I was tired of dystopian stories with depressed teenage characters. So I decided to write a book where the struggles were very real, but there was hope beyond merely being a survivor.

The result?

Unbanded.

Anna wants her memories back. All of them.
If you want to know what happens when…

• The government tries to regulate emotions
• The surface world is scarred by firestorms, so cities are sheltered in great abandoned quarries
• A feisty heroine wakes up from a coma with false memories
• The City of Ember meets Mockingjay

Then Unbanded is the book for you!

In the city of Mendacium, your emotions aren’t your own. All citizens wear government-regulated empath bands that monitor their feelings and keep dissent from spiking.

All citizens…except the rebels deep in the city, known as Unbanded.

When Anna wakes in a hospital, with her last year a blank grayness, she’s told the rebels nearly killed her. She’s told she worked among the Unbanded as an undercover agent. And she’s told by Commander Kagan, the brother she can barely remember, that she must regain memory of an impending Unbanded attack before the rebels turn the empath bands against the city.

But her returning memories don’t add up.

As Anna navigates her fragmented past, relationships she doesn’t remember, and political intrigue, the questions only turn darker. What actions did she commit among the Unbanded? Who is actually weaponizing empath bands? Can she trust the split loyalties of her former handler?

And why does she find herself recognizing and caring about those who should be her enemies?

Unbanded was first launched via Kickstarter in October 2025 with a successful campaign that pulled together 127 backers and $5,051. The retail launch was June 16, 2026 with copies available via Amazon and the author’s website. Find more details (like a picture of the cool stamp each autographed copy gets) here!