In the intense final installment of The Byron Trilogy, a demon-infested version of 1920s San Francisco, only the gifted can see the darkness coming.
Demons walk the streets of San Francisco, but the city’s citizens remain blissfully unaware. It’s up to gifted supernatural investigators like Falan and his sharp-witted partner Cassi Wu to hunt down the evil hiding in plain sight and stop it before it spreads. When they’re called to a decaying house on McAllister Street, they expect a typical exorcism. Instead, they’re nearly killed by a force unlike anything they’ve faced before, a mocking, entity immune to their usual demon-fighting methods. Things take a darker turn when a dead girl appears in their mentor Byron’s parlor, bearing a terrifying message:
A Shadow is coming. It’s almost here. And it wants to destroy all life.
Now, ghosts are flashing through the city like lightning strikes, and rumors of impossible hauntings send fear through San Francisco’s underworld. With time running out, Falan and Cassi must confront not only the rising threat but the truth behind it… and it may be tied to their own pasts in ways they never imagined. As the supernatural world begins to crack open, one thing becomes clear: this final hunt will change everything.
Fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Grimm, Angel, and The Dresden Files will love this action-packed blend of urban fantasy, alternate history, and Christian supernatural suspense. Perfect for readers who enjoy the dark spiritual warfare of Frank Peretti and the adrenaline-fueled thrills of Ted Dekker.
Don’t miss the electrifying finale of The Byron Trilogy.
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The Story Behind the Story
With Falan, I decided to deviate from my earlier pattern of writing demon vs. my supernatural gumshoe stories, and create a ghost story instead. My young Black hero, Falan, gifted to confront and defeat demons, along with his friend Cassi Wu show up at a house in San Franciso, prepared to do their usual exorcism… and find something else instead. It is not a demon. It does not respond to their usual tactics. It takes a hell of an effort to banish it from the property…
But ghosts don’t exist. Right?
Ghosts are a fun concept for me to explore, because I’ve always wished they could be real in a sense. But it also baffles me about why we always give them a sinister overtone, as if our loved ones going to “another place” or being in “a second dimension” would somehow alter their personality and make them sinister. Does death truly transform us that much, into something the living would not recognize? Is this a fear-based warping of our dread of the unknown? Philosophical thoughts, for another time.
Out of this idea stemmed more ghosts, a shadow, and an ancient foe, somewhat inspired by reading a great deal of Sir Terry Pratchett (may he rest in peace, and be writing hilarious novels in the afterlife with Death at his side). I stole… err, borrowed some of his concepts for certain aspects of this story, with love and respect. I also stole… err, borrowed some ideas from other places, such as the medieval Catholic imagery of Purgatory as an in-between place of waiting; and I infused it with a small tribute to C. S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce, in that souls who pass into this great beyond must choose to journey toward the distant mountains (heaven). I would like to think Lewis would enjoy my little book. Who knows? Maybe he’s reading it now.
It was a joy for me to write with a different set of characters, but it felt important for me not to be cliched. I wanted Falan to have his own story, a powerful one in which he does what he was born to do, defeat evil with his loyal dog at his side. Because Raven and Byron both have supernaturally gifted cats, it felt only right that a boy and a dog embark on a dangerous mission together. Because they are man’s best friend, after all.
