Hello hello hello, friends! Party of Fools, the first novella in my new Empire of Eats series, is out today! HOORAY! A culinary comedic fantasy for fans of Legends & Lattes and Sir Terry Pratchett, as well as a nice quick read for when your brain wants a snack rather than a full course meal.
“This was also when the Stranger entered the building. As a seedy bar, Ale’s Well was used to strangers. They had what you might call a diverse clientèle, the sort who didn’t ask questions and never gave easy answers when it came to who or what they were and which line of work they were in, exactly. It was fluid that way, a liminal space in which a person might become anyone or anything at all, no matter who they were on paper.
Unfortunately, liminality fit this Stranger like a corset two sizes too small. You could see the way their strongly defined character squeezed out in all the wrong places, from the set of their broad shoulders to the way their cloak swirled lyrically around their feet. Their boots were too expensive for this district despite having quite a bit of mud scraped from them before entering.
Reed and Gladys appeared not to notice the Stranger. There’s a trope in stories like these where the hero walks into the seedy tavern and everyone stops to look at them, silence falling like an anvil. That may happen sometimes, somewhere, but not this day and not here. ”
PARTY OF FOOLS
Ale's Well That Ends Well...
What happens when a wayward immortal Emperor, a halfling metal bard, and a 60-year-old barbarian queen walk into a bar? They plan a worldwide food tour, of course! But first they have to escape the capital without being caught by the Captain of the Royal Guard, who’s bent on protecting the Emperor from pesky rebels—rebels who may already be Emperor Vallora’s new friends...
Some things you will find in this book/series:
Food puns
Entirely queer ensemble cast (ace, aroace, trans, pansexual, homoromantic)
Extremely slow burn sapphic ace romance subplot
Autistic main character
Mostly older characters (everyone is over age 50 except for one teenager, although two of them are immortal/longer lived and generally act/look like they’re in their 30s)
Cheese boards
Unidentifiable pub food
An immortal dog who can read
Rebels who do secret theater
Deep fried food on sticks
Lots of tropes but also inversions of tropes!
General silliness
There are no content warnings for this first book, aside from a heavy focus on food and light casual drinking, if either of those can be uncomfortable for you. There’s no weight discussion or moralizing around the food stuff!
If you do read, please consider leaving reviews wherever you got it and/or on sites like Goodreads and StoryGraph—even if it’s just a single sentence, it REALLY helps with visibility! (And if the book isn’t on those sites yet, well, someone wanna put them up?) Even better, tell your friends if you think they’d like it! Social media for creators is really tough these days, but word of mouth still rules.
Thank you all so much for your continued support! I’m hoping to get the second novella in this series out in the fall, so you won’t have to wait long for more. I’m super excited to finally have something that’s funny and weird out in the world, and I hope you all enjoy it. <3