Capture the Sun – Page 3

Happy Holidays!

December 19, 2022 / Capture the Sun, Life, Snippet

Happy holidays from our house to yours! I hope this holiday season brings you peace, joy, and all the best presents from Santa. 💕

A picture of Mr. M and me with a festive background. Happy Holiday from House Mihalik!

I’m so grateful for your enthusiasm and support this year, and I can’t wait to see what 2023 and beyond brings! With that in mind, I maaaay have included a new tiny little snippet of Capture the Sun below, but you won’t tell my editor, right? ;)

Happy holidays and happy reading!

I blinked my eyes open to a room filled with dim light. When I lifted my head, I saw that the glass panels had darkened, shading the room from the blazing sun outside. I glanced down at Nilo and found him watching me with an unreadable expression. “What time is it?” I whispered, unwilling to break the fragile peace.

“Midmorning,” he replied just as softly.

I hummed an acknowledgment and then lay back down. Nilo froze as my head returned to his shoulder, then he slowly, carefully wrapped his arm around me. I wasn’t touch starved, not exactly, but it’d been a while since I’d trusted anyone enough to just cuddle.

Not that I trusted Nilo completely, but I trusted that he wouldn’t take advantage of this.

“You don’t have to stay, if you want to get up,” I murmured a few minutes later. Then I reluctantly added, “I should probably get up, too. We have things to do today.”

Nilo’s arm tightened around me. “I’m exactly where I want to be. Stay. Just for a little while longer.”

…

Happy Holidays!Read More »

Capture the Sun Chapter One!

December 8, 2022 / Capture the Sun, Reading, Writing

An intergalactic thief must join forces with the charming teleporter who stole her last job—and may now be her only hope for saving her former crew.

Preorder Now!
Out June 20, 2023

I turned in my copyedits yesterday, which means that if you mosey over to the Capture the Sun book page, you’ll find a freshly copyedited first chapter. Happy reading!

Every time I read this book, I’m struck anew by how much I love it, especially since writing it was a bit of an endurance test. But I think it turned out great, and I hope you do, too! If you’d like to ensure your copy arrives in a timely fashion, here are some handy preorder links: 😉

Signed book preorders will be happening, but probably not until sometime in the new year. I’ll post the link when I have it.

Now I’m probably going to work on my fantasy romance for a bit because the short story started giving me trouble, and I need a change of pace. Plus I’ve been itching to write it, so that’s always a good sign.

Speaking of fantasy romance, I read The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy in two days this week and adored it. Two bitter enemies end up anonymous pen-pals thanks to magical mail, and they find they have more in common than they thought. I never expected to cheer this hard for a main character who was an undertaker, and yet, it was a delight. Plus, it’s on sale for $2.99 right now! As always, try a sample first to see if it’ll work for you. :)

Capture the Sun Cover Reveal!

November 10, 2022 / Capture the Sun, Writing

The cover for Capture the Sun is starting to roll out to retailers, so I guess it got approved, lol. I’m usually the last to know, and I’ve been sitting on this for months, so I’m super excited that I can finally share. 🎉 Behold Lexi and Nilo!

Capture the Sun Cover, featuring a man and woman in silhouette against a fiery orange sun with a futuristic city in the background. — Click to embiggen

The sun, the city, Luna… I love it all! In case you’ve missed it, this is the third and final book in the Starlight’s Shadow trilogy, and it’s publishing in June 2023. But preorders are up now, if that’s your jam. :)

Acclaimed author Jessie Mihalik returns with the thrilling conclusion to her Starlight’s Shadow trilogy. An intergalactic thief must join forces with the charming teleporter who stole her last job—and may now be her only hope for saving her former crew.

As a recovery specialist, Lexi Bowen’s jobs typically require more trickery and thievery than honest work. Her former captain might not approve of her flexible morals, but stealing artifacts for rich assholes pays the bills, and Lexi’s had enough of war and death. The FHP left her to die once; she doesn’t plan to give them a chance to finish the job.

Unfortunately, her latest contract takes her to Valovia itself—and right back into the orbit of Nilo Shoren, a Valovian teleporter who already cost her one payday and nearly stole her heart.

Armored against his clever charm, Lexi plans to get in, get the job done, and get out. But when her former crew goes missing in Valovian space, Lexi will have to work with Nilo to figure out what happened—and stop it—before the galaxy’s two superpowers can use the disappearance as an excuse to return to war.

Hunt the Stars, Eclipse the Moon, and Capture the Sun on a teal background.

Look at all three book together!! Aren’t they gorgeous??? 😍 I’m so thankful to the team who made them happen, which leads me to my next point…

On a less fun note, the HarperCollins Union workers are currently on strike for better wages because HarperCollins has refused to negotiate with them for nearly a year, and I support the striking workers 100%. The union is NOT asking readers to boycott HC books, but if you like books by HC authors and want to help the people who make them happen, here’s a thread of ways you can.

Capture the Sun Release Date Update

October 31, 2022 / Author News, Capture the Sun, Writing

If you’ve already preordered Capture the Sun, then you might’ve gotten an email (or two!) from your retailer telling you that the release date changed. Nobody panic, but the date did get pushed back slightly due to issues with the printer.

The good news is that it wasn’t pushed all the way to mid-July, which was the first change. The bad news is that it was pushed from May 9 to June 20.

Cue the wailing and gnashing of teeth. I’ll wait.

I absolutely hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the printer literally isn’t able to bind the book until the end of May, so you can see where an early May release date might have been a bit of a problem. :(

You’ll have to wait just a little bit longer, but I hope it’ll all be worth it in the end. 💕

And if you have preordered already, maybe just double-check that it wasn’t canceled? I think retailers keep the orders active when the date changes, but I’ve heard some horror stories, too, so if you get a chance, maybe just pop over and check. I’ll put the links below so it’s hopefully super easy. Thank you!!!

Edits Are Done!

October 21, 2022 / Capture the Sun, Snippet, Writing

I sent off the edits for Capture the Sun to my editor this morning! 🎉 Overall, edits weren’t too bad this time, and I only added about 2k to the manuscript, bringing it up to 111k words. This is pretty much right in line with the other two books. In fact, all of my trad books have been around 110k-115k words, so I’ve got consistency going for me!

An iPad on a bamboo desk with the first two pages of CAPTURE THE SUN showing.

I shared the image above on social media when I was doing a final read-through of the book after most of the edits were done, and I’m sure some of you were yelling “ENHANCE!” like this was CSI (no? just me??), so here’s the full text, since it was too long to fit in an alt tag. It’s not final-final, and it hasn’t been copyedited, but here you go, the opening of Capture the Sun:

I’d sworn I would never set foot on Valovia again, but I was about to prove myself a liar. That fact had never been in question, but I tried to keep the promises I made to myself. The screen in my cabin gently mocked me, displaying a green and brown close-up of the planet while the atmosphere buffeting the ship’s hull grew denser as we sank toward the surface.
Valovia had burned me twice already. I usually learned from my mistakes, but once again the promise of money had overridden my good sense. I mentally winced. My former captain, Octavia Zarola, would be so disappointed in me. Tavi had a strict moral compass. Mine was a lot more flexible.
And a lot more lucrative.
Case in point: the sumptuous first-class cabin surrounding me, paid for by Besor Edfo, my contact and potential employer on Valovia. It was an obvious ploy for him to demonstrate that he had money to spare, since I hadn’t agreed to take the job yet, only to meet, but it was a nice touch. As was the prepaid first-class return ticket.
Besor had offered me a truly ridiculous amount of money to recover a stolen figurine for him. Apparently, he and a rival had been feuding over the piece of art for close to a decade, and it had switched hands a dozen times thanks to the efforts of a few recovery specialists.
Officially, recovery specialists were experts at tracking down items that had gone missing, whether through negligence or theft. But in reality, we were often the reason items went missing.

The book is due out in May 2023, but in case you don’t want to forget, here are some handy links for you. 😉

Now I’m going to take the weekend off (woo!), and go mattress shopping (boo!). That sentence was a real roller coaster, lol, but fingers crossed we find something we like that doesn’t cost a fortune. 🤞🏻

I hope you all have a good weekend!