I’m an international, multiple award-winning author with a passion for the voices in my head. As a singer, songwriter, independent filmmaker and improv teacher and performer, my life has always been about creating and sharing what I create with others. Now that my dream to write for a living is a reality, with over a hundred titles in happy publication and no end in sight, I live in beautiful Prince Edward Island, Canada, with my giant cats, pug overlord and overlady and my Gypsy Vanner gelding, Fynn.

Trash Heaven has been Didi Duke’s home for as long as she can remember. The dumping ground of the galaxy provides her with everything she’s ever needed or wanted. Except, maybe, the attention of her inventor father, always busy with his next creation. Good thing he’s passed on his talents to his sixteen-year-old daughter. With the company of her best friend—the cyborg crow, Pip—Didi is happy to scour her territory for treasures discarded as trash. But, when an evil Underlord kidnaps her father, Didi can no longer hide herself away in the garbage. Her plan to resurrect a retired cyborg gunslinger and rescue her dad leads her into danger and the heart of the rotting planet—Trash City. She’ll figure out the rest of her plan—eventually.

Didi and the Gunslinger

Her quiet time is up as fast as it arrived, the thud of boots approaching vibrating through the decking and alerting her someone comes for her. Didi chokes on a sob, chin dropping to her chest. She pushes herself upward an instant later, before that intruder can find her this way. Torment her for her weakness, abuse her for her tears before forcing her back into work. The miserable crew of this miserable ship have no idea their constant torture-physical and mental-isn't necessary. That her own internal drive to hide from her failure and the loss of the gunslinger is all the motivation she needs to keep going, to do as she's bid. That and the memory that aches in her muscles, in the pit of her gut, at the agony the cuffs and collar deliver at seemingly random intervals. Her headlong cooperation is fed more by her need to forget what's happened to the one person she owes so much and has let down epically out of stupid, gullible need than any kind of pain her body can endure.


Chapter 68: Survivor