Welcome

Karen J Carlisle is a writer of Victorian mysteries, steampunk, fantasy, and cosies with a twist.
Illustrator. Gardener. Chocoholic and tea lover.

Steampunk Event this weekend!

Celebrate Christmas in July

For those who love to read Christmas/Holiday stories: you asked for it, so you got it.
Karen is publishing Viola Stewart’s Christmas adventure, Tomorrow, When I Die, in paperback.
Join Karen for an online, live book launch in July, to celebrate both Tomorrow, When I Die: A Christmas Adventure, (Viola Stewart) and Twixtmas: An Aunt Enid Christmas Story (of sorts) for Christmas in July!
New cover reveal coming soon.

Karen is currently working on the second book in her steampunk adventure series, The Department of Curiosities, set mostly in Adelaide.

Book Boxes:

Limited edition ‘12 Days of Twixtmas’ Book Box (physical book box)
To celebrate the release of Twixtmas, Karen is creating a limited number of book boxes, with paperback and book-related items (orders available now).
Direct from author only. Enjoy 12 days of opening presents (including paperback), each a book/Christmas-related item – some hand-made by the author herself (that’s me!).
Included: the paperback (and eBook download), something to drink, something to play with, things to decorate with, something to use when reading, something to wear, and more!
**Digital Book Box coming soon.

Doctor Jack & Other Tales digital eBook Box – Announcing my first digital book box!
This was one of my secret projects for 2024, inspired by author Nicole McKeon, The eBook box was launched to celebrate Doctor Jack & Other Tales being the chosen book for August’s Temporal Textural Talks – a steampunk book club run by Madame Askew and the Grand Arbiter
What’s inside: eBook download link, annotated maps, printable art and ‘Ghastly Murder’ front page posters, computer wallpaperss, printable character art colour in pages, ambient soundtracks, printable crochet pattern for your own granny book square!
Grab your eBook box now from: https://karenjcarlisle.com/product/doctor-jack-ebook-box/ (AU$)
This item is a virtual/digital product. No postage is required.

Want regular updates and news?
Sign up to Karen’s email list for her monthly newsletter, Tea & Tidings.

You can find Karen on youTube, Tiktok, Instagram, Facebook, Bluesky and Mastadon , and support her on Patreon to receive sneak peeks, exclusives, behind the scenes, and more, or buy her a cup of tea at Ko-fi.

Other books include:

Her ongoing series, The Aunt Enid Mysteries, is cosy(ish) fantasy mysteries set in Adelaide.
Great Aunt Enid is your average seventy-something year old. She loves to cook, is a regular at bingo and spends hours in her garden, talking to her army of garden gnomes and fussing over the colour of her hydrangeas…
And only she stands between the Dark and the fate of the world.

Aunt Enid’s back, but something’s changed…
A deal with fairies… to solve a mystery… and prevent a war.
Fairies and magic: It’s all real!

A Fey Tale: Find out how Arthur Conan Doyle’s visit to Adelaide in 1920, and how Adelaide’s mysterious fairy doors inspired the book.
Twixtmas: Sally must travel to an unknown Otherworld, with an unwanted companion, to safe a friend.

Book 3,  Twixtmas, Now available direct from author and online
VIEW BOOK TRAILER #1/ BOOK TRAILER #2

Your BONUS Aunt Enid prequel mini-adventure is available in eBook/digital format with newsletter subscription.

Ever wonder that happened to Doctor Jack (The Adventures of Viola Stewart)? His journey continues in the first book of the James Findlay Journals.

Because villains are the heroes of their own story.
A dark mystery on the high seas in a new series.

Available direct from author in eBook and paperback
or from online stores.

View Booktrailer HERE and Don’t forget your Book Tea! 

Karen has collaborated with Adelaide tea merchant Wyverstone Tea to create Crimson Smog, a book a tea blend to enjoy while reading Blood Ties. Read more about Book Teas HERE. (links to Wyverstone tea)

The Adventures of Viola Stewart is a three-book series of Victorian mysteries, set in the late 1880s. Viola Stewart is a widowed optician with a penchant for detectiving who, with her friend, Doctor Henry Collins, chases secret societies and uncovers nefarious plots. All three books in The Adventures of Viola Stewart have been re-released with new shiny covers.
Buy them now – DIRECT FROM AUTHOR or online – via Karen’s shop.

Mrs Hudson Investigates – original short eBook series of Holmesian mysteries featuring Mrs Hudson, John Watson, and Mary Watson.

With the help of Mary Watson, Mrs Hudson proves she is just as canny as the Great Detective. I mean, what can’t a woman do if she puts her mind to it?

The Department of Curiosities is the first book in her second series (duology) of books set in her Victorian steampunk world. This series is set in early to mid 1880s, with new characters, and is a rollicking steampunk tale of adventure, a heroine, mad scientists, traitors and secrets. All for the good of the Empire.
(Second edition, 2023 – eBook and paperback, with new cover. Available now – from author and online)

 View Booktrailers HERE

Cogs and Conspiracies is a steampunk short story collection:- Five short tales set in a world of steampunk and alternate history, with adventures from England to the Antipodes. Here be villains, gadgets, mechanical creatures, secrets and conspiracies. All in time for tea.
Available in Paperback and eBook direct from authoror from online stores. (2023)

Find out about Karen’s other short story collections HERE

CLICK HERE if you want to know book trigger warnings

Read more about Karen