Cold Rain Falling

Out in the black, every past decision echoes.

Captain Joe Huelise has spent half his life hauling freight across forgotten routes-uncharted sectors where laws fade and reputation keeps you alive.

Tired, worn down, generally pissed off, resents almost everyone else. Simmering anger under his smile. Violent nightmares. Prime was twenty years ago.

His ship, the Cold Rain Falling, carries more scars than crew, each one earned under contract to Yellow Knife Intermodal Freight: long hauls, low pay, and silence when things go wrong.

But this run feels different. Cargo manifests don't match. Crew members whisper in the corridors. Somewhere between two dying stars, the Cold Rain begins to hum like it remembers something-a voice deep in the hull, older than Huelise's command, older maybe than the company itself.

When a ghost transmission slips through the static, the captain finds himself trapped between loyalty to his contract and the unraveling truth about who- or what-really owns the Cold Rain Falling.

As isolation deepens and the boundaries between machine and memory blur, every man and woman aboard must decide what their silence is worth.
And in the quiet reaches of space, silence can kill.

A hard-edged, atmospheric sci-fi novel of freight, fatigue, and fading humanity, Cold Rain Falling delivers slow-burn tension and psychological depth for readers who loved The Expanse, Alien: Isolation, and Rendezvous with Rama.

Lee Anne Wonnacott Weltsch is a dog lover, writer, and author of Western fiction and science fiction novels as well as business books.

With several years of writing short stories, poetry, and novellas, Lee Anne has a unique story-telling technique on how people get into bad situations.

Lee Anne has a master's degree from the University of Phoenix. Her travels have taken her to the nooks and crannies of Mexico and Europe to broaden her historical knowledge.

Now retired from the professional recruiting business, Lee Anne lives and works out of her home within eyesight of Mt. Hood in Portland, Oregon. She lives quietly with her husband, Gil.