Available now: War In Limbo

 A Kirov Series Special Edition!

Available Now on Amazon!

Kirov has gone to many grim futures, but this one was one of the most dangerous. After preying on the Imperial Japanese Navy in WWII on many occasions, Karpov finds a pleasure cruise for the ship and crew runs afoul of turbulent weather, and they are marooned in Limbo after they are grounded by a massive Typhoon. Soon they are found by old enemies, made far more dangerous by the modern ships and weapons they now command. It is an enemy they have faced and fought before, the product of a twisted history that has spun off a new altered Meridian. Was Ivan Volkov responsible for this future? Though Volkov is dead, Kirov must now face and fight the new dominant Pacific power in the year 2030, not China, but a rejuvenated Imperial Japanese Empire that has risen from the ashes of WWII like a dark Phoenix.

The Empire has but one weakness, its center is unformed and the young Emperor in waiting has no real power. Instead the Empire is ruled by quarreling Daimyos who serve as Regents and command powerful fleets. While planning to begin new conquests, they remain bitter rivals, each maneuvering to gain face and force to propel them to the coveted rank of Shogun, a military dictator who will seize the reins of power and unite all the warring Clans.

One among them, Odo Nobunaga, has discovered a most unusual ship aground within his Regency, and he soon learns the secret of their tremendous power. As Odo maneuvers to gain possession of the the Kamenski Device, Fedorov and Karpov must negotiate with the Japanese to secure safe passage home to Petropavlovsk. But Mother Time has other plans for the ship and crew, and sets her mind on ending its offensive voyages once and for all. This brings Kirov to a fateful hour that no one aboard ever thought they would face.

This Kirov Series special Edition (Series Volume #67) is a stand alone novel focused on the ship and crew.

Kirov Series serves up an Encore!

 Surprise Volume #65 in the Kirov Series is Available now!

Encore

OK... It's an Encore, and author John Schettler has put together an all new mission handed to Karpov and Fedorov by Director Kamenski. The result is everything you ever liked about the Kirov series. There's mystery, Troyak and the Marines deploy for some ass kicking. The Ice Men Skeletals are back, there's airships, haunting landscapes in the polar regions and lost deserts of the world. Kirov goes to sea when a variation ends the war in 2025-26 differently, and removes a key trump card from the Allied hand. Karpov wants to set things right. Volkov shows up with a big surprise or two, and the vendetta between Volkov and Karpov finally gets its proper resolution. A few plot holes are filled, and a few loose ends tied off. And best of all, its out now for kindle!

While the author isn't promising this will happen all that often, he was just too restless, like Karpov, and Kirov just had to get back on stage for one more swansong. Here it is. 36 more life saving chapters!

Kirov Series Encore: $6.99 for Kindle version

Quality Trade Paperback: $19.99

Kirov sails for the Final Sortie

 

Buy for Kindle: $4.99

Fans of the long running Kirov Series may have a lump in their throats as Karpov (the younger) takes the ship into the Pacific for what will be the ship's final sortie. His prey? The Imperial Japanese Navy in 1941. Arriving after Pearl Harbor, Fedorov sets the course to intercept the Kido Butai as it returns to Japan. 

Get ready for action, because Karpov is going to lay into the Japanese Navy like Clint Eastwood with a good piece of hickory. The action builds and builds to a climax at the end of Chapter 15, until a problem presents itself.

   Series readers will remember that the Modern Japanese Destroyer Takami emerges from the ash covered Java Sea after Krakatoa erupts, Captain Harada begins interacting with Japanese Generals and Admirals, until he works his way up to a meeting with the legendary Isoroku Yamamoto himself—and some of this interesting interaction is revised here. The remainder of this volume is then every bit as riveting as the first 15 chapters, loaded with naval combat, much of it devoted a long series of engagements between Kirov and Takami as they stalk each other like a pair of Gladiators. Takami has some surprising new capabilities to even things out, but remember, Karpov is in the big Chair aboard Kirov, and can never be underestimated.

The Long Goodbye...

At the conclusion of Volume 6, Sea Lions, Fedorov sustained an injury that would take his life, but Karpov is not willing to let the author write his co-conspirator in Time out of the story just yet. As he has done twice before, he immediately rushes to the Kamenski Device in an effort to get to safe time in the past where Fedorov is whole, healthy and well… But something goes wrong. The Deus es Machina in a box fails to perform as anticipated. Enter Sir Roger Ames for a look under the hood of the Kamenski Device to see if he can identify the problem, which then launches Karpov on a mission to find the one thing they need to get it to work properly again.  This will soon take Baikal back to the lake it is named for.

Season 8 has been a roller coaster ride with a number of twists from the more familiar military fiction into the realms of both horror and pure science fiction. When Karpov’s excursion in search of Kolchak’s Gold led him to a strange hidden railway tunnel near the source of the Angara River we were all transported to what the author calls “Strange far places,” a phrase he quotes from H.P. Lovecraft. Then we got some riveting scenes where a platoon of rangers on patrol along the Stony Tunguska face some of the very same creatures that both Karpov and Fedorov stumbled upon while on opposite ends of Siberia. Fedorov calls the creatures “Raptors” and what can only be called the “Raptor War” begins, reaching its height at the mid-point of the season, in Coming Through. Biology has a good deal to do with the outcome of that conflict, as Baikal moves from one suspected entry point to another, finding and demolishing hidden temporal rifts where the Raptors are coming through to modern years and wreaking considerable havoc. On two occasions, Karpov resorts to heavy handed blows against the Hordes of flying intruders.

Fedorov wants to investigate a strong magnetic anomaly in the Taklamakan desert, which leads to an amazing discovery. Then, trying to clean up loose ends and problems, they decide to hunt down the German raider Kaiser Wilhelm, flying to the deep south Atlantic to stop that ship’s meddling before it can return to Germany with its great nuclear prize in hand. Once again, it is Fedorov’s curiosity that then pulls the mission team further south into Antarctica. The author confesses he has a strange fascination for stories set in polar climes, possibly because he spent three years teaching Eskimos up near the arctic circle in Alaska. This side trip was first presented as a visit to Operation Highjump, which itself is wreathed in its own set of legends and lore. Then the team makes another macabre discovery in a strange far place, and one that will have some rather dire consequences.

The Author has revealed that Sir Roger Ames is a man from the future, and then uses him to make other revelations about the thing Fedorov’s team finds in the ice caverns of Antarctica. It is certainly not to be mistaken for anything that evolved on this earth, like the Raptors. This time the story goes full on X-Files and Sir Roger, using his knowledge from the future, explains that if earth is visited by alien species some might be benign, others not so benign. Using a metaphor, he characterizes the specimen Fedorov has discovered in Antarctica as the “Murder Hornets” where Alien species are concerned. And the team soon learns that their discovery could be quite dangerous, not only to the mission crew, but to the planet as a whole.

Their decision to return to Antarctica and settle the matter seems to tamp things down, but the author has told us that plot line is not yet tied off. Now we move on to the seventh book in this season, The Final Sortie, where the author largely stays with the ship and crew as Karpov stalks the Imperial Japanese Navy in the early days of the Pacific War in 1941-42, and raises hell. The action builds and builds to a climax at the end of Chapter 15, until  the arrival of the modern Japanese Destroyer Takami, which then sets off another series of battles against that ship.

At the end, Fedorov confronts another mystery that haunts him from the days of the endless fog the ship was once marooned in—something that effects the fate lines of Volsky, Orlov and others. The cliff hanger here is the coming of Admiral Kita, arriving early at Enewetok through the rift created by the US post-war Ivy Mike detonation. That rift extended deep into the past, and delivers a powerful modern day Japanese task force to the scene, one even stronger than what we saw earlier in the series. Is this the nemesis the author will use to seal Kirov’s fate?  We’ll just have to wait for that last volume coming the first quarter of 2022. Brothers, after ten years with this story, it will be a sad day when it ends with the Series Finale in the final book, appropriately entitled Journey's End. That said, the author has included an announcement at the end of this book for a new series he is launching in 2022, something altogether different that I’m now really looking forward to. The first Volume of that new tale is already complete, and John is working on the web site while he finishes Journey's end. Its in an entirely different genre.

For now, hop aboard Kirov for the Final Sortie. This one builds up at the end to what will likely be the last missiles to be fired by the ship and crew. The Series Finale, Journey's End is going to focus heavily on all the main characters, as each one's fate line is tied off, one by one. If you were there at the beginning, you'll definitely want to be there for the ending in these last two volumes. So join our 'Wanderers in eternity' and walk that missile deck once again, but be ready when the claxon sounds!

 

Kirov Saga #63

The Final Sortie 

By

John Schettler

 

Part I – Catch-22

Part II – Wading In

Part III – Karpov’s War

Part IV – Hara’s Dilemma

Part V – Moskit#10

Part VI – Bloodhounds

Part VII – Shadow Thread

Part VIII– Strange Bedfellows

Part IX – Gladiators

Part X – Devil in the Banda Sea

Part XI – The Marathon

Part XII – Homeward Bound

Here There Be Dragons...

Kirov Series #35

Dragonfall

NOTE: This was originally titled "1944" but as all the action here occurs in late 1943, that title is now reserved for the next book, Volume 36.

 AVAILABLE NOW : $4.99 (Kindle Version)

About Dragonfall

Here comes the next volume of the long running Kirov Series, and right on schedule, only it has been retitled Dragonfall. The title it releases, 1944, will instead become volume 36, and largely because this action packed book needed all its chapters to finish off 1943.

We begin with a welcome return to the battlecruiser Kirov. With the Siberian off with Fedorov aboard Tunguska on their mission to get after Tyrenkov, the younger Karpov has taken command of our favorite ship, and his restless energy soon leads to battle. Eager to get the war moving against the Japanese, he decides to first clear up a logistical problem he had in supplying Petropavlovsk, the major port on the southeast coast of Kamchatka, taken earlier in the war. It can only be supplied by landing on the west coast, and hauling supplies over the rugged terrain of Kamchatka, so Karpov wants to open a sea lane through the 1st Kurile Strait.

The problem thee is the de-facto Japanese occupation of Shumushu and Paramushiro, two islands just off the southern tip of Kamchatka. Artillery, air units and naval units make any convoy through that strait a near suicide mission, and Karpov sees the only solution—assault and occupy those islands to clear the sea lane. This sets up the opening three chapters, as the mighty Kirov leads the Siberian offensive to accomplish this task.

Part II then takes up to the US strategy in the south Pacific. MacArthur wants Tulagi, but Nimitz wants to continue into the Marshalls. They will both get what they want, for the US finds itself strong enough to mount both offensives simultaneously. Yet the Combined Fleet has also reached its high water mark. Admiral Kita pledges his 21st century task force to serve Yamamoto’s needs, and they plan to go gunning for the US carriers. Enter Vladimir Karpov, and Kirov is back again by Part III, aptly entitled “Ambush.” Those next three chapters again bring Kirov and Kazan into direct confrontation with Admiral Kita and company, and the missiles and fireworks fly.

The next nine chapters take us to the East Front, for the onset of the Soviet Winter offensive. It has to major aims this time around, the capture of Kharkov in the south, and then the isolation of all German forces stubbornly defending at Moscow. Sergei Kirov wants his cities back. In all this action, we now see what the Soviet army has become capable of, and how the German situation grows ever more desperate in the East. The fortunes of some German Generals falter and fail, while others rise to take their place in the intense fighting that characterizes these nine chapters.

Part VII, “All Hallows Eve” then takes us to Southern France to relate what the Allies are doing there in their last big offensive of 1943. Beginning in late October, the action rages into late November with drives by Patton, Clark, O’Connor, and Montgomery all complicating Rommel’s defense, which struggles desperately to hold back the Allied surge. The action finally shocks Hitler into seeing the gravity of the threat now posed by the US and British forces in France.

After this brief three chapter roundup on action in the West, we then return to the Pacific. The title of this volume is derived from this action, for a full 16 of the 36 chapters in the book deal with battles in the Pacific, and Kirov is right in the middle of things. Yamamoto throws the Kido-Butai at the US Navy, intending to counterattack through the Solomon Sea towards Tulagi, which is Bull Halsey’s watch. At the same time, Nagumo sets out to see if he can stop Nimitz in the Marshalls, which is soon seen as the more immediate threat by Yamamoto. He decides to reinforce Nagumo at the expense of Hara’s operation in the Solomons, and two big carrier actions result as the resurgent Kido-Butai meets the ever strengthening power of the US fast carrier task forces under Spruance, Mitscher, Fletcher and Ziggy Sprague.

I won’t tell you which dragon gets slain, but its right in line with all the great Pacific battles we’ve see thus far. After this segment concludes in Chapter 31, the book the reserves the last five chapters for Fedorov and the Siberian Karpov’s mission against Tyrenkov, which has taken a strange twist when the airship arrives just hours before the event it is named after. This segment takes up right where it left off at the conclusion of Event Horizon, and drives that plot line forward, with all its many ramifications and consequences involving the viability of the altered states we have been living in for so long.

Ending with a recap of all the great action of 1943, this volume concludes on New Year’s Eve of that year, and we are now poised to enter the decisive year that will entitle the next volume, 1944. This compelling and detailed alternate history of the war drives faithfully on, and now we’re entering territory that will feature some of the most colorful and interesting battles of the war. The Allies are still planning a cross channel attack. The heavy bombers may lead off a major breakout operation in France akin to Operation Cobra. There may be a big airborne operation like Market Garden in the offing. The US may blunder into the nightmare that was Hurtgen Forest. Hitler will most certainly risk everything in one more counterattack like the Battle of the Bulge. The U.S. will surely go for the Marianas at Saipan and Tinian soon, even while MacArthur hastens to invade New Georgia so he can break the Bismarck Barrier and be in a position to return to his cherished Philippines. And oh yes, Georgie Zhukov will have his mind set on crossing the Dnieper.

I’ll be there!

AVAILABLE NOW : $4.99 (Kindle Version)

Ironfall

Kirov Series: Book 30

Ironfall

The war continues in 1943, as Japan launches a bold new attack against the Fiji Islands that leads to a decisive battle off Yasawa. In Syria, Erwin Rommel unleashes a classic flanking attack towards Damascus with “Operation Eisenfall,” even as the Allies attack Kesselring in Tunisia with Eisenhower’s “Operation Hammer.”

   Then, as the German 11th and 17th Armies slowly grind down the last of Soviet resistance in the Caucasus, tensions reach a breaking point when they meet Volkov’s forces dug in west of Maykop. The Führer has ordered his legions to take and occupy that place, and Ivan Volkov chooses to stand his ground. The war in the east now threatens to spiral out of control, with new fighting erupting on every frontier when General Zhukov opens his Spring offensive in a massive attack towards Kharkov that now threatens to reshape the entire front.

   Meanwhile, Elena Fairchild finally learns the fate of the men she sent into the hidden passage beneath St. Michael’s Cave, and makes a discovery that will give her the means to find and retrieve the key  lost on the Battleship Rodney. As she plans her mission, Fedorov and Karpov arrange a meeting with Volsky and Gromyko to discuss their new plan to shatter this altered meridian by traveling to 1908.

READ MORE ABOUT IRONFALL HERE

Buy for KINDLE: $4.99

Just Released: Lions at Dawn

Kirov Series, Book 28

Lions at Dawn

Arriving early for Christmas this time around, Book 28 in the Kirov Series should be available on amazon by December 23rd.

The war moves back to North Africa, where Eisenhower, Montgomery, Patton and the Air Marshals plan their drive on Tunis. General Patton has ideas of his own, and they do not involve waiting for Monty to fight his way along the Algerian coast. His plan presents a major crisis for Kesselring and Von Arnim when Hitler orders the withdrawal of all Germany’s elite paratroop units. The Führer has eyes on a new prize in the Middle East, and devises a daring return to that theater in Operation Phoenix. Meanwhile, General O’Connor’s British 8th Army begins its big push to capture Tripoli, but he meets a determined and skillful defense by the Desert Fox, Erwin Rommel.

An exploration of St. Michael’s Cave at Gibraltar by Fairchild & Company leads to a hidden mystery beneath the Rock, and far to the east, the isolated atoll at Eniwetok receives some very unexpected visitors. The surprising developments set the destroyer Takami on a dangerous collision course with Vladimir Karpov and Ivan Gromyko, when the Russians set out to cleanse the timeline of all contamination, including their own! Events lead to a dramatic battle at sea that neither side ever expected.

Lions at Dawn
by John Schettler

Part I – All Hallows Eve
Part II – Operation Phoenix
Part III – The Halfback
Part IV – Chariots of Fire
Part V – Humbugged
Part VI – Speed
Part VII – Unforgiving Minutes
Part VIII– Friends & Enemies
Part IX – Saint Michael’s Cave
Part X – Stalemate
Part XI – Lions at Dawn
Part XII – The Perfect Moment

For Kindle: $4.99
Quality Trade Paperback: $19.99

MORE INFO HERE 

Kirov Series #27: 1943

The War in the Pacific heats up as the U.S. goes on offensive.

Admiral Halsey returns leading three new Essex Class carriers into 1943. While the US makes a big push to defeat the Japanese on Fiji, Halsey must fend off the skillful maneuvers of King Kong Hara as Japan moves to garrison her vital holdings in the New Hebrides. The action on both land and sea heats up as the U.S. launches a series of bold new offensives to challenge the Rising Sun.   

Meanwhile, Vladimir Karpov leads the battlecruiser Kirov into the warm waters of the South Pacific, intent on causing harm to his enemy. He hatches a plan to take the war right to the heart of Combined Fleet operations with a daring raid on the main Japanese naval base at Truk.

Then, after a long slow journey beneath the ice, Captain Ivan Gromyko arrives in the Pacific with a very special guest aboard the submarine Kazan. Sent by Director Kamenski he must make the difficult decision to decide the fate of Kirov, yet Vladimir Karpov has other ideas that could set the two former allies into dangerous opposition... Now he uses his devious skills to try and persuade Fedorov and Volsky to join his cause.

READ MORE HERE

BUY KINDLE VERSION: $4.99

BUY TRADE PAPERBACK: $19.99
 

Special Release

War in the Pacific, Volume II

Sea of Fire

A Kirov Series Battle Book

Sea of Fire: Volume II in the alternate history of the Pacific War presents the story of JS Takami and the battles of mid to late late 1942. When the shock of what has happened to them is finally realized, they must answer the question of who’s side they will support in the war. Meanwhile, the action in the Pacific continues with the Battle of the Coral Sea, Halsey’s raid on the Marshalls where he battles a pair of Japanese ships that never were, then Yamamoto launches Operation FS and the landings on Fiji begin, leading to the US landings at Suva Bay and the climactic Battle of the Koro Sea. Karpov’s summer offensive on Sakhalin Island is also covered, with the battle between Kirov and an unexpected challenger in the Sea of Okhotsk. Finally, Admiral Hara’s Indian Ocean Raid and the battle with Somerville’s Far East Fleet concludes this volume. The action will then immediately continue in the next regular series novel, entitled 1943, which is entirely focused on the Pacific Theater, (scheduled for Nov 1 publication.)  

Sea of Fire - A Kirov Series Battle Book - More Info Here

by John Schettler
54 Chapters, 474 Pages, About 156,000 Words

 KINDLE FILE: $4.99     ~ ~ ~     TRADE PAPERBACK: $19.99

ALSO AVAILABLE IN TRADE PAPERBACK BOOK FORMAT:

Foxbane

Volume I of the Desert War

550 Pages: $19.99

GET FOXBANE HERE

 

Available Now: Thor's Anvil

Just Released!

Book 26 in the Kirov Series

Thor's Anvil

The crew of Takami returns to the South Pacific to meet with Yamamoto, and now they must undertake a new operation. A daring raid into the Indian Ocean is planned, as the Japanese aim to capture the last British outposts on Ceylon.

Lost in time, Anton Fedorov now confronts his moment of destiny in the lonesome village of Ilanskiy, and the decision he makes will decide the fate of the world he hopes to return to.

Meanwhile, the Germans now drive to the city of Volgograd, cutting it off as their troops reach the Volga in the north. There, a vital bridge links Hitler’s legions to those of Ivan Volkov, and the Germans mass their toughest Pioneers to attempt to break through at Rynok. Steiner is determined to storm this last Soviet bastion in the south, but Chuikov and Shumilov plot the stalwart Soviet defense that made this place an anvil of doom for Germany’s fortunes in the war.  As the elite German divisions strike one by one to hammer upon that anvil, General Zhukov unleashes his long awaited winter counteroffensive aimed at Kursk. Will Volgograd become the turning point in the war as it was when named Stalingrad, or will the tides of war lead fate somewhere else?

KINDLE FILE: $4.99

TRADE PAPERBACK: $19.95

MORE INFO HERE 

Special Release: Kirov Series Battle Book 3

The Kirov Battle Book Series Moves to the Pacific!

Dear  Readers,

We had originally hoped to present the Odyssey of the Argos Fire as the next Battle Book Series release this month, but that volume is taking more time than expected due to the addition of new material. To fill the void, we move now to the War in the Pacific, with the first of several Battle Books devoted exclusively to the that campaign, uninterrupted by any of the many other plot lines in the series. This month we present Volume I in the War in the Pacific: Roll of Thunder, available August 1, 2016 for Kindle and also as a trade paperback a few days after that.

About Roll of Thunder

This is the alternate history of the war in the Pacific, extracted from many volumes of the long Kirov Series and re-edited into one continuous narrative. There are already 90 chapters featuring action from the Pacific, far too many to assemble in just one volume, particularly if a print trade paperback version is also being produced, as is the case with this Pacific War Series. Those chapters are scattered throughout five or six volumes in the main series, but here, that history will be presented in a series of Battle Books, this being the first 45 of those 90 chapters.  

In this volume, the war begins with the Japanese Pearl Harbor Operation, where the first carrier to carrier battle of the war begins to set the history off on a very different course. Then comes the story of the US “Pensacola Convoy,” and the alternate history US battle with the French Pacific Fleet in the New Hebrides. As the Japanese land on the Philippines and MacArthur is forced to flee to Australia, the war progresses with a detailed presentation of Yamashita’s Malay Campaign and the exciting Battle for Singapore.

Karpov’s initial duels with the Japanese Navy are covered, including his attack on the Kido Butai, and the opening rounds of his Plan 7 operation against Japanese occupied Kamchatka. The Japanese invasion of Timor follows to recount the fate of the Australian Sparrow Force, along with the Battle of Badung Strait, the Battle of the Java Sea, and the British effort to reinforce and hold the strategic island of Java. Even as the Japanese invasion there proceeds, this volume will conclude with the dramatic events off Java that led to the arrival of a most unexpected visitor. The material above will present 45 chapters, 400 pages; about 132,750 words.

In editing this, I have revised certain segments to eliminate information not needed for this narrative, and also included small segments of new material in places to improve the flow. I worked a bit so that a reader who is new to the series can jump right in without having to read all of season 1 and 2. So if you are a Pacific War fan, I hope you will enjoy my spin on this history, though be advised that it will be heavily influenced by the underlying premise of the series as a whole—what if a modern day ship of war suddenly found itself transported into the midst of WWII? How would it, or how could it, influence the course of events and shape the outcome of the war, and by extension, of all the history that follows.

The battlecruiser Kirov was that ship, launching a series that has become much more than I ever expected from the story, and this is but one of the many subplots presented in that series, which has covered wartime action on every key front.

Volume II for the Pacific War will then continue with the story concerning Captain Harada and his crew, the Battle of the Coral Sea, Halsey’s raid on the Marshalls, Japanese Operation FS and the landings on Fiji, the Battle of the Koro Sea, US Marine Landing at Suva Bay, Karpov’s Landings on Sakhalin Island, and finally the battle between Kirov and an unexpected challenger in the Sea of Okhotsk, (another 45 chapters in all). It will then probably take at least one more volume of this same length to cover the remainder of the Pacific War, or possibly two, all chapters I expect to write as the Kirov Series soon moves into 1943. For those many readers who have written and asked me to cover the Pacific in the next release for the Battle Book Series, here it is.  Enjoy!

NOTE: And don't miss the next regular series release Thor's Anvil, which is on schedule for release Sept 1st.

- John Schettler