V. S. Holmes | News

WE CAME TO DANCE is LIVE!

6/3/2023

I'm so excited to share that the Kickstarter for the We Came to Dance anthology is live today!

Amphibian Press came together with over a dozen authors to support Club Q through storytelling. On November 19, 2022, an LGBT community hub and nightclub called Club Q was attacked by a shooter in Colorado Springs. Five people were murdered. Someone tried to destroy not just individual queer folx’ lives, but a safe place for the LGBT community. Someone silenced the music everyone in the club had come to celebrate with gunfire. We can’t let that happen.

Authors from around the world shared stories of queer joy, filled with gender and culture-diverse characters, found family, community solidarity, love, comfort and hope. All proceeds will be donated to Club Q.

Keep a lookout as Amphibian Press reveals the incredible authors who came together to make this amazing project possible! You can find out more, support the project, and share with your friends below!

Advance Reader Copies of FUGITIVES!

3/5/2023

The time has finally come! With FUGITIVES back from my editor, I'm getting ready to share Nel's latest adventure with all of you. I'm looking for some advance reviewers to join my street team, the Trowel Bearers! If you're a fan of fast-paced, character-driven science fiction with a queer cast and a side of space-horror, I'd love for you to join me! Help reveal the FUGITIVES cover and share an honest review in exchange for an advance copy. Spots are limited so be sure to apply soon!

Archaeologist Dr. Nel Bently has spent her life avoiding clingy exes, but she never dreamed she’d be escaping across the stars. Now she and a fleet of refugees are hunted at every turn by the only woman she ever made the mistake of loving. And Nel, used to outrunning everything, just lost a leg.

Facing her life’s new trajectory is hard enough, but when Nel starts hearing the deadly signal they tracked on Earth, she is forced to team up with the two men who were once her greatest enemies. Then, a grisly discovery on an abandoned hauler sheds horrific light on the voices in Nel’s head–and what, exactly, Lin is after.

Their hold is full of bodies, their plans are full of holes, and bad-tempered Dr. Nel Bently, avoidant-extraordinaire, is sick of running.

Beautiful and Heartwrenching

2/1/2023

I had the immense privilege to read an advance copy of Heart, Haunt, Havoc by the talented Freydis Moon. While I’ve read their work before, each new piece is more intricate than the last. Heart follows exorcist Colin Hart as he’s called to clean a towering house being renovated in Colorado. Whatever stalks this house–and its handsome occupant, the secretive Bishop Martinez–proves to be more complicated than Colin planned, however. The two must wade through piles of secrets, broken promises, and heartbreak or risk being haunted for the rest of their lives, if they survive at all.

Heart, Haunt, Havoc is an atmospheric treat, filled with magic, faith, and longing. As someone who has spent a lot of time in old buildings, Moon captures the uniquely living way that old buildings respond to us as they shift and breathe. The tale spins wholesome and clever one minute, then heart wrenching and deadly the next, all with the steady, unyielding advance of the predator that haunts the house itself. While the setting becomes a character in itself, I’d be remiss in not mentioning how authentic each character’s queerness feels, from the reserved Colin to complex Bishop. The tale leaves us filled with a sensation of hard-won peace, relief, and a spark of hope and I can only cross my fingers that we will see some of these faces again.

Recommended for lovers of the modern gothic romance who know how heartbreak haunts us. 5 out of 5 stars.

PRE-ORDER NOW!

SPIKE : ALLOYIN WARRIOR LITO

12/20/2022

It's so much fun to explore this vivid, incredible world of adventure, danger, and magic! Aside from enjoying the awesome cards and beautiful art of the game as a player, I'm developing lore, flavor-text, original characters, as well as some more secrets yet to be shared! With every new official tournament, more is added to Solis's complex, exciting story. As a player's unique deck shapes the battle, I illuminate their toughest battles and incredible victories with short, written "cut scenes."

SPIKE : ALLOYIN WARRIOR LITO
Hackers of Buying and Switching, GenCon, 2022

Blood splattered across Lito’s acrylic faceshield. She let out a feral whoop, wrenching her blade from the corpse at her feet. Another lunge and the weapon squelched into the meat of some blubberous, heaving thing. The air above the battlefield was a crimson mist. A bellow echoed across the battlefield.

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ASHES : TEMPYS VS NEKRIUM

12/13/2022

Here's my first short for SolForge Fusion! It's so much fun to explore this vivid, incredible world of adventure, danger, and magic. I hope you enjoy this battle between a Tempys elementalist and Nekrium zombies, courtesy of the "Storming Reeves" deck from Gen Con's Tournament.

Keep a lookout for more pieces dropping soon!

ASHES : TEMPYS VS NEKRIUM
The Storming Reeves, GenCon, 2022
Corpses littered the mountainside, bones, and scraps of battle-wrent flesh jutting from the scree. Sunder’s distant rally cry echoed across the peaks, and the elementalist dragged himself to his feet. With every salvo, their numbers dwindled further, flashes of green and gold piercing the night.

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Joining the SolForge Team!

10/2/2022

The news is out! This summer I joined forces with the incredible Stone Blade Entertainment team to work on world-building, lore, and original characters--as well as some more secrets yet to be shared! Working with these amazing folks has been so much fun, and this is an awesome world I can't wait to share will all of you. I've already cracked open my own deck a few weeks before launch and I'm having so much fun playing in a world I helped flesh out. If you pop over to my Instagram you might catch a glimpse of my favorites!

Want to know more? Check out the details below and grab a deck of your own. See you on the battlefield!

SolForge Fusion is a hybrid deck game from the creators of Magic: The Gathering and Ascension Deck Building Game.

Algorithmically-generated half-decks uniquely printed just for you. Fuse your decks together and explore an endless array of strategies. Level up your cards and overwhelm your foes!

With tens of thousands of possible cards in the first set alone, part of the fun of SolForge is collecting unique decks and sharing them with the community! Each deck comes with a unique QR code you can use to scan and add that deck into your online collection. Decks in your collection can be used to register for tournaments and other community events.

Join in on the fun and scan your deck today!

Explore 200 Sci-Fi Worlds!

5/6/2022

I'm so excited to share I've partnered with Other Worlds Ink to curate its first StoryBundle – Explore 200 Sci-Fi Worlds! We’ve included fifteen sci-fi anthologies and collections showcasing 139 authors and more than 200 individual stories. It’s only available for a limited time – from May 4th to May 26th. This StoryBundle offers a large selection of ebooks from independent and small press fantasy writers.

This StoryBundle features a wide variety of themes – fighting climate change, exploring the far reaches of the galaxy, future crime, hopepunk, sci-fi zombies, space marines, exosapiens, LGBTQ+ heroes, and so much more. With 139 authors, chances are that you’ll find some new writers to love.

SFWA StoryBundles are curated collections of ebooks offered at a steeply discounted price. Readers who purchase Explore 200 Sci-Fi Worlds will gain a rich collection of sci-fi short story fiction, and can opt to donate part of their purchase price to support SFWA’s new Heritage Author Republication Program (HARP), aimed to help elder and disabled authors get their books back into print.

Readers may choose what price they want to pay for the initial four books, starting at $5. Spending $20 unlocks eleven more books that they can receive with their purchase.

Core Bundle
Escape Vector
Shout Kill Revel Repeat
Tangents & Tachyons
The Way of the Laser

Bonus Books
A Metal Box Floating Between Stars and Other Stories
Beamed Up
Fix the World
In Harm's Way
Into the Black
Lost Signals
Mirror Shards
Once Upon a Star
Soulmates
The Future Will Be Written by Robots
Transcendent 4

Once May 26th passes, this particular collection will be gone forever, so grab it now!

Get Your Copies Now!

Heretics Wins Silver at Global Book Awards!

4/16/2022

I'm thrilled to share today that, out of hundreds of nominees, Heretics (Stars Edge: Nel Bently 4) took home the silver medal in hard science fiction at this year's Global Book Awards! It's hard in this journey to remember why we do this, why we write, why we eviscerate our deepest thoughts before the masses. I've been in a tough slump, writing-wise. I think about Nel and her story a lot, but find it so hard to put those thoughts and feelings on to the page.

Days like this, however, when her darkest moments, my darkest moments, are seen and appreciated, make all the difference.

A huge thank you goes out to my wonderful readers, friends, the team of editors, designers, and marketers who make these moments possible. A special thanks, too, to Creative Edge for always having my back!

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smart but heartfelt, full of profound ideas

2/22/2022

Focusing on the humanity of worlds--whether fantastical, futuristic, or our own, is something that's always been very important to me. I'm so grateful that The Reviewer understands how important it is to remember the roots of SFF!

"V. S. Holmes's storytelling is what good science fiction should be: smart but heartfelt, full of profound ideas delivered with a sense of humanity. Travelers is engaging precisely because it is about something all of us have experienced: That moment when you grow up enough to realize that the universe is more wondrous―and dangerous than you could ever have imagined. Lovers of character-focused sci-fi will find plenty to enjoy in this gripping alternate science fiction adventure book."

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"Deep, solid, gripping, heart warming, heart-breaking"

2/17/2022

I am so, so honored when I get reviews like this one from Scribble's Worth. Writing Nel's journey always has its ups and downs, and I worry sometimes whether her temperamental, hard-headed personality will strike its mark. Huge thank you to the reviewers at Scribble's Worth and to Creative Edge for connecting us!

"A razor-sharp story where our MC runs, barefoot on top of the blade. Excellently told, as we can feel every emotion, every droplet of panic on the dangerous scenes in the book!

This book is AWESOME! One of those you can’t turn your eyes away from. *Claps*. Mysterious characters that we know already but somehow are completely new, love stories, heartbreak, exes, chase, bullets, wounds and infection, rotten meat, the FBI and… sexy aliens. HA! Original in so many ways. Deep, solid, gripping, heart warming, heart-breaking and with "steamy doses of lesbian sex. Oh, and curses. Lots of curses. What is there not to love?!"

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