The only act of piracy that no one seems to mind is preying upon pirates themselves.

A ship and crew with no port to call home still need supplies. And to take those supplies by force makes one the lowest form of life in the Black Ocean: pirates. But avoiding that moral quagmire doesn't put food on the table or fuel in the engines. Hunting other pirates, by contrast, does. And no navy or government will shed a tear.

Mission 5: Empty Jesters The newly dubbed Arete is on a self-appointed mission to clear civilized space of pirates, since the squabbling former ARGO worlds no longer devote the resources to stop them. Captain Jessie Ramsey manages to plunder enough ships to feed her own people, but just barely. What happens when she takes prisoners, and they need to eat, too. And what about this mystery wizard they rescued from one pirate vessel, who seems to know Eric Ramsey a little too well?

Mission 6: Realspace Real Chase With ramshackle equipment, failures were inevitable. But when the Arete's star-drive goes down, the sharks of the galaxy circle. Stuck in realspace, fast, but not as fast as their tormentors' star-drives, formidable but not invincible, the crew rushes repairs. Because if engines or weapons fail them before they can flee back to astral space, they're done for.

Mission 7: Outlaw World With allies scant, Jessie Ramsey tries to negotiate port rights with a world that took the civil war as an opportunity to declare their own independence from Earth and Mars. However, those talks get put on hold when rebels against the independent government take Jessie and a companion hostage. But these rebels didn't know who they were dealing with.

Mission 8: Who Let the Dogs In The Arete is possible the most potent ship in this half of the galaxy. But inside, they're nothing more than a misfit collection of species trying to adapt to an unfamiliar alien technology. With the right strike team and the right plan, taking over the ship might be easier than fighting it. Especially since someone lured the ship's wizard away at the worst possible time.

Bonus Short Story: Amid Summer Night Schemes Aboard the Arete, chaos reigns. Light on rules, everyone does what they feel like, and as a result, little gets done. But the ship's bartender has a solution: money. Not to make it, but to print their own and use it amongst themselves. And of course, being a little outside the law to begin with, there is no way that homemade coins and no financial oversight could possibly go wrong.

Black Ocean: Passage of Time is a science fantasy series set in the late 26th century. What if Futurama jumped 5 years ahead instead of 1000? What if Doc and Marty lost the car keys? What if Bonnie and Clyde were siblings instead of lovers? Passage of Time jolts the Black Ocean universe forward into new adventures and new perils with a new cast of zany misfits trying to outsmart the galaxy just to get by.

Strap in and hold on tight. Passage of Time is the latest series in the Black Ocean universe, and it's an action-packed, mystery-filled, madcap ride across the galaxy!

I am a creator of worlds and a destroyer of words. As a fantasy writer, my works range from traditional epics to futuristic fantasy with starships. I have worked as an unpaid Little League pitcher, a cashier, a student library aide, a factory grunt, a cubicle drone, and an engineer--there is some overlap in the last two.

Through it all, though, I was always a storyteller. Eventually I started writing books based on the stray stories in my head, and people kept telling me to write more of them. Now, that's all I do for a living.

I enjoy strategy, worldbuilding, and the fantasy author's privilege to make up words. I am a gamer, a joker, and a thinker of sideways thoughts. But I don't dance, can't sing, and my best artistic efforts fall short of your average notebook doodle. When you read my books, you are seeing me at my best.

My ultimate goal is to be both clever and right at the same time. I have it on good authority that I have yet to achieve it.

Visit me at jsmorin.com