Project Charon 2

Project Charon 2

Patty Jansen

Science Fiction & Fantasy

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 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.
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The Rabbit in the Hole

The Rabbit in the Hole

Patty Jansen

Science Fiction & Fantasy

The Oakhurst School of Magic is going places. They're applying for accreditation as an official institute of Pure Magic, and this will attract more students. But in amongst preparations for the visiting accreditation committee, Mrs. Marsh's rabbit goes missing and Veronica gets roped into trying to find it. Why does a wayward rabbit matter? Well, it's a magical rabbit, and you can't have magic running loose in the school grounds if you want to impress the committee. Scratch that, it's a clockwork rabbit and it symbolises everything Pure Magic is not, everything Mrs. Marsh and a couple of other teachers stand for. The one rabbit stands for a deep division in the school community. The school's reputation, Veronica's job and the harmony of the Oakhurst village are on the line. How can Veronica make sure no one is harmed, not even a clockwork rabbit?
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Elevation

Elevation

Patty Jansen

Science Fiction & Fantasy

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.
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Expendable Heroes

Expendable Heroes

Patty Jansen

Science Fiction & Fantasy

The last thing Steven remembers was waiting in a prison cell for the results of an appeals trial. His crime: speaking out against unfair treatment of workers. His opinion of his sentence: it's political. Next thing he wakes up on a commercial ship run by the Merlin Company, where he meets Luciane, Rollo and Jack, fellow prisoners of an inconveniently political nature, and the four will be sent down to a planet where a research team has vanished. Everything needed to survive and return is on the abandoned base, and all the company wants is to know what happened to twelve scientists. Except the company is lying. They know what happened to the scientists. They're testing something, and the four are guineapigs. They're not supposed to come back. The space craft to return is not even at the base anymore. But one discovery will change everything.
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Contamination

Contamination

Patty Jansen

Science Fiction & Fantasy

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 travellers.
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Extermination

Extermination

Patty Jansen

Science Fiction & Fantasy

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 was 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.
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Mist & Dawn

Mist & Dawn

Patty Jansen

Science Fiction & Fantasy

A fisherwoman finds a dead man on a tiny offshore island, with no clue about how the man got there. A camel driver deep in the northern desert rescues a man who speaks no known language, but is clearly well-educated. An ancient sect that was considered close to extinct sucks in all the land's young people and creates tension that may well lead to a civil war. And the old astrologer to the court, a weaselly and much-maligned relic of old times, might have hidden, for twenty years, evidence that those things are connected. An epic saga of magic-turned-technology, power and discovery.
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Innocence Lost

Innocence Lost

Patty Jansen

Science Fiction & Fantasy

Johanna sees the past when she touches anything made of wood. A basket made of twigs tells her that an attack on the port city of Saardam is imminent. As daughter of a rich merchant, she belongs to a class where it is forbidden to speak of magic, she can't warn anyone. Worse, it seems that the attack is in response to something done by the royal family.Johanna is the daughter of a rich merchant in Saardam. As only child and without a mother, she has grown up with notions, such as that she wants to take over her father's river trade business in her own name. Courtesy of her eastern mother, she has an unusual ability. She sees things in willow wood: whenever she touches wood, it shows her what has happened around the tree or wooden object. Any kind of magic is not common in Saardam, and the Church of the Triune, which rapidly gains influence in the city, forbids it.While she goes to church, Johanna also maintains a loose network of magic-enabled people. One of those people is Loesie, a farmer's daughter from out of town.One day, Loesie comes to town after having been struck mute by magic. She carries a basket made from willow twigs that tells Johanna that a group of bandits with demons is about to attack the city.But there is no non-magical proof, so she can't tell anyone or she'd be branded a witch. The time of witch-burnings was not that long ago. Never mind that the army is still approaching, and there are increasing signs that Saardam's embattled royal family might have done something that has angered magical forces in the east. Add to this that the royal family seems to have fallen out with the city's nobility, and that the recent death of the crown princess has left the family with only one heir: the mysterious prince whom no one has seen for years and who has suddenly returned home.At the annual ball, Johanna's father has brokered a dance for her with the prince. Johanna just wants to warn people of the impending attack.
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Whale Mail

Whale Mail

Patty Jansen

Science Fiction & Fantasy

Picture this: you've somehow come into the possession of a dragon (long story—you can read the previous book if you really want to know, but it's kinda embarrassing, so you don't need to). And you need to return that dragon to the place it came from. You've tried putting it on a truck—but it destroyed the truck. You've tried putting it on the train—but it destroyed the carriage. Now you've put the dragon in a warehouse while you figure out what to do, but— You guessed it: the dragon destroys the warehouse. Tell me, why wouldn't you trick some rich merchant into lending you the only thing you haven't yet tried: a boat. Trouble is, the merchant's price is that you return an old artefact to the whale kingdom along the way. <p>Whales are not nice. They're very big. They're cranky. And, here is a secret: they hate dragons. They especially hate...
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