Flash Gold Chronicles - La série

Eighteen-year-old Kali McAlister enters her steam-powered "dogless sled" in a race, intending to win the thousand-dollar prize and escape remote Moose Hollow forever. The problem? Fortune seekers and airship pirates are after her for the secret to flash gold, her late father's alchemical masterpiece. With her modified rifle and a pocketful of home-made smoke bombs, Kali wouldn't normally hide from a confrontation, but taking on a whole airship single-handedly is a daunting task. Unfortunately, the other racers won't assist her--they're too busy scheming ways to sabotage her unorthodox sled. When a sword-slinging stranger shows up, wanting to hire on as her protector, she's sure he has ulterior motives, but he's the only one interested in helping her. The question is...why? Details: an 18,000-word (75 page) steampunk novella set in the Yukon during the gold rush era.

Self-taught tinkerer Kali McAlister is determined to build an airship and escape the frigid Yukon forever. Unfortunately, she’s the heir to the secrets of flash gold, an alchemical energy source that tends to make her a popular target for bandits, gangsters, and pirates. With the help of her bounty-hunting business partner, Cedar, Kali has outwitted and eluded attackers before, and she thinks she’s prepared for anything. Then her ex-fiancé strolls into her workshop. As if fooling her once wasn’t enough, he aims to embroil her in a fresh scheme. Meanwhile, a new nemesis is stalking her, a shrouded figure with an arsenal of deadly machines that make Kali’s inventions seem like toys. This time, it’ll take more than her ingenuity and Cedar’s combat skills to survive. Hunted is a 27,000-word steampunk novella. Printed page count equivalent: 120

Half-breed tinkerer Kali McAlister doesn’t care that the gold rush has stormed into Dawson and prospectors are flooding the north—all she wants is to finish construction of her airship, so she can escape the Yukon and see the world. Unfortunately, the world keeps chucking wrenches into her machinery: a mysterious gambler is pumping her for information on her bounty-hunting business partner Cedar; the notorious gangster Cudgel Conrad is after Kali’s knowledge of flash gold; and a series of gruesome murders is plaguing Dawson. Someone—or something—is ruthlessly slaying tribal women, and, if Kali and Cedar can’t find the killer, she might be the next target. Peacemaker is a 40,000-word steampunk novella.

After years on the hunt, Cedar Kartes is finally within striking distance of Cudgel Conrad, the criminal who slew his brother and framed him for murder. With the help of Kali McAlister, his business partner and the woman he’s mustering the courage to court, he believes he can finally rid the world of a bloodthirsty felon. But nothing is ever easy in the Yukon. The new police commissioner has taken an interest in Cedar’s checkered past, a suspicious newspaperman is trying to make friends with Kali, and Cudgel may be laying traps for Cedar even as Cedar is trying to trap him.

Kali has been working toward her dream of building an airship and escaping the frozen Yukon for so long that she can scarcely believe it’s close to becoming a reality. There’s just one problem. Cedar, her friend and business partner (and maybe a little more), is in jail, and the American authorities are on their way to hang him. The Mounties aren’t listening to reason, so the only way to free him may be to break him out of their headquarters—if she can. Even if she succeeds, she’ll be branded a criminal for the rest of her life.