saardam. In the months since they fled, the Fire Wizard Alexandre has ruled the town with campaigns of death and fear, focused on the eradication of the Church of the Triune, the former state church of Saarland that doesn't allow magic and that is more popular with the common people than with nobles. Johanna meets up with underground members of the church, even though her little gift of magic makes her feel ambivalent about it. She knows that ousting Alexandre will require a powerful magician, something she and her followers do not have. What is more, Alexandre's men discover the group, and the band of resistance fighters faces the showdown with the tyrant long before they're even close to ready for it.
©2015 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
Extermination
Summary
While space biologists Jonathan Bartell and Gaby Larsen attend a conference held at a base in the asteroid belt, a man approaches Jonathan in great distress. He's been asked to take over command of a previously commercial research station, but strange things started happening: plants glowing in the dark, lights turning themselves on and off, computers misbehaving. He discovered the cause, but Section Command issues a gag order on the issue. This is strange, because the Force is investing big in research. Jonathan is left with many questions: Who is this man, why does no one want to hear what he says, what is he doing at the conference, and what is the ultimate enemy of humanity? A novella in the Space Agent Jonathan Bartell series, which explores biology in space and what happens when people start messing with it.
©2018 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
Originator
Summary
After having escaped from Kelso Station, Tina and her crew run low on supplies. Both stations they can visit are in pirate hands. They have to make a toss-up decision on which would be the safest. They choose the bigger station. But while they’re in the dock, trying very hard not to be noticed until they can negotiate the ridiculous supply wait times before they leave again, Tina finds out that her daughter, Evelle, is a prisoner at the station. Trying to free her brings Tina much closer to the pirates than she ever wanted to get.
©2019 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
Contamination
Summary
Jonathan Bartell is a young man, just out of university, when he signs up for the position of Quarantine Officer at the Orbital Launch Station. He is part of a crop of students who flocked to study exo-biology when bacteria were discovered on Mars and who are now all making their living flipping burgers because the jobs are few and hard to get. He is lucky to get a job in space, no matter how mundane. Or so he thinks.... Gaby Larsen is a doctor at the tiny hospital at the space station, and she keeps secrets, not because she wants to keep them, but because she is too scared to share them. Because out in space, your worst enemies are your fellow travelers.
©2017 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
The Dragon King
Summary
Take an adolescent boy. Make him angry. Add dragons.
Saving Prince Bruno from the church crypts hasn't turned out the way Nellie had planned. The boy is morose, angry, hellbent on revenge, and incapable of wielding the power he has been given. But the group of refugees who have fled from the city have bigger concerns. It's winter, they need to survive, and find a safe place to recover and plan their next move.
But the boy does something stupid. Through the prince's single impatient action, they don't have the time to recover anymore. The wizard knows where he is, he has the whole city eating out of his hands, and Nellie has to come up with a plan to defeat him, because the only other option is death.
©2018 Patty Jansen (P)2019 Patty Jansen
Soldier's Duty
Summary
Note: The character is in the military; contains some military-grade swearing. Izramith Ezmi is many things: a member of the feared, all-female Hedron guards, a war veteran recently returned from a pointless and bloody mission, and impatient, angry, and above all, lonely. With her contract about to run out, she may be on her way to becoming a ruthless mercenary, since what she really wants - becoming a mother - is out of the question. Her family carries a gene that causes deeply malicious madness. Her nephew was born with it, and her useless sister has left him in the care of an institute. A baby. Two days old. She wants to ask her uncle, himself born with the condition, if he can do anything for the boy. But her uncle and his band of mad outcasts have gone missing, rumored to be on the world of Ceren. So Izramith takes another hired-gun contract in Barresh, which is a city-state on Ceren. The job is to provide security at a high-profile wedding. Simple and straightforward, right? No crawling in mud, no shootouts, no mangled bodies or blood-drenched soil. And meanwhile, she can try to find her uncle. Except he isn't there, and the job isn't simple. Izramith and her team discover evidence of an extensive spying ring that threatens the entire city. Postponing the wedding would be an admission of defeat, so it's time for desperate measures. Izramith leads a small team in what has to go down as the most harebrained mission to ever be undertaken in the universe. Much is at stake: peace, the lives of her uncle and her nephew, and her own.
©2013 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
The Necromancer's Daughter
Summary
One brave woman's struggle against magical forces. Queen Johanna's position in Saardam is fragile. The barons and kings of the countries in the hinterland are not happy that she helped the royal family to survive and is now about to ensure the next generation. They vow to teach this little upstart country a lesson for once and for all. Of course it is not so much about petty rivalry, but about access to the seaport that connects the hinterland with the lucrative ocean trade. Johanna knows that if it came to a fight Saardam could never survive, so she has invited all the heads of state and other important people for talks to invest in the city's shattered infrastructure for the benefit of all. As a congregation of royal families gathers such as the lowlands have never seen, the magicians travelling with the esteemed guests prepare the final and most insidious attempt to get control of the upstart little country and its usurper, commoner queen: through her baby daughter.
©2016 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
Watcher's Web
Summary
She is lost on an alien planet. He said he'd help her get home. He lied. Jessica's plane develops engine trouble over the dry Australian inland - and crashes in thick, unfamiliar rainforest. A group she thinks is a search party shows up, but it consists of large-eyed not-quite people who kill all survivors except Jessica and a long-haired hippie named Brian. No one is going to come to rescue her. In fact, they're not even on Earth. While the pair wrestle their way through the forest in search for help, Jessica becomes ever more suspicious of Brian. Why does he know so much about the world where they have ended up? Why is he so insistent on helping her? Jessica has always been able to use her mind to tell animals what to do and now she's hearing voices in her head. Another man is pleading her not to listen to Brian. Except this man can kill someone with a single look, and he uses his mental powers to order people around. In this utterly strange and dangerous world where people seem to want something from her, who can she trust? A gritty survival story in the vein of The Hunger Games, set in a Star Wars locality.
©2011 Patty Jansen (P)2020 Patty Jansen
Self-Publishing Unboxed
Summary
You intend to self-publish or have published a book or two. You’re not selling very well and wonder why not. You feel you should be doing something, but the thought of “marketing” gives you nightmares. You don’t want to become one of these people shouting “buy my book” on Twitter. But you would still love to start selling some books and pay some or even all of your bills with your writing income. The good news is that this is ever more possible when self-publishing, if you set yourself up right. This is where the three-year plan comes in. The Three Year, No-Bestseller Plan for Making a Sustainable Living from Your Fiction has been a popular forum and blog post on the subject of career and audience-building versus chasing sales and rankings of individual books. People have long asked me if I’m going to turn the post into a book. The post itself is about 1500 words long, but it covers only an overview of the strategy and is intended for people who are already familiar with many of the tactics discussed. There is much I could add and explain in more detail, but enter inside. Self-Publishing Unboxed is a 101 guide to self-publishing and selling your self-published books, and it will show you: What are the basics of self-publishing How to optimize your book’s listings How to decide which services to use (and how to pick scams) How to decide what you need to spend your time on besides writing What are easy and cheap ways to promote And much more... It is ideal for people who are at the beginning of their publishing career, as well as those who have dabbled a bit but are ready to take it seriously. Take control of your writing career and get the audiobook now.
©2017 Patty Jansen (P)2019 Patty Jansen
The Sahara Conspiracy
Summary
Second book in the series. Listen to Seeing Red: Ambassador, Book 1 first. 3 December 2114 Cory Wilson is woken in the middle of the night with a summons to appear in the president of Nations of Earth's office. An aid worker in Djibouti has discovered a shipment of alien guns. As ambassador to gamra, the extraterrestrial organization which controls the Exchange, the FTL wormhole network, Cory has often been critical of Earth's handling of extraterrestrial problems. This is his moment to shine, to apply his knowledge about alien customs, to, in the words of the president, "get those idiots out of there". Except the usual suspects, the Zhori mafia who have caused trouble on Earth for a long time, are nowhere to be seen. This is something far more dangerous, something that involves all of northern Africa, something that provokes the anger of Asto, gamra's largest world. Asto's army is already prowling in orbit, ready to strike.
©2015 Patty Jansen (P)2017 Patty Jansen
Ambassador 1: Seeing Red
Summary
24 October 2114: the day that shocked the world. Young diplomat Cory Wilson narrowly escapes death in the assassination of President Sirkonen. No one claims responsibility but there is no doubt that the attack is extraterrestrial. Cory was meant to start work as a representative to Gamra, the alien organization that governs the FTL transport network, but now his new job may well be scrapped in anger. Worse, as Earth uses military force to stop any extraterrestrials coming or leaving, as 200,000 extraterrestrial humans are trapped on Earth, as the largest army in the galaxy prepares to free them by force, only Cory has the experience, language skills, and contacts to solve the crime. But he's broke, out of a job, and a long way from Earth.
©2012 Patty Jansen (P)2016 Patty Jansen
Willow Witch
Summary
After fleeing from the burning ruins of Saardam, Johanna, Prince Roald, Loesie, and Nellie have been captured by a group of bandits and are being taken to a place unknown through a forest rife with magic. Loesie, struck mute by an unknown but powerful sorcerer, is behaving increasingly strange. The friends try to escape, but is Loesie helping them or is she a danger to them? Every step they take through the ghost-ridden forest brings them closer to the duke who is rumoured to be the source of the evil magic. He is the necromancer whose anger against Saarland's royal family has lain the world to waste.
©2014 Patty Jansen (P)2018 Patty Jansen