Did you know that Amazon has a list of the top-selling and free sci-fi and fantasy books? The list changes constantly — authors and publishers set their books to free temporarily to promote their work, and, of course, books move up and down in the rankings. Read on to find your fun free read for this weekend! And grab the books quickly because they don’t always stay free for long.
This week’s list is completely different from those of the previous weeks. So if you’re a fan of free books, there are going to be new things to read all the time. If you want to get this list in your inbox every Friday afternoon, subscribe to the MetaStellar weekly newsletter.
There are a lot of books to go through, so this week I’m being helped out by a couple of other members of our MetaStellar community. If you’d like to join me in doing these reviews — and taping our regular Free Friday videos — email me at maria@metastellar.com.
5. Murder’s a Witch by Danielle Garrett
This is the first of 12 books in the Beechwood Harbor Magic Mysteries, a cozy magical mystery series. The other books are $4.99 each but are all in Kindle Unlimited. The author has been on our Free Friday list several times before.
From Maria Korolov:
Holly, a witch, lives with her cat Boots and four other supernatural housemates in a 120-year-old house. When the book opens, Holly catches a suspicious man skulking around. It’s night time, and there’s no legitimate reason for someone to be dressed all in black, looking around the outside of the house with a flashlight. The man, Nick, claims he’s a private investigator who also runs tours of haunted houses and he thinks the house Holly lives in might be haunted. She refuses to let him tour the house and sends him packing.
The thing is, the house is, in fact, haunted — Holly’s fourth roommate is a ghost.
The house is also a protected space for supernaturals. Which is a good thing for Holly, since she’s been banished from several supernatural communities, including the nearest one, in Seattle, and now has to live in the human world. But when she’s home, at the house, she can be her normal witchy self.
She works at a coffee shop, and uses magic to make little artistic designs from milk froth on top of lattes, since she hasn’t gotten the hang of doing them the non-magical way. She also uses her job as a cover for selling magical potions.
Then that private investigator, Nick, walks in. Is he investigating her? One of her housemates? Or is something more nefarious going on?
Meanwhile, she’s got bickering housemates — the werewolf and the vampire don’t get along — a temperamental ghost, and, oh right, she finds a dead body behind the coffee shop.
Overall, I like the premise and I like Holly.
But I don’t like Nick because he’s smarmy and smirks — I hate the word “smirk” — and incredibly annoying and self-important. Also handsome. I have a horrible suspicion that he and Holly will end up together. I hate it when female protagonists end up with the worst guys. I figure, if someone starts right out by being an annoying jerk, things aren’t going to get better with time.
If it wasn’t for Nick, I’d definitely stick with the book, since it’s exactly the kind of cute cozy mystery I love to read. But I don’t know about Nick. I might keep reading for a little longer and see if he improves at all. I do like the fact that there are twelve books in this series, and that they’re in Kindle Unlimited, so if I can get over my dislike of Nick — or if he also meets a gruesome death — then it would definitely be worth it.
Get the Kindle ebook free from Amazon here.
4. Where There’s a Witch, There’s a Way by Victoria DeLuis
This is the first of six books in the An Eira Snow Cozy Mystery, a magical cozy mystery series. The other books are $2.99 each but are all in Kindle Unlimited. This is the author’s first time on our Free Friday list.
From E.S. Foster:
Eira Snow is a witch in her 40s fresh out of a divorce. She just opened a spiritual shop in town, but business hasn’t been going well. She finally gets her first customer, only to discover the elderly woman’s body when she delivers the customer’s package.
After stumbling on the body, Eira calls the police. But she hears a voice and realizes the dead woman has come back as a ghost. The ghost talks about her cat before disappearing when the police arrive.
As she leaves, Eira spots the customer’s cat and calls it to her. The ghost, Tanya, hangs around, becoming enraged when the detectives believe that her death was an accident. Yes, she did fall down the stairs, but the ghost insists she was pushed.
Eira tries to explain that Tanya’s death may have been murder without giving herself away. The police, however, don’t believe her. She’s forced to go home with the ghost’s cat. Tanya follows, reuniting with her daughter along the way. From then on, Eira vows to figure out who Tanya’s killer is.
I haven’t read too many cozy mysteries, but this one was really entertaining. I liked Eira’s voice and humor, including how she handled each situation despite the craziness around her. The prose kind of veers into telling rather than showing sometimes, but it was easy to get invested in the plot. If you like cozy mystery, check out this series!
Get the Kindle ebook free from Amazon here.
3. Casino Witch Mysteries by Nikki Haverstock
This is the first two books of the nine-book Casino Witch Mysteries series. The rest of the books are $2.99 to $4.99 each and are not in Kindle Unlimited. The author has been on this list before.
From Maria Korolov:
Continuing with our cozy magical mystery theme, though this one is set in a casino instead of a cute cozy bookstore in a quaint and cozy village.
Ella has just found out that she’s a witch, there’s a mischievous cat who wants to be her familiar, and her new coworker is cranky but very, very attractive.
I must have read this story a million times already. But, to be honest, I’m going to read it again. And enjoy it.
So, Ella works at a casino, and she just moved into her Dad’s apartment after he’d been murdered. She’s a freelance financial auditor. While she’s working at her desk, a giant cat, the size of a medium-sized dog, keeps bothering her and sneaking into her office. This is a common type of cat in this town, which is Rambler, Nevada. And the cat bites her.
She’s at the casino’s owner’s office when she sees marks spreading up her arm from where the cat bit her, and thinks she’s been infected by a poison. But the casino owner knows what’s going on, and she calls in witnesses and they do a little ritual. Ella’s now bonded to a cat and learns she’s got some magical powers — her ability to spot financial fraud isn’t just pure professional skill – and the casino owner sends her home with a ton of cat supplies.
At home, she discovers that her dad left her a mysterious necklace and that her new cat hates dry cat food.
I’m interested. I like the Ella. I like the casino owner. I like the cat. This book set is a keeper.
Get the Kindle e-book box set free from Amazon here.
2. A Wild Ghost Chase by Elle Adams
This is the first of nine books in the A Reaper Witch Mystery cozy. magical mystery series. The other books are $5.99 each but are all in Kindle Unlimited. The author has been on this list before.
From Maria Korolov:
Maura is a half-witch, half reaper and can talk to ghosts. She used to work at the morgue, but she just got fired. Her twin brother has been dead for eight years, and he’s getting bored with being a ghost — but is too stubborn to move on. So he gets a kick out of causing problems for his sister. He caused havoc at her previous job too, when she worked at an office. And jobs in the magical world are even trickier to hold when you’re haunted by a very annoying brother. She’s running out of career options when she gets an email from someone who wants her to get rid of a ghost.
The gig is in a magical community, Hawkwood Hollow, so her brother might have other people to talk to there, since many witches and wizards can see ghosts.
So Maura casts a camouflage spell on herself, gets on her broom, and flies off to Hawkwood Hollow. When she gets to the town, she discovers that it’s really creepy. And simply swarming with ghosts.
She discovers that her customer is a teenager who has a ghost-themed blog. There’s a big house in town, and the woman who lived there died in an accident the week before. The teenager is hoping to get rid of the ghost — and also to get some footage of Maura banishing it. Apparently, Maura is famous for that kind of thing in the magical community.
I have some significant doubts about this job. First of all, how much can this teenager really pay? Second, Maura definitely doesn’t want to be on camera doing this. Third, they’re trespassing. I don’t understand why she doesn’t just turn around and leave.
And, in fact, Maura and the girl get kicked out of the house by a detective without ever actually meeting the ghost, though they do hear something. The detective doesn’t even think there’s a ghost. He’s investigating the house owner’s death.
Maura wants to just go home, but the weather turned bad and she doesn’t want to fly home in a storm. So the girl invites her to stay at the inn her mother owns.
Maura stops by the inn, meets the mother and some of the other locals, sees a bunch more ghosts, and decides to go talk to the town’s reaper. That’s the person who’s responsible for keeping the ghost population to a manageable level, and he’s clearly not doing his job.
When she finds him, the reaper turns out to be a very grumpy old man who claims to be retired — and doesn’t have an apprentice ready to take over. And he refuses to do anything about the ghosts.
She considers calling the Reaper Council so that they can take case of the situation, but she’s not on good terms with the council. She goes back to the inn and has dinner at the inn’s restaurant, and takes the teenager’s mother’s offer of a room for the night. But she only sleeps for a little while. After she has a nap, she and the teenager go back to the haunted house to take another stab at ghost — hopefully without the detective around.
Except the detective is there. He figured they’d be back, and was waiting for them.
I’m torn about this book. On the one hand, I love the magical setting. But, on the other hand, Maura seems like a very disorganized and incompetent person, and her ghost brother is extremely annoying. I am getting caught up in the story, though. Was the woman who died murdered? Why is this town full of ghosts? What does the Reaper Council have against Maura?
I do want to know!
From Lilivette Domínguez-Torres:
This is a paranormal, cozy mystery that will leave you dying to know more about the ghosts that appear in it and what happened to them. Through it we get to meet our main character Maura. After being fired from the morgue she used to work with for doing a favor for the ghost of one of her clients, she ends up on the hunt for a new job.
What’s interesting about Maura is that she’s a witch but not just any witch — she’s a reaper, meaning that she can see ghosts and has the power to banish them to the other realm. Thanks to this, she gets an email one day with a job offer to banish a ghost in some town she’s never heard of called Hawkwood Hollow. At first, Maura wants nothing to do with it. She stopped taking ghost banishing jobs years ago but it’s either ghost hunting or getting kicked out from her current apartment, which is why she ends up accepting the offer and traveling to Hawkwood Hollow with her twin brother Mart who, by the way, is her hilarious ghost companion.
Once she makes it to Hawkwood Hollow she ends up realizing that the place is literally a ghost town. There are ghosts everywhere and even as a Reaper, she can’t help being creeped out by it. What makes this story so fun and interesting is the fact that when Maura gets to meet the person that emailed her, she realizes it was a teenage girl who runs a blog about ghosts. This brings the perfect fun cozy vibes to the story but then the mystery of what really happened to the ghost they wish to banish the story only gets more interesting.
To be honest, I think I might actually continue reading this. The story is fun, the writing is great, the characters are fun and it sounds like a great and enjoyable mystery. I can’t wait to learn what’s happened in this town for there to be so many ghosts around and I can’t wait to know more about Mart and why he hasn’t left her sister’s side after all of these years. I definitely recommend this if you’re looking for a quick and fun cozy mystery.
Get the Kindle ebook free from Amazon here.
1. The Oldest Starfighter by Jamie McFarlane
This is the first of — so far – one book in the Oldest Starfighter military sci-fi series. This is the author’s first time on our Free Friday list.
From Melody Friedenthal:
The book opens with Gordon’s nap being interrupted by a seven-foot-tall man knocking at his door. The stranger, Korsic, says the immortal words “I’m from the government and we need your help” — a variation on then-President Ronald Regan’s claim of the most terrifying words in English.
Gordon isn’t interested. But Korsic offers Gordon a thousand bucks to listen to what he has to say.
Korsic has a gold device that will make Gordon forget their conversation if he’s uninterested in Korsic’s offer. Gordon is skeptical.
The visitor tells Gordon that he’s recruiting Starfighters for the Obsidian Union, a NATO-type organization of multiple planets. Gordon doesn’t believe a word he’s saying, tells him to get lost, and isn’t polite saying so.
But it turns out Gordon is a retired military jet pilot and has exactly the skills Korsic is looking for, despite Gordon’s poor physical shape. Korsic is unconcerned… shades of John Scalzi’s Old Man’s War?
Korsic tells Gordon that Earth is a target for takeover by an unfriendly species who want Earth for themselves. He also takes off his human clothes and shows Gordon what he really looks like: nine feet tall, horned head, and humongous muscles.
This is convincing.
But what really convinces Gordon to sign up is Korsic telling him that one of his other recruits is a rival of Gordon’s, a guy named “Hoop” Hamilton. I’m sure we’ll be reading more about Hamilton.
Korsic tells him to make sure that the next alien to show up shows him one of the gold devices as proof of which side they’re on.
Gordon spends the next few days tying up loose ends, financial and relationship-wise. He’s visited by his ex-wife.
Then a female alien comes to accompany him back to wherever. She’s wearing a wool skirt and pulls the gold device out of its pocket. The author writes here, “No woman I knew would wear wool in June or would store anything in a pocket.”
Which is how I know this book was written by a man.
So far the book has given me a sense of anticipation. The first few chapters contain several humorous lines — the “pocket” reference inadvertently, I suspect — which I enjoyed.
So far, so good. Time permitting, I’ll be reading more. I’d recommend this book to anyone looking for a military sci-fi book that doesn’t take itself too seriously.
Get the Kindle ebook free from Amazon here.
See all the Free Friday posts here. Do you have other free books for us to check out? Comment below or email me at maria@metastellar.com.
Have you read any of these books? Are you planning to? Let us know in the comments!
Or watch Maria and Emma discuss all five books in the video below:
MetaStellar editor and publisher Maria Korolov is a science fiction novelist, writing stories set in a future virtual world. And, during the day, she is an award-winning freelance technology journalist who covers artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and enterprise virtual reality. See her Amazon author page here and follow her on Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn, and check out her latest videos on the Maria Korolov YouTube channel. Email her at maria@metastellar.com. She is also the editor and publisher of Hypergrid Business, one of the top global sites covering virtual reality.
Melody Friedenthal is a librarian at a public library and a copyeditor for MetaStellar. In her spare time she's the chief bottle-washer for To Tell A Tale Writers' Group and is an affiliate member of the SFWA. Her work has been published in Tales From Shelf 804: an anthology, N3F, Bardsy, MetaStellar, and New Myths. She believes writing is a gateway drug, alpacas are cute, and dark chocolate is heaven.
E. S. Foster is a writer and graduate student at the University of Cambridge. Her work has been featured in a variety of literary journals and small presses. You can find out more about her and what she does at her blog, E. S. Foster.