Halloween Book Sale

October 28, 2025 / F.T. McKinstry

Greetings!

I hope you’re all well, and weathering these troubled times with grace and dignity. Yeah, okay, I think most of us are freaking out and flailing around in some way or another. Things are weird. Bad, even. That aside, it is human nature to focus on dreadful things and overlook nice ones — that 9000-year-old reptile brain survival thing that media and algorithms are very good at manipulating. Sadly these days, they have a great deal to work with, god help us.

This is my favorite time of year. Predictably, my writing is full of dark and spooky things, monsters, curses, wicked trees, otherworldly villains and the like, mostly under the banner of high fantasy. But not entirely.

Recently, I broke ranks and wrote a Gothic horror novella about a crossroads bargain, which involves a deal made between a desperate (i.e., stupid) human and an otherworld entity, in the liminal space where two paths meet. Such bargains are tricky and usually result in unpleasant consequences. This one did—a centuries-old curse by the Unseelie Fae, more specifically, a wicked elf with an army and an axe to grind.

Enter Elspet, the unfortunate progeny of this bargain, a sensitive, hyper-vigilant young woman who sees things in the floral patterns of her bedroom wallpaper—including a beautiful elven lord who is the ancient enemy of the aforementioned bastard.

Against the backdrop of an old, neurotic family, a creepy forest bordering the estate, a string of grisly, unexplained deaths and an antagonistic aunt, Elspet lands into a situation that forces her to make a devastating sacrifice that brings her to the threshold of the otherworld…and herself.

For a limited time, A Northward Gaze will be on sale for $0.99 on Amazon.
Read the story for free with Kindle Unlimited.

Be well, stay safe, and Happy Halloween! And remember, even the most ghastly, tragic tales can have a silver lining.

Summer Story Sale

June 23, 2024 / F.T. McKinstry

Hi Beautiful Campers!

I hope you’re all well, and staying cool. Whether you’re baking—I mean basking—by the lake, sheltering in the woods or just hiding out in the AC, I have some fantasy stories for you, to take you to cool, dark, interesting places. From June 23-27, these stories will be on sale on Amazon.

Wizards, Woods and Gods: Short Stories. $0.99
Twelve stories involving swords, sorcery, love, gods, assassins, shapeshifters, wizards, war…and a badass cat or two. 206 pages. “F.T. McKinstry writes in a way that involves all the senses. Highly recommended.”

The Sea Witch’s Bargain. This story is included in Wizards, Woods and Gods.
An ordinary hedge witch falls afoul of an ancient order of sorcerers. They know her secrets. They know her weaknesses. And she has something they want. To escape them, she must make a deal with a devious, vengeful monster that will most certainly get her killed, unless she uses all her wits and then some. 24 pages. “Grim, eerie, almost tangible world building.” Based on an excerpt from The Wolf Lords, Book 2 in The Fylking.

A Northward Gaze: A Novella. Free!
An old forest with a dark history. An old family with a lot of secrets. And a young woman who sees faces and creatures in the floral patterns of her bedroom wallpaper. When an unholy tryst with an elven lord and a series of grisly, unexplained deaths drive her into the labyrinth of a faerie curse put on her bloodline in a centuries-old crossroads bargain, she must sacrifice the dearest thing to her in all the world—or lose her life and serve the Unseelie Fae for all eternity. 124 pages.

These stories are all available on Amazon and Kindle Unlimited.
Enjoy!

Monsters, Books and Liminal Spaces

October 25, 2023June 20, 2024 / F.T. McKinstry

Greetings, Trick or Treaters!

So I have this new favorite word: liminal. It means relating to, or being in an intermediate state, in-between, not one place or the other. It beautifully describes those mysterious, shady places that occur in nature, such as twilight, the edge of a river or pond, the space where a forest meets a field, or the veil between the mortal world and the otherworld. It can also refer to a state of consciousness or an aspect of life in which a person is in transition, suspended in that frustrating hinterland where everything is still for a time.

October is a liminal time of year, when the sun drifts lower in the sky and shines through tall trees, casting long shadows. The wind is cold, whispery and strong. This shift culminates on All Hallows’ Eve, when spirits and dark things emerge from the veil between the worlds, curious and enraged. This is the realm of not only honoring the shadows, but facing them: the beast in the dark you don’t see coming, or that keeps rising again and again no matter how many times you kill it, and will shred you like a cabbage if it catches you. This can be transformative or terrifying—usually the latter.

Some souls are more attracted to monsters, cliffs and chasms than others. It’s a dirty job. Personally, while I love a good science experiment gone bad, my favorite monsters are those that are themselves liminal: shapeshifters, vampires, elves, draugr, demons and the like. Fae cursing humans. A river or a tree that can devour you. That eerie feeling of being watched from the eaves of a twilit forest.

Naturally, this comes out in the things I write. A shrink might say that’s healthy or even necessary, to give my personal monsters some airtime. Well. Maybe. Assuming I have a choice.

Ahem. Anyway, if you like dark fantasy, here are some offerings:

The Chronicles of Ealiron. This series involves the shady exploits of an assassin who is trained in magic and has an inborn talent for sensing and trafficking with the darker forces of nature. By way of his penchant for getting into trouble with all the wrong kinds of things, you’ll find powerful witches, apparitions, curses, immortal predators, sea monsters, evil gods and wizards behaving very badly.

The Fylking. This series takes place in a war-torn realm occupied by immortal warriors who for millennia have used it as a military outpost. Magicians, shapeshifters and masters of the liminal, these beings maintain an interdimensional portal that has, over the centuries, caused the natural veil between the worlds to thin. When their enemies come to play, all manner of things come to life: tricky gods, sorcery, draugr, goblins, immortal warlocks, elves, demons and an order of witches founded by an ancient king to honor the magic practiced by their immortal overlords.

A Northward Gaze. A gothic fantasy novella. This is a wicked dark tale with a silver thread. Neurotic family, old tricky forest bordering the estate, a string of unexplained deaths. A sensitive, hyper-vigilant young woman who sees things in the floral patterns of her bedroom wallpaper.

And elves. These aren’t the goofy little characters you see in Christmas specials. No, this lot plays for keeps. The forest is theirs—and so is our protagonist.

She leaves a trail of monsters, brutes and fools on her way across the threshold.

Stay safe, stay sane, and remember: “Fun Size” is a shameless marketing euphemism.

Valentine’s Day Epic Book Sale

February 13, 2023 / F.T. McKinstry

In my never-ending quest to uphold a reputation, I tend to look upon Valentine’s Day with all the warmth of the Winter Warlock. Try to give me a choo-choo and I will sic my monster trees on you.

The thing is, beneath my wintry fortress, I can be a bit of a softie. Despite my curmudgeonly self, I appreciate the people in my life: friends, family, social media peeps, geeks and readers alike. I am grateful.

So, I’ve decided to show my love with a book sale. Depending on what you’re into, it might not compete with chocolate and roses, but hey, that shit’s expensive (especially on Valentine’s Day). A story lasts forever. Dark stories about wizards, warlords, fiends and shadows last even longer. Heh.

February 13-15, all the books in my epic fantasy series the Chronicles of Ealiron will be on sale on Amazon. The first four of these books are normally $4.99.

Want some more chocolate? A Northward Gaze will also be free! In this gothic fantasy tale, an old forest with a dark history, a tryst with an elven lord and a series of grisly, unexplained deaths drives a woman into the labyrinth of a faerie curse put on her bloodline in a centuries-old crossroads bargain.

See? Softie. And choo-choos are cool–especially those elven-made ones.

Love you all. Stay safe and well.

The Metamorphosis of a Book Cover

January 31, 2023June 20, 2024 / F.T. McKinstry / 2 Comments

Earlier this year, I released a novella called The Crossroads Bargain, a gothic fantasy tale about an old forest with a dark history, a tryst with an elven lord, a lot of unexplained deaths and disappearances, and a faerie curse cast in a centuries-old crossroads bargain.

I created the cover art in the usual way. But for some reason, it unsettled me; it wasn’t quite what I was looking for. There were nervous whispers. I brushed them aside, knowing full well how reckless that is.

Just recently, I did a painting of a scene from the book, in which our protagonist, a sensitive, tormented sort, fades into the faerie realm and there sees the hall of an elven lord tucked into the forest. As I worked on this, a calm whisper suggested that it might make a good cover image.

Okay but I’m keeping that spiderweb.

Then, I suddenly thought of a title, from a saying in the story that describes what to do on a crossroads if you want to summon something from the otherworld:

A northward gaze; a wish as clear as a mountain stream; and a willingness to sacrifice the unimaginable.

Yeah, that little bit of advice causes all manner of horrors, by the way. But never mind that. My new cover came together so beautifully, I decided to change it. It captures the vibe of the story well.

A Northward Gaze is now available on Amazon. Oh, and about those crossroads instructions. Don’t try that shit at home.