Early in the morning of June 25, the Planetary Society’s LightSail 2 mission launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket. Actual deployment of the sail is set for today. These are great accomplishments to celebrate. On a more personal note, my novel Firebrandt’s Legacy received a wonderful review from Midwest Book Review. The reviewer says Firebrandt’s Legacy is “A rip-roaring space adventure!”
Also underway is the annual Smashwords Summer/Winter Sale. It gets its name because where I live in the northern hemisphere, readers are loading up their e-readers for great beach reading and vacations. In the southern hemisphere, it’s the middle of winter where people are spending time in a warm and cozy place reading. So, to celebrate the successful launch of LightSail 2 and a good review in Midwest Book Review, my novels The Solar Sea and Firebrandt’s Legacy are on sale at Smashwords for just $1.00 each this month. Keep reading for the details.
In The Solar Sea, whales around the world changed their songs the day scientists announced the discovery of powerful new particles around Saturn’s largest moon which could solve Earth’s energy needs. The Quinn Corporation rushes to build a solar sail space craft to unlock the secrets of these strange new particles. They gather the best and brightest to pilot the ship: Jonathan Jefferson, an aging astronaut known as the last man on Mars; Natalie Freeman, a distinguished Navy captain; Myra Lee, a biologist who believes the whales are communicating with Saturn; and John O’Connell, the technician who first discovered the particles. Charting the course is the mysterious Pilot who seems determined to keep secrets from the rest of the crew. Together they make a grand tour of the solar system and discover not only wonders but dangers beyond their imagination.
T. Jackson King, the author of Battlestar and Star Glory says, “This story follows the private space industry exploration of the Moon and becomes a kind of Voyage of the Beagle as the solar sail ship Aristarchus visits Mars, Jupiter, then Saturn and its giant moon Titan … Highly enjoyable read. Highly recommended.”
Get the book for $1.00 at: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/805692
In Firebrandt’s Legacy, Ellison Firebrandt fights the good fight for Earth. Under a letter of marque, he raids the ships of Earth’s opponents, slowing down their progress and ability to compete with the home system. On the planet Epsilon Indi 2, he rescues a woman named Suki Mori from a drug lord, only to find she isn’t so happy about living a pirate’s life. However, when the captain finds a new engine that will make him the most successful pirate of all, Suki is the only one who can make it work. Now Firebrandt must find a way to keep his crew fed and his ship supplied while relying on a woman who barely trusts him and while every government in the galaxy hunts him to get the engine back!
Midwest Book Review says, “A grand space opera filled with high adventure from cover to cover, Firebrandt’s Legacy is highly recommended.”
Get the book for $1.00 at: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/916916
David Lee Summers' Web Journal 
I know that, back in the day, a lot of us thought Saturn’s moon Titan would be a good possibility for human colonization. But our scientific knowledge about the solar system has changed a lot. Did you have to update anything in your book to account for current knowledge.
I really didn’t end up changing much of anything. The Huygens probe, which visited the surface, had already landed before I wrote the first edition, so the most important details about Titan hadn’t changed. One of the other premises is that it could be relatively easy for a sufficiently advanced race to hide from humans, especially when humans don’t expect to find them. Saying much more would get into spoiler territory, but if we continue our investigations, I might have to consider changing some things. The question at that point will be how much I want the book to stay current versus how much the book should be allowed to represent the world of 2005-2015 when it was first created?
[…] Direct links for these books are at my post: https://davidleesummers.wordpress.com/2019/07/02/celebrating-the-future/ […]