Welcome to the home of Aether Torrent, launching September 2, 2025!

Aether Torrent is a 94,000-word YA action-adventure fantasy novel about labor, religion, found family, and the meaning of treasure, all LGBTQ+ friendly.

I started writing Aether Torrent in May of 2007 simply for the amusement of myself and my friends. Too many years of refinement later, here we are.

So, what's the story about?

Even in a world of magic, the economics of exploitation still rule.

Tori, a disenchanted atheist stealing treasures and suffering through retail, wants to turn her black-market boss's ill-gotten treasures into a life-affirming museum.

Avani, a devoutly religious fugitive blamed for her temple's violence, wants to evangelize safely distant from the influence of her temple's zealots.

Cirrus, a flying, shape-shifting tiger woman coerced into mercenary violence by her military, wants help for a private mission of her own.

The three women help each other fight their way out of their respective bad situations and into a new goal: reaching Tori's mother in a distant city where, Tori hopes, all of their wishes can come true.

Over five days and nights, Tori, Avani, and Cirrus travel between city-states and wilderness, battling through monsters and manipulators, growing closer in every trial. All the while, they race time; if they take too long, Tori's "museum" treasures will be confiscated before the world can enjoy them like she does.

Magic exists in their world as a natural force. Ordinary people wielding the proper tools can draw out elements of the omnipresent aether and use them to supplement the world's early-20th-century technology. Those who do so frequently are called aetherists.

Words of Praise for Aether Torrent

"This story is cinematic as all get-out. It gives us a likeable cast and keeps moving as Tori, Avani, and Cirrus move from one train wreck to the next, leaving chaos in their wake.

It's a ton of fun, and you also have a unique world filled with magic and crime and shark people and giant crabs. It's got a ton of different moving parts, and everything is bursting with life.

Frankly, I think that if you get an agent's attention with this, you've got a really good chance at getting this optioned, because it feels like it's begging to be adapted to a visual medium."

~ Trick Weekes, Narrative Designer at Bioware, lead writer for the Dragon Age series, and author of Dragon Age: The Masked Empire, Feeder, and the Rogues of the Republic series

About the Author

Jack Duffe (pronounced like Duffy) is a certified English teacher and liberal secular progressive humanist from -- of all places -- the state of Oklahoma. It can happen! He enjoys reading, politics, history, yardwork, and nerd media of many kinds. He will now stop speaking in third-person.

Peruse my Lnk.bio for convenience, or follow me at @jackscarab.bsky.social on Bluesky!