The Reddening

Katrine is a lifestyle journalist who moved to a stretch of coast known for seaside holidays and natural beauty, hoping to leave earlier traumas behind. Her new life is disturbed when a huge hoard of human remains and prehistoric artefacts turns up near Brickburgh.

Helene is a lone parent, disillusioned, who lost her brother Lincoln six years ago. Before he vanished, he recorded strange sounds from underground, and they pull her toward the caves at Brickburgh. Early humans butchered one another there over sixty thousand years, and images of their nameless gods still cover the walls.

The area is remote and unwelcoming to outsiders. Rumours of drug plantations circulate, there are fresh sightings of the mythical red folk, and people who ask too many questions have been vanishing for years. Locals believe an infernal power lingers beneath the earth.

Kat and Helene have no real choice but to face it, to protect themselves and the people they love. This is folk horror with a prehistoric streak, built around ancient rites, old deities and a violence that predates civilization. It won the August Derleth Award for Best Horror Novel in 2020.