Promo: Dark Walker Series by Shelly Campbell

Good morning, squiders! Those of you who’ve read Hallowed Hill will know I love a good haunted house story, and I’ve got a series today that sounds amazing!

DARK WALKER SERIES

Shelly Campbell

GENRE: Speculative Fiction/Horror/ Dark Sci-fi

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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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I asked Shelly what the idea that inspired her series, and she was good enough to write me a guest post on the matter!

Guest post:

Fellow squiders, I’m happy to be a guest on the blog today. Thanks so much for having me! Gulf, book 1 of the Dark Walker series was originally inspired by a short story prompt that simply said: there’s a locked door and your main character has found the only key. What do they find beyond the door?

I thought it would be fun to write a portal short story where my character, David, finds a doorway to another world but it’s no fairytale on the other side. Terrible monsters are trying to cross the bridge he’s built, get onto his side, and devour his family. He’s inexplicably becoming invisible in his own world, and he can’t warn his family, because they don’t see or hear him.

The other inspiration behind the story was to play with the idea of invisibility. I felt a bit unseen as a teen, like I wanted to make a big impact in the world I was growing up in, but at the same time I felt too small and inadequate for the task. I wanted to lean into that. What if my main character was actually becoming invisible and they had to save their entire world on their own? That was the idea in a nutshell.

As soon as the short story was complete, I knew this was something I could expand upon. I fell in love with the main character David and needed to give him more page time to tell his story properly, so I wrote Gulf, which allowed me to get some rich world-building and deep character development onto the page. It also posed a lot of questions that (hopefully) readers would want answered.

Breach, book two, expands the worlds, answers some questions—and gets David into way more trouble ? I just finished book 3 to wrap up the series and it will be out in early 2025. It’s been one heck of a ride following David through different dimensions. If you like sci-fi horror, I hope you’ll give the series a try. I’d love to hear your thoughts on it. Keep feeding those imaginations, squiders!

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Excerpt:

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.

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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

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