Dark Walker Series: Gulf

 

DARK WALKER SERIES

Shelly Campbell

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GENRE:   Speculative Fiction/Horror/ Dark Sci-fi

 

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BLURB:

 

Series Blurb: 

 

When we were children, they told us monsters weren't real. They were dead wrong.

 

It’s just a closet door with a skeleton key, but when David opens it, he unlocks a gateway to a sinister world that’s bent on destroying everything and everyone he loves. Some doors are better left closed. 

 

Embark on a thrilling journey with the Dark Walker Series, and be transported into an interdimensional tale of monsters, lies and self-discovery. Where the terror of darkness is real and the line between ally and enemy is as thin as a blade.

 

"Equal parts coming of age story and otherworldly horror, Gulf probes the depths of loneliness, loss of identity and childhood trauma. It is a true treat for fans of the genre and had me clutched in its razor-clawed hands from the first word to the last.” -C.M. Forest author of Infested

 

Book One Blurb:

 

Seventeen-year-old David is fading from his world, like a Polaroid picture in reverse. He longs to feel connected to something bigger.

 

When his brothers discover the new extension at the rental cottage comes with a locked door, David finds the key first. Expecting to claim a bedroom, he opens a dimensional gateway instead, exploring abandoned versions of his world in different timelines, 1960s muscle cars alternating with crumbling cottages.

 

Except now the dimensional bridge won’t close, and something hungry claws the door at night. David scours for clues to break the bridge, but each trip to the other side makes him fade more on his. Even if he succeeds, he risks severing his connection to his own world, and dying on the wrong side, forgotten.

 

Book Two Blurb:

 

There are doors that open to other worlds, but it’s no fairytale on the other side.

 

I thought otherworldly monsters bent on devouring my whole world starting with my family trumped everything. Turns out, I was wrong. My world's only one of thousands facing annihilation from the maneaters that tried to eat me alive. Charlie saved me, rolled into my life on a motorcycle, and rescued me.

 

Problem is, I’m the Embassy’s property now. They’re the interdimensional agency tasked with stemming the flow of ravenous aliens into our universe, but they seem more interested in studying me. I crashed a gateway in a way they’ve never seen. The Embassy wants to replicate that. I think they want to use me as a war weapon.

 

If I don’t convince Charlie to help me escape, I’ll be an Embassy science experiment for the rest of my short life, or worse, eternally trapped in the dark hell that fills the spaces between worlds.

 

 

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Excerpt Three from GULF:

 

Something that sounds like a dog scrabbling across hardwood jolts me awake. I focus on a low wooden ceiling and struggle to place my surroundings. My legs tingle under a heavy weight, and when I push away what I assume is a blanket, the dictionary slides off my knees and falls to the floor with a thud. The busy scratching intensifies, reminds me of mice running through our hollow walls back home, or cockroaches.

 

That sounds bigger than cockroaches. I frown.“Shit!” I whisper, scrambling to the edge of the loft, and blinking into the darkness below.

 

James is standing in front of the couch. A wedge of pale moonlight from the kitchen window ribbons across his back, and his shoulders shudder. He’s shivering. A moving shadow ahead of him catches my gaze. It’s a black hand extending under the door, elongated fingers splayed, claws scrabbling for purchase on the worn planks as it reaches for James’s ankle.

 

“James!” I yelp.

 

He shuffles closer to the five-panel, oblivious to my call, but the maneater hears it and rattles the door violently.

 

“James, stop!” I plunge down the ladder and my feet hit the floor so hard my ankles twinge. Spinning, I grip the couch as I round it, grasping for my brother’s shoulder. I miss, barely raking his back as he shuffles ahead with his hand reaching for the crystal doorknob glinting in the moonlight. “James!”

 

The black questing hand snags around his ankle and yanks hard.

 

James’s chin snaps against his chest as the rest of him rag-dolls backward. A thick smack reverberates through the floor as his head ricochets off hardwood.

 

I scream and jump over him.

 

The claw twists James’s foot sideways and jerks back, mashing my brother’s heel against the bottom of the shuddering door, deaf to his waking, harrowing wail.

 

Blood trickles down his foot.

A Word With the Author

1.Did you always want to be an author?

 

According to a dusty pink diary my sister and I recently uncovered in my mom’s basement, I’ve wanted to be a famous author from at least the age of eight. I didn’t take it seriously until I was into my forties though.

2.Tell us about the publication of your first book.

 

My debut book Under the Lesser Moon is a grimdark fantasy that had a bumpy road to publication. It received an offer and I waited a year for a contract before I withdrew it for fear that the book would never actually get published. After that, it was picked up by a lovely small publisher who helped me tear it down and build it back up into a proper book. They provided several thorough rounds of editing and procured a fantastic cover artist. They did the same with book 2 in the series Voice of the Banished, and I was just thrilled with the whole process. Unfortunately, my books were out for less than two years before that publisher closed their doors. I had my rights returned, and the cover artist was lovely enough to grant me cover rights too—that’s quite rare. I added a bunch of interior character art, had audiobook versions created, and brought The Marked Son duology back into print under my self-publishing imprint Dark Little Bird Publishing. I intend for it to stay on the shelves for a good long while!

 

3.Besides yourself, who is your favorite author in the genre you write in?

 

I write in horror, sci-fi, and fantasy. My favorite horror author at the moment would be Laurel Hightower, sci-fi I’d go with Essa Hansen, and for fantasy Trudie Skies.

4.What's the best part of being an author? The worst?

 

The best part of being an author is getting other people so excited about the worlds and characters you’ve made up in your head that they feel compelled to let you know they loved it. How magical is it that? A bit of ink on paper can stir emotions in people I’ll never meet, even after I’m long gone. 

5.What are you working on now?

 

I’m working on book three in my Sol Survivor series. It’s a YA solar flare post-apocalypse where our main character Iris struggles to survive in near future Canada. It’s got found family, lush world-building, and a few good twists! My co-writer Megan King and I wanted to create a series where someone with ADHD was the main character and hero and we’d love if you checked out the first two books in the series, Knowledge Itself, and Madness of People.

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

At a young age, Shelly Campbell wanted to be an air show pilot or a pirate, possibly a dragon and definitely a writer and artist. She’s piloted a Cessna 172 through spins and stalls, and sailed up the east coast on a tall ship barque—mostly without projectile vomiting. In the end, Shelly found writing and drawing dragons to be so much easier on the stomach. Shelly writes speculative fiction ranging from grimdark fantasy, to sci-fi and horror. She’d love to hear from you.

 

http://www.shellycampbellauthorandart.com

https://twitter.com/ShellyCFineArt

https://www.instagram.com/shellycampbellfineart

https://www.facebook.com/shellycampbellauthorandart

https://www.tiktok.com/@shellycampbellauthor

 

 

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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION 

 

The author will be awarding a $15 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner.

 

 

 

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway