R.J. Hore
Fantasy, Paranormal, Science Fiction, Mystery
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Ronald Hore had three stories published in a writer's group anthology in 2005 and in 2006 won a Canadian Author's Association national short story contest for a ghostly love story. His short story Chrysalis appeared in the modern vampire collection Evolve in 2010.
In 2012, writing as R.J.Hore, his first full-length novel, The Dark Lady, a medieval-style fantasy was published by Burst Books.ca. (A division of Champagne Book Group) This tale has since been turned into a trilogy with Dark Days and Dark Knights. A second series of swords, magic and romance novels followed, The Queen's Pawn, also now a trilogy with The Queen's Man in 2015 and The Queen's Game in 2016.
A stand alone, slightly different fantasy novel, Alex in Wanderland, was released in 2015
The first book of a space opera trilogy: "Of Destiny's Daughters" arrived in 2019 with book two "Hammer Across the Stars" and and book three "Expeditions to Earth" in 2020.. That makes 14 full length novels and eventually 4 Omnibus Housetrap collections..
His slightly off the wall fantasy detective series, The Housetrap Chronicles got off the ground with the Housetrap, the first of a fantasy detective series of novellas. This was followed by Dial M for Mudder and House on Hollow Hill. These have also been collected in a volume 1 anthology in paperback.
Next in this fantasy detective series came Hounds of Basalt Ville, Murder in the Rouge Mort, and The Treasure of the Sarah Madder, also now available in print in a second collection.
A seventh in the Housetrap series, Menagerie A Trois, joined the group in 2015 followed by number eight. Murder on the Disoriented Express and number nine Silence of the Sands in 2020. These were released in a third omnibus collection. .
By 2022 the Houstrap series was complete, with The Road to Hell is Paved With Parsnips followed by 'Twas the Week Before the Night in 2021 and the final episode. The Mid-Winter Cuckoos at Midnight in early 2022. A fourth collection containing these last three will follow in 2022.
Ron signed on with a second publisher, eTreasures from Florida, and his first book with them, a Sci fi thriller "We're Not in Kansas" was released in early 2016. This was followed by a What-if Spec fiction fantasy trilogy "Toltec" series. Toltec Dawn in 2016, Toltec Khan in 2016, and Toltec Noon in 2018.
A member of several writing groups, and the genre reviewer for an on-line magazine, Ron has appeared on genre discussion panels at local cons in Winnipeg and Calgary. When not writing, or wrestling a large cat off of the keyboard, Ron may sometimes be found wishing he was still sailing on Lake Winnipeg.
5 STARS
Great Reading
If you enjoy fantasy set in a medieval world, I am sure you will really enjoy The Queen's Pawn. The engaging characters as well as the complex plot make for an exciting novel from start to finish.
Reviews
5 STARS
Must Read
R.J. Hore pens "The Queen's Pawn" in an original plot that flowed smoothly with interesting and well developed characters. I was totally fascinated by the descriptions and could actually see it all play out in my minds eye. A really fun read and highly recommended to all fantasy, medieval fans.
Murders, kidnap attempts, lies/deceit and betrayals versus a ten year old girl. Will she prevail? Take the journey with Nefasti…and watch and learn.
Of Destiny's Daughters
Of Destiny's Daughters 1
Politics and uncommon sense collide when a spaceship suddenly appears over Ottawa, Canada.
When a gigantic damaged spaceship suddenly appears over Ottawa requesting assistance the world is thrown into confusion. Why are they really here? If they are having problems, what caused the damage?
Then there is the Thorncroft family:
Paul is feeling depressed and gets sucked up into a spaceship.
Lucile and her ex-military girlfriends are bored and looking for a fight, romance, or something to break up the monotony.
Their mother, Martha, is trying to hold the family together while she deals with her husband’s PTSD and alcoholism.
Everyone else is trying to discover the alien’s secrets and befriend them, or destroy them and anyone who has dealings with them.
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Hammer Across the Stars
Of Destiny's Daughters 2
Lucky Lucy searches for adventure and maybe romance (?) across the vastness of space.
After leaving Earth to join the Rygeillian Navy and see the universe, Lucy Thorncroft finds herself hurtling from one adventure to another. Not much chance she’d ever settle down and miss out on spaceships, alien monsters, evil empires and exotic planets?
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Expeditions to Earth
Of Destiny's Daughters 3
Can Lucky Lucy convince Earth’s strong-arm government that joining with the aliens is the only way to save themselves?
Lucy Thorncroft finds herself hurtling back toward her home planet Earth, with a raucous shipload of old friends, and serious dangers, old and new, waiting to greet her.
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The Queen's Pawn
The Queen's Pawn 1
On his way to study for the priesthood, Harow is mistaken for a bold and infamous duke. Instead of study, he finds himself thrust into action to rescue a beautiful queen and her spoiled daughter, as they flee the city. Now, a rebel army is hot on their heels and Harow must keep his wits about him as he leads the small group of survivors to safety.
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The Queen's Man
The Queen's Pawn 2
Harow, mistaken as a duke, has spirited the High Queen Reginee and her daughter Desiree-Rose to safety in the mountainous land ruled by bold Duke Owaine. Now Owaine and Reginee are scheduled to be wed and the queen wants Harow to stand up for her at the ceremony. With marriage on their minds, and a short supply of eligible men, Harow finds himself the target of several young ladies and a jealous Desiree-Rose who is already planning their wedding.
But Harow has other things on his mind as the queen’s brother and leader of the rebellion that overthrew the kingdom continues to plot with his allies close by just across the border. They want to stop the royal wedding at all cost, including murdering or kidnapping the queen and her daughter.
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The Queen's Game
The Queen's Pawn 3
With the queen safely married and his family joining him, Harow’s life should be back to normal. Instead, his fate leads him down a different path. He is still at odds with the princess, and he has a beautiful and deadly neighbor who raises dragons in her spare time.
Amongst duels, battles, and monsters, Harow is taxed with the assignment of assisting the princess in her campaign to choose a suitable suitor. When she is kidnapped and held by an evil magician, he leaps into action once again, leading a hunting party into the tower to rescue her.
With the princess safe and his world finally at peace, can Harow find his happily ever after?
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The Dark Lady
The Dark Lady 1
Young Princess Nefasti wakes to discover her father, the King, poisoned and her mother near death. As she is the sole heiress to the ancient high kingdom of Vadio, the king’s three brothers begin to plot and quarrel over who will become Regent and control the kingdom until she comes of age or dies. Their solution is to marry her off. If this trio were not enough of a problem, the greedy surrounding kingdoms all want to gobble Vadio up, and their ambassadors scurry through the castle plotting and scheming.
Princess Nefasti has two main goals: to survive, and to discover who is responsible for the death of her parents.
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Dark Days
The Dark Lady 2
Young Queen Nefasti’s hold on her throne is tenuous. Her powerful neighbor to the west has declared war, and her other neighbors want something in return for their offered aid, such as her hand in marriage and her kingdom. Assassins lurk in the shadows while handsome suitors try to bribe her with gold and jewels. Her best friend and protector is leaving and one of her favorite ladies-in-waiting is threatening to commit suicide.
Could anything else go wrong?
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Dark Knights
The Dark Lady 3
It has happened at last. Queen Nefasti’s friends are deserting her on all sides, treachery threatens from inside her own castle, and an invasion led by an old and angry acquaintance is knocking at the very gates to the Kingdom of Vadio. Dark Magic has stirred up things best left alone. Nefasti has been given a final choice, marry The Lord High Protector’s son, or suffer dire consequences.
All of this threatens to ruin her 16th birthday celebrations, and probably end her life.
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Alex in Wanderland
Standalone
Thrust into an alternate world, a married couple finds themselves as saviors of the land, with subtle hints of a slow and painful death as their ultimate reward. Alex and Alexis find themselves on a not-so typical quest to fulfill a ridiculous ancient prophecy. Their travelling companions: the priest, the protector, and the thief, are suspect, and everyone else seems out to stop them from reaching their ultimate goal.
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Knight's Bridge
Standalone
A bloodied knight fleeing a lost cause rescues a woman escaping from the madness of a burning countryside and guides her and her daughters to temporary safety. An angry warlord is dispatched to seize a bridge but decides first to divert and ravage a small town. A young squire, following his master into his first battle, has numerous fears and uncertainties to overcome. Each have a story to tell and they all meet together in the clash around the Pax Regis, the King’s Peace, a magnificent stone bridge over the Matriarch, the Mother of Waters.
A tale of brutal warfare, adventure and romance, with the destiny of a kingdom at stake, the lives of the four main characters hang in the balance, yet the widow Eodithe of West Riverside still hopes for a normal life, for herself and her two young daughters, if they can survive.
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Summer in Paradise
Standalone
Only one road leads to paradise, and he found it.
University graduate James Witson needs a change of scene in order to get away from the English professor who ruined his life and the other painful memories James wants to forget. He randomly chooses a remote coastal village in which to find himself and write a great novel.
Paradise Cove is perched on the edge of the continent, a thin strip of civilization between the storm-tossed ocean and a thick, dark forest. Most of the locals appear friendly enough, although they hold a few odd beliefs such as little people in the forest and a White Lady who haunts the by-ways.
James has no use for ghosts or witches, but even he has to admit things in Paradise Cove are strange. From the mansion down by the harbor that looks more like a pagan temple than a home to the uncanny way the girl at the general store anticipates his wishes.
But James isn’t the only one hunting for something. An archaeologist is already in the village, rummaging through her rental house, trying to find an old journal that is the key to a mysterious tomb and possible riches. When Dr. Edith Bernard’s student helpers flee the dig site on the barrens, she enlists James as her assistant. As they try to understand why the original inhabitants abandoned the area over two thousand years before the Europeans arrived, there are more questions than answers.
Searching for himself, James Witson finds far more than he bargained for.
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Housetrap
Housetrap Chronicles #1
In a world ruled by committees of wizards, and packed with every creature imaginable, in the sleazy backstreets of Central City you can always count on Randolph C. Aloysius to solve your problems. That is, assuming his trusty Girl Friday, Bertha, can track him down.
A sucker for a pair of legs, Randy takes the case of a long legged Elf trying to locate a missing boyfriend. Simple.
Of course, nothing is ever simple in Randy’s life, what with avoiding commitments to his long-suffering lady friend, an attempted murder, a real murder, stolen baubles, and another damsel in distress. What’s a private eye to do?
Simple really. Follow the clues off-world, avoid demons, vampires and other assorted miscreants, and hope to come home with enough coin left over to meet Bertha’s back wages.
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Dial M for Mudder
Housetrap Chronicles #2
In Central City’s shady underworld, even the mob bosses have trouble with theft. Randolph C. Aloysius, a well-known local detective who prefers to work alone, is hired by the Big Gnome (aka Fat Bob) to recover a missing statue. And the Big Gnome insists Randy take famous assassin, Faster Frederica, an X-rated Troll who likes to play with knives, along with him.
If that is not trouble enough, Randy must lead an expedition into the swamps of Venus made up of Faster, a Hobgoblin senior citizen, with a teenage Goblin for a guide. Did I mention the evil wizard?
Swamps filled with hungry plants and other nasty things, and a dungeon, complete the foggy picture. Of course, treachery abounds; just another normal day at Randy’s office.
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House On Hollow Hill
Housetrap Chronicles #3
Sounds like a simple assignment. Randy and Bertha go undercover for a high class weekend in the country, all expenses paid. All they have to do is pretend to be somebody else while keeping a close eye on their host, Archibald Anthony, the famous Serial Painter, and mingle with the other guests, exchanging pleasantries. Their job? To keep Anthony alive until the long weekend is over and sort through the suspects when the bodies start falling.
Of course the guests include some of the top rungs of the social ladder: vampires, elves, hobgoblins, goblins, trolls, gremlins, plus the addition of the varied staff members loose on the estate. Strangely enough, almost everyone seems to have their own private agenda.
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Hounds Of Basalt Ville
Housetrap Chronicles #4
As usual, Randy is behind in Bertha’s wages. When she begs him to help her younger brother in a northern mining town, it’s an offset opportunity. Just because there are mysterious goings-on in Basalt Ville, and rumors that Hell Hounds have been seen, there’s no reason for worry. He tackles the job with his usual dramatic flair.
The body count piles up, with hounds baying, and even stranger things rising out of the ground, making for an almost-typical few days outside the office.
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Murder In The Rouge Mort
Housetrap Chronicles #5
There are some people Randy would really rather forget. Faster Frederica is one of them. She has a nasty reputation and a bad habit of playing with very sharp knives. So what is he to do when she appears in his office and insists on hiring him to find her missing brother, Fast Freddy?
Only it turns out Faster also needs a bodyguard. Apparently there are some dead bodies lying around, the Committee of Public Safety is looking for her, to chat, as well as an assortment of underworld characters.
Randy finds himself caught in the middle of a gang war, and an investigation that leads him into the depths of a dangerous building in search of answers. The usual mayhem ensues.
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The Treasure Of The Sarah Madder
Housetrap Chronicles #6
Take an order from the Committee of Public Safety he can’t refuse and add an expedition made up of an apprentice wizard still wet behind his drooping ears and a teenage elf who just happens to be the favorite niece of a high-ranking CPS agent. With no idea where he is going, what he is looking for, or who is supposed to be trying to stop them, private eyeball Randy is set for a typical trip where things can only go wrong.
To make things worse, their cover story is that they are making a film, about butterflies, of all things. Exotic locations, exotic villains, who could ask for anything more to break up the monotony that started out as a typical day at the office? Randy could, if he had the freedom of choice.
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Menagerie à Trois
Housetrap Chronicles #7
With no clients in the office in two weeks, Randy is bored and Bertha is nagging. Then three cases walk in the door all at once. First, an impoverished widowed goblin who doesn’t believe her husband committed suicide. It must be murder, only the minions of the Com P.S. have already closed the case. Then there is the well-off gnome who had a battered old horn stolen from his shop. Lastly, a stuck-up wealthy and obnoxious elf whose wife was kidnapped, but he is only worried about a cheap missing necklace.
The usual pressure on Randy to solve the cases while trying to avoid getting involved with some serious nasties sounds simple enough. Did we mention shadowy figures with scythes or the seductive crime bosses?
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Murder on the Disoriented Express
Housetrap Chronicles #8
Eyeball Randy accepts an assignment to escort two harmless elves—an elderly maiden aunt and her niece—across the continent. Seems simple enough. If only…
Private Eyeball, Randy Aloysius, agrees to accompany an elderly elf and her attractive niece on a relaxing train trip across the continent to the wet coast. They seem harmless enough, so what could go wrong?
Well, there’s the obvious murder of a bent politician, throw in a card-playing vampire, a brownie public relations hack, and a grieving widow murder suspect, not to mention other assorted suspicious characters, and someone out of Randy’s past he'd rather not see again.
Then there is the train itself, which may be in serious need of life support. After all, it does have to cross a prairie filled with woolly mammoths and climb treacherous mountains passes where nasty things lurk
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Silence of the Sands: Sink. Sank. Sunk.
Housetrap Chronicles #9
His secretary Bertha has gone missing, and so have her mother and a large tourist island. Randy has to find emergency transportation to the disaster zone and fast, if he has to rescue the lost damsels and ease their possible distress.
If the rough trip to the beach isn’t bad enough, he soon finds himself adrift in a kitchen sink and lost at sea. Then there are the characters in black who have an urge to sacrifice a few folk and a hungry deep sea beastie with long nasty tentacles.
Good thing someone stuffed a kitten in Randy’s pocket. Just another typical day outside the office, complete with wayward women and a missing beach.
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The Road to Hell is Paved with Parsnips
Housetrap Chronicles #11
Randy’s old, sometimes good buddy, Charlie is accused of murder most foul and Randy and Bertha must stash him away from the fingers of the law and discover the truth. What they uncover are parsnip hijackings and strange goings-on, vegetable cartels, and demons.
While north to the parsnip fields Randy falls into the clutches of Freydis, the queen of the Huldufolk, who don’t usually take kindly to strangers. She’s willing to make an exception for Randy if he signs their agreement in blood. All he has to do is rescue several loads of parsnips from an army of villains, get the vegetables back to the city in time for the Annual Parsnip Festival, discover who the mastermind behind the hijackings is, and clear Charlie’s occasionally good name.
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Twas the Week Before the Night
Housetrap Chronicles #12
Holidaze Interuptus. Randy and Bertha are forced to undertake a dangerous mission on a rickety space service and repair vehicle in order to prevent ruthless space-faring pirates from capturing an orphanage filled with small children and selling them as slaves to work in the asteroid mines. All our heroes have to do is get to the moon Calypso before Crispness Eve and transport the children and their annoying headmistress safely to Titan. Then Captain Rinch and his pirates show up and they are not very happy.
Daring battles aboard spaceships, amazing rescues, Bertha in peril, Randy harassed, and will the patrol ship from Titan reach them in time? Will the pirates spoil everyone's Crispness Eve?
Not to mention the Crispness festivities, food and drink, and much merry music.
With hungry vampires, gremlin pirates, seductive songstresses, and the short, heavily armed fist of the law, everyone is brimming with Crispness Spirit.
Oh, and the helpless little children aren't so helpless. And what's that stuff about Randy and breakfast next morning?
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