Talking "Aliens are Demons"

And an Index of Sci-Fi and Fantasy Substackers

Fallen Universe FLASH Sale and Giveaway

Great news, everyone! My third book in the Fallen series, Dormition: Short Stories from the Fallen Universe, is available for digital preorder. Both the Kindle edition and paperback come out on February 12th. It will be on Kindle Unlimited.

And I have a special deal for those new to the Fallen! If you contact me by Midnight American Eastern Standard Time, March 1st, either via email or comment below telling me you have preordered the 99 cents digital edition of Dormition, I will give you digital copies of Fallen and Risen for free! That’s right, you can get the first three books of the military psychological science fiction series for 99 cents.

And to those who have read Fallen and Risen, I will give you a free copy of Dormition if you contact me by Midnight American Eastern Standard Time, March 1st.

Check out the Fallen series on Amazon today!

Please remember to leave a review once you finish it.

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Podcast Interview on Brian Eskow’s Searching for Political Identity

As long time readers of mine know, I have an interest in critical analysis, the debate about aliens, and questions of religion. These interests helped drive the creation of the Fallen series.

In late 2023, podcaster Brian Eskow interviewed me on Christianity and Judaism's opinions on the possibility of extraterrestrial life. It was a fun talk where I discussed various viewpoints on the question of the potential of alien life.

This time, he interviewed me about whether aliens are really demons. In this interview, I expounded on the theological arguments about the possibility of aliens and discussed alleged alien abductions. Also, we touched upon Darwinism, antipodes, Candace Owens, Our Lady of Medjugorje, and cargo cults! The conclusion won't surprise readers who remember the "Aliens are Demons: A Survey of the Claim and Why I'm Skeptical" post, but you might just learn something new.

The interview can be enjoyed on Apple Podcasts, Audible, Rumble, Spotify, YouTube, and X.

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Substack Science Fiction and Fantasy Index

As part of my support for independent creators, I am planning a series of indexes to increase discoverability on Substack. This list is a collection of science fiction and fantasy Substacks. Check them out for new, original stories. Note: This list isn’t an endorsement, but an index to help readers. Nominators provided their own titles and descriptions. I edited for formatting and standardized spellings.

For the next index, I am looking for Substackers who do book reviews. Please let me know if you know some!

Science Fiction

A Knight's Title - An epic sci-fi fantasy; it’s a story that follows a group of Knights (what elite soldiers of this universe are called who each posses their own ability) and a Princess on-the-run from her home world, on a journey to retrieve archaic weapons of mass destruction. Each episode has its own genre tone set to it (one episode might be horror while another romance, and another espionage, etc.

Andy Futuro - You cannot unread this so consider carefully whether you like your mind the way it is or want it twisted into new shapes.

AroundSciFi - The science fiction I do on Substack has its roots in my studies of quantum mechanics. I like stories about consciousness and machines, parallel worlds and temporal superpositions. I also like creepy or cyberpunk elements.

C.P. Night’s Myriadu - Sci-fi and fantasy stories from the Myriadu, the fictional universe of C.P. Night.

Cabinet of Curiosities - Stories from the near future.

Germanicus Publishing - Home to Holy Inquisitors, Crusader sharks, preternatural arts, and the musings of author Michael P. Marpaung.

Graphomania - Darkly funny in all of the wrong places.

Greyburne's - Currently I'm publishing an 8-part cyberpunk serial called The Duty Free Shop. My 'stack is a mix of sci fi and fantasy, featuring serial novels and shorts.

Grim Acres - My current novel, "Mars Fire" - slated for release somewhere towards the end of 2025 - focuses on a near-future Mars setting, where independent colonists are faced with a very aggressive and very expansionist neighbour in the form of the Asian Prosperity Union (CCP China on steroids, after conquering most of its neighbours in the Pacific).

Henry’s Sneak Peeks - Where I post excerpts from my fiction (including 11 contiguous chapters from Paradox: Escaping Fate) with and without commentary.

James R Steinhaus - With Donald of Mars I try and give you a more realistic view of what living in a mars colony might be like.

James's Substack - My stories are generally about why villains do things.

M.S. Olney's Substack - Mix of sci-fi and fantasy.

Mac's Musings - Ozempic for Breakfast | Dogfood for Dinner is a serialized story set in a world where technology and human disconnection collide, blurring the lines between survival and surrender.

Mark Watson Books - I post serial horror fiction and sc-fi.

My Life as a Mad Lib - SciFi Camp Podcast.

Nekonikon Punk Substack - Science Fiction/ dystopian, cyberpunk.

Nether Street Blues - Nether Street Blues is a slipstream Substack that explores the shadows where history, folklore, and imagination intertwine, offering fresh stories that resonate with depth and wit.

Parrish Baker - Social science fiction set in a futuristic world with strong past elements.

Piercing the Veil - Stories told by a traveler in this antique land. Stories about the good, the true, and the beautiful. Stories about the spaces between stars.

Ronin Digital Express - Comic/samurai/western with a sci fi paint job.

Science Fiction and Fantasy Writing - The Gravity Keyper will open portals, fight aliens, run from aliens, trash talk aliens, romance aliens, win, loose and draw.

Singular Dream - Singular Dream serializes Quibble, a novel set in the far future after a technological singularity. Quibble is a heretic in a transhuman theocracy where AIs are gods and life is just the waiting room for digital transcendence.

The Black Knight - Nothing beats good ol’ inspirational heroism, in outer space or otherwise!

The Evil Plot - An absurdly unlucky girl gets tangled in a conspiracy with her supervillain boss and accidentally saves the world. Well, part of it, anyway. She tried, okay?

The Mary Sue - Poetry, Sci-Fi, Superheroes, and Parody.

The Multiverse - The Multiverse is the online home for everything sci fi author Mark Oceans writes.

The Oort Cloud - A collection of my philosophical science fiction stories. These tend to be big worlds filled with everyday things that feel like something you recognise but are also very Alien. I write a lot about perception, how we perceive the Universe and our place in it, what it means to be human and how others would view Humans in all of our complex, limited capacities.

The Pneumanaut - Personal essays from the son of a preacher man interrogating Christianity at laser-sword’s point. Alien sainthood, digital resurrection, Heat Death Rapture, salvation for cyborgs—dive in and discover what science fiction, science fact and the sacred all have to say to one another at The Pneumanaut.

The Signal - A former medic makes the impulsive decision to rescue a sentient AI from imprisonment—by smuggling it out in her own body—and gets tangled up with a real smuggler who agrees to get her off the station in exchange for medical treatment (aka fixing the bullet wound that he got while shielding her).

The Travelling Circus - The serial fiction of Mark Watson, #1 best-selling, multi-award-winning author.

Theseus McSmash - Harvard neuroscience undergrad in his early, underground, experimental years of writing. Back when it was all still sci-fi and consciousness.

Timothy’s Substack - Currently published an 8k short story related to my novel “The Source of Destiny.”

Waybound - A short story collection/anthology set in a far future cold war gone hot that uses a variety of perspectives to explore a deep and rich universe full of human depth. It's world-driven but heavily character-focused.

Wyatt Werne - Space 2074 is the new Wild West and on the lunar colony, Sheriff Kate Devana is the law. “Gripping, Expanse-y X Firefly”

Fantasy

BamBoncher’s Substack - A hopeful part time writer who tries to get out some of the stories floating in my mind in the snatches of time I can find in my crazy busy life - and sometimes I even write fiction too!

Brothers Krynn - We're two brothers, we do reviews, write fantasy stories & do podcasts.

Cycle of Reversion - My main story is a modern fantasy serialized novel called The Cycle of Reversion.

Falden’s Forge - Epic fantasy in bite-sized stories, with an emphasis on historical realism, deep characters, and gritty action.

House of Long Shadows - A magazine of Gothic short fiction accompanied by new and classic art

I Wanted to Tell You Something - The adventures of a girl doomed to wander in the fairy woods until the spell on her is broken

Jonathan Shuerger’s Substack - A Marine Corps veteran writes stories of heroes who confront the darkness within and without.

Meow - Tucked away on a quiet street, the bookstore doesn't have an address - but it doesn't need one, as it magically appears to those who are meant to find it.

Mercy Falls: The Woman of the Apocalypse - A paranormal urban fantasy romance series featuring a soul-eating demon cursed with the inability to be intimate falls for a vampire enforcer who awakens his dormant desires—while he stirs a dangerous side of her nature, complicating their forbidden romance.

Mil y Una Historias (Spanish Language) - Several different stories including The Legend of Sinardia, a high fantasy medieval serial.

Made From What’s Not Real - Unconventional writing from a conventional guy.

Mythscape - Serialised epic fantasy and community driven choose your own adventure stories.

Nether Street Blues - A slipstream exploration of a city’s shadowed heart, where paranoid and mystical elements converge in highly literary tales of lost souls navigating a liminal world of distorted realities, collapsing faith, and fleeting redemption.

Outfoxed Entertainment - "Mark of the Shadow" is a dark epic fantasy that follows four aspiring heroes as they strive to defeat the Phantom Lord before his shadow marks and minions desecrate the land.

Pandora's Box of Infinite Stories - The Last Dragon - A satirical fantasy world full of bad-tempered, back-stabbing dragons, reluctant heroes who smell and witches who get on like a house on fire.

Plotted Out - Cornish fantasy and dark humour. Worth reading if you like fae, monsters, magic, mystery and a smattering of light romance.

Scattered Lore - Fantasy with a dark twist.

Scribbler -- A Portal to Fiction - A new look at The End Days of King Arthur in The Shield of Locksley.

Senchas Claideb - Writer of sword and sorcery fantasy, historical fiction, and horror rooted in the lore and language of Celticism.

Snowy Hearts - Feel again the wonder of a child's first memory of a snowflake with a trove of stories, serials, quests and sculptures, now with seasonal tales.

Tales of Calamity and Triumph - Stories of monsters, heroes, mysticism, adventure, and the human spirit, as inspired by the pulps.

Tea and Tales - I write short stories, novellas, and serialized novels spanning everything from epic to cozy, grimdark to noblebright.

The Amazing Adventures of Tortoise & Gecko - A serial novel of wit, wonder, loss, and transformation, it includes talking animals, piracy, empire, and buried text.

The Dust Realm Narratives - “The Chronicles of Narnia” meets “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?”

The Inkscale Library - Fantasy/SF short stories, plus thoughts on the craft and novel-related shenanigans.

The Mind’s Attic - The King's Vault serialized novel.

The Mordreigiau Chronicles - A Regency-era Arthurian quest to avoid ecological collapse, with sea dragons told through discovered diaries and documents.

The Thief - Award-winning and fully cast, fully immersive, low-fantasy mystery audiodrama, in which the drawlatch heroine called "Symphony" stumbles into a missing-person conspiracy.

Wanted to Tell You Something - The adventures of a girl doomed to wander in the fairy woods until the spell on her is broken.

Windflower - Fun, traditional, and dramatic tales, mostly long-form, but occasional short stories, as well, focusing on traditional values and morals with some inspiration from Tolkien and C.S. Lewis.

Worlds of FabianSpace - From dragon detectives to rednecks in space, read stories and get news about Karina Fabian’s books and happenings.

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Other Independent Book Promotions

Dog Gone Troubles by Karen McSpade - Free Book

Meet Sidney Grace: Quirky Journalist. Curious Witch. Professional Butterfingers.

Sidney Grace, a young journalist living in Boston, is not ready for all the troubles heading her way. For starters, she’s curious about her grandmother’s magic even though her spellcasting is a bit rusty. Sidney finds herself caught between her curiosity to learn more and her mother’s hatred for all things supernatural. After all, her mom has a Tupperware empire to run and magic isn’t part of her business plan! The fact that her dad doesn’t seem to be bothered by an occasional spell gone wild, isn’t smoothing the waters between these two matriarchs.

But the family drama and her untapped magic are the least of Sidney’s troubles. Things turn worse when her new boss asks Sidney to cover the annual Pup Parade and she makes a terrible mistake that could cost her career…and ultimately her life. Can her grandmother cast a spell that actually works right the first time and save Sidney? Or will her troubles finally get the best of this new witch?

Remix: A Night Owls Story by Stephen Gay - Free Novella Prequel

The Moon, 2195. Ethan Keller has a history of jumping first and asking questions later. Tonight is no exception.

When his best friend gets a lead on a tech shipment from a dodgy informant, they see a chance to make their dreams a reality.

However, the underground criminal network has different plans.

Will Ethan’s heist give his friends a boost or trap them instead?

For a sci-fi adventure, get a jump start on Remix: A Night Owls Story.

Remix is a prequel short story to the award-winning Night Owls Series: A Moon Colony Sci-fi Adventure.

Ad Man, Ad Astra by Richard J. Dowling - Free Novella

Can a humble Ad-Man from Knuckleville, USA, beat William Shakespeare and Marie Curie in a battle of minds?

Leap Hamilton is a can-do copywriter in 1959 who gets transported to the year 2119 by an AI known as Isaac.

Isaac needs a champion to help Humanity regain its former glory.

People, you see, have become too reliant on Isaac's problem-solving abilities. Hence, future humans are as dumb as Toilet Golf.

So, Leap must compete against Shakespeare and Curie to solve an impossible task: help a race of aliens known as the Cruiskeen get to the next galaxy in time, or risk a brutal civil war.

Can Leap prove that he has what it takes? It's not like he'll be executed if he fails. . .

"Ad Man, Ad Astra" is a prequel to "How to Sell the Stars", and the first Leap Hamilton Ad-Venture.

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Until Next Time

Next time, the international science fiction interview series continues with a written interview of SDG Lemaitre, a Scottish science fiction writer. See the previous interviews of British (English), Nigeria, Pakistan, South Africa, and Ukraine.

As always, please leave a comment with any questions, reviews, thoughts, whatever about Fallen, Risen, Dormition, An Odd Pilgrimage, The Savannah Paranormal Detective Agency or whatever else I have discussed. I promise to reply!