Blog
A New Start Jan 1, 2023
Well, after eight years with another website host, they were bought last year and everything changed. So here I am in a place where I have some control (I think. . . for now. . .) and rather than reconstruct my old blog, I've decided to just start fresh.
A lot has changed in eight years: My first book was published, then my second. I went from winning an international short story contest for non-professional authors to having more than two dozen original stories published, many in pro markets. I was a 2020 finalist for the SFWA Small Press Award for a short story in DreamForge, and twice won the Colorado Book Award for best Science Fiction and Fantasy.
I haven't arrived. In fact, I don't even know where there is that I'm headed. But I'm on my way to somewhere and it's sometimes hard and often rewarding, and I probably couldn't stop this train now if I wanted to.
So here we all are at the start of 2023 and more new things. I wish you a happy, healthy year filled with pleasant surprises and great plot twists!
Mar 21, 2025
"I Promise" out now in Tales to Terrify
I'm a 100% audio reader, so it's a genuine thrill when my own work gets an audio version. Delighted to hear my little gothic, creeping-dread flash story performed brilliantly by Sara Sheckells on Tales to Terrify! (If interested in checking it out, it's Ep 686 and my story starts at timestamp 21:36. About a 10 min listen.)
Mar 3, 2025
March(ish) 2025 Newsletter
https://ldcolter.substack.com/p/okay-maybe-newsletters-every-2-months
Book recommendations, bits of news, and, as always, a cute animal video...
Jan 1, 2025
Dec 12, 2024
Free ebook!
Have a Smashwords account? Like epic fantasy? The Halfblood War is featured FREE in the Smashwords end of year blowout sale from now until Jan 1st!
A sweeping story of love and war, prejudice and acceptance...
Tirren, heir to the ruler of Thiery, has raised his half-Elven son in a land that hates and fears the Elves, but his son's struggle for acceptance is only one source of Tirren's pain. The other is his unfading desire for Yslaaran, the Elven woman who eighteen years ago captured him in a spell, seduced him, and vanished. She returned only once more... to hand him his infant son.
When a neighboring ruler attacks the land of Thiery, Tirren rides to battle with his halfblood son at his side. Learning of the war, Yslaaran fears the conflict will unravel her long-laid plans for the boy. If she doesn't interfere, he could die before his time, but if she reveals her hand by meddling, her own people could rise up against the humans they despise, trapping the land between two deadly enemies.
The fate of two races hangs in the balance, but only Yslaaran knows that both humans and Elves risk a future far more devastating than war.
Freebie sale page for The Halfblood War: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1638402
Find it along with many other sale books here: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1638402
Sept 19, 2024
June 16, 2024
I'm very flattered to have been included in The Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, v4 with my short story "The Deaths of All We Are" first published in HFQ's May, 2017 issue. The story is a retelling of The Lady of the Fountain, an Arthurian story of Owain and the Black Knight and the Lady, only here it's told from the pov of the lady's servant, Luned. If you enjoy sword and sorcery fantasy, you can find the anthology on Amazon here:
Mar 28, 2024
Woo Hoo! The brand new First in SciFi and First in Fantasy Podcasts are offering first chapters - and The Halfblood War is live today! Want to preview more than the first five minutes of a scifi or fantasy audiobook before deciding? Check out their podcasts. Want to hear Ch 1 of my stand-alone epic fantasy? You can have a listen here: https://www.spreaker.com/episode/the-halfblood-war-by-l-deni-colter--58991056
Apr 24, 2023
The pre-order is up as of today for the inaugural issue of the ZNB Presents anthology! Twenty-four short sci-fi and fantasy stories, including my my near-future, dystopian story of an uplifted Fennec fox and a young idealist who’s begun to question whether people can really be saved from themselves.
Available at:
and the ZNB website store
Print issue to follow.
"Monsters" out today at Fantasy Magazine Jan 2, 2023
Jan 2, 2023
My new flash fiction story "Monsters" is live today in Fantasy Magazine.