Happy Thursday, friend! The spotlight for today is author Ross Harrison and the latest in his NEXUS series, Fear of the Dark. I previously enjoyed Blades of the Fallen from the series. Let’s welcome him and learn about the book.
Get to know the author: Ross Harrison
Welcome, Ross! Tell me and my readers a bit about yourself!
I have been writing since I was a child (something my dad kindly reminded me of just recently when he emailed me a copy of something I wrote so long ago I have literally no memory of it). It’s the only thing I want to do, can do (no need for anyone to comment on that), or can imagine doing. It turns out, I also enjoy writing screenplays, so I have been trying to find more time to write some of those.
How long did it take you to write this book, from the first idea to the last edit?
If we’re counting the first time I put any words of the book down, then I technically started in April 2019. But that’s because I will sometimes get a scene in my head for a book I’m not writing and have to put it down. I think I properly started writing soon after Church of the Assassin was published – so around Christmas 2020. A year and a half seems to be about my average, regardless of the length of novel (this is by far the longest).
Who would enjoy reading your book?
Why, anyone, of course! But perhaps I could narrow it down… Fear of the Dark is a science-fantasy space opera, so fans of Banks or Hamilton , for example, may not enjoy it. There is no hard sci-fi in my books (more Star Wars/Guardians of the Galaxy than Interstellar or The Martian, to put it in film terms), but this one does have just a hint of horror. I can’t say that I can put my finger on why, but traditionally, my books seem to draw a slightly larger female audience, which is nice.
Do you have a favourite quote or scene in the book that you find yourself going back to?
I don’t know if it counts, but I have a soft spot for the first scene with the main characters, Archer and Juni, together. They are technically the main characters of the series, yet I haven’t actually written about them since book 2 (and they’re only side characters in that), in 2012! So ten years later, I found myself with a stupid grin writing their first scene together.
I’m also fond of a sinister question that is asked of one of the characters, from an unseen entity: “What is the nature of fear?”
What is something you have learned on your author journey so far?
It’s the only thing I want to do.
What’s the best piece of advice you have received related to writing?
To take in, but then ignore, most writing advice. And also to just keep writing.
If you could give a shout out to someone(s) who has helped in your writer journey, please feel free to mention them below!
I was looking at my bookshelf the other day, and I was reminded (with a prickle of embarrassment) the time I wrote to Malcolm Rose (author of the Traces series) as a teenager. I don’t remember what I asked him or even really what he said back, but I do remember that he actually did reply and he was very nice, encouraging, and generous with his time and advice.
I also can’t/shouldn’t go through a question like this without mentioning Mary Fan (Jane Colt, Flynn Nightsider), whom I met on a Harper Collins site before either of us had published our books. Hers was also space opera, so we were drawn to each other’s books and we shared some critiques, and hers was my first review after publication, which was also the first review on her blog. So it was nice to share some bits of the same journey.
This book is part of the same series as Blades of the Fallen. Tell me more about the series. How many books are there? Do you have ideas for another series or story?
Although standalone, this will be the sixth book in the NEXUS space opera/science fantasy series, named as such due to the fact that every book has some kind of connection to at least one other. The original idea was that those connections could be as simple as a passer-by bumping into Archer in one book, and then that passer-by is the main character of another book in which they happen to bump into some idiot not looking where he’s going. But in reality, the connections are much stronger. For the most part, the books are standalone, because I wanted a Discworld style series that people could technically get more from by reading in order, but still pick up any of them in any order they want.
I have many idea for many more books in the series, including a third Fallen book to make that a trilogy, two more Fear books to make this a trilogy, and two more Assassin books to make that a trilogy too (character trilogies, though, as the stories themselves are wrapped up in each book). And then the end of the series will also be a trilogy (ignore the contradiction to the Discworld bit), so I might need to try to write faster so I’m still alive to actually finish the series.
Now that I realise I misread the question… As for other series, I would like to write a fantasy series after this one, and a thriller series, because I enjoyed writing my noir thriller, Acts of Violence, and Church is more thriller than sci-fi, so I think my mind is looking in that direction more than it used to.
Fear of the Dark
Genre: Science Fiction
Publication Year: 2022
A dark planet on the galaxy’s edge. A primordial predator. A desperate hunt for a dangerous secret.
When the medical frigate Ruby Rose picks up an SOS from the planet’s lightning-ravaged surface, the medics do not hesitate to drop into the raging storm. But the innocuous little planet is home to something sinister. Something desperate. Something that will stop at nothing to find what it’s looking for.
Across the galaxy, the crew of the Star Wraith receives a call for help. The captain of a medical frigate has lost his medics, and one of their names is all too familiar. But how could the Wraith’s crew know that a simple rescue mission will lead to a string of murders and a waking nightmare that will leave them forever changed?
Content notes: While it is not the focus or described in detail, one character is dealing with anxiety/panic attacks resulting from combat trauma that occurred before this book.
Book Excerpt from
Fear of the Dark
She pulled off the cap and struck it. With spitting and sizzling, hot red light flooded the area. A hideous face glared down at her and she gasped and recoiled. It didn’t move. The deep shadows in every nook and cranny caused the stone face, already on the edge of the flare’s reach, to look perhaps more evil and intimidating than its sculptor intended. It sent a chill along Victoria’s spine.
Perhaps it was her heart rate beginning to slow again and the sweat on her skin cooling, or the severe grey-blue stone shining in the unnatural red light, but she felt cold. Eerily cold, if that was a thing. Like the few times she’d walked into a morgue. The light showed her that the entrance hall of the tower was small and empty aside from the statue regarding her from the flickering shadows. She hadn’t expected a receptionist sitting behind a desk, but was there no one to meet her and ask her why she was there? Why was the entrance open if there was no one to stop trespassers? She supposed they could be thousands of miles from any other signs of civilisation. This could be the only inhabited part of the entire planet. Not much need for a ‘Keep Out’ sign, then. Alternatively, everyone could be occupied with whatever emergency was her reason for being on the planet. And it was probably safe to assume this was where the SOS signal originated.
There was nothing else but walls and floor. And steps. Steps in the corner, past the stone observer, disappearing into a walled stairway spiralling to the next floor, about six metres above her head. Victoria wasn’t sure how a tower that looked so wide on the outside could have an interior entrance hall so much smaller. Were the walls that thick for protection against the powerful lightning or was there something inside them? An elevator would make sense, but there were no obvious doors.
Whatever the case, she needed to climb those stairs and find her crew, the emergency, the tower’s inhabitants or, ideally, all of the above. Succumbing to the urge to move quietly in the still, dark space, she moved towards the steps.
But the statue didn’t want her there. It was a stupid thought, but that was exactly what it felt like as the flare’s light crept over the stone and revealed more of the grotesque, four-metre-tall creature. Now that she could see it in its entirety, it raised the hackles of her fight or flight instinct. It was clearly only stone, yet it made her want to turn and leave. No, not turn. She couldn’t turn her back to this thing.
The statue had seemed familiar in form when she could see only a vague, anthropoid face. But as it stalked into the light, it became something else. A forehead and four narrow eyes that, individually, could almost be human slid, melted into something akin to two elephant trunks, twisting like gnarled branches around and behind its bulbous torso. From this, six flabby tentacles quested outward, the entire surface of each covered alternately with barbed suckers and deep, trypophobia-inducing orifices. The tentacles were so well realised that they looked as though someone had frozen a real creature. Its eyes, though blank stone, glared angrily, hungrily, primally at her, equally beckoning her to come nearer and telling her to flee.
Everything about the thing felt wrong. Its eyes, though narrow, were slightly too large and deep, the tentacles were just a bit too long, the torso was too heavy-looking for something that seemed like it could easily run down any prey it wanted. It was uncannily real looking, despite being alike nothing she thought could exist. It was perfectly sculpted from a single block of stone, yet her brain wanted to see it as multiple statues pieced together, such was its bizarre and abhorrent appearance.
Her skin crawled. This was not for her eyes. Who sculpted it and why? It sat there like an eldritch deity, threatening to twist her mind if she continued to dare gaze upon it, yet to reach out and crush her if she were fool enough to look away.
Victoria squeezed her fist tight until it stung a little, to remind herself that she was in the real world, not a horror story. It was only a creepy statue, made eerier by the unnatural light of the flare. She was an adult, and too intelligent to be frozen to the spot by arty stone.
In defiance of the watcher’s predatory gaze, she pushed forward, towards the steps. One of the tentacles partially blocked the way, and she turned sideways – facing the statue, of course – to sidle past it. The barb protruding from a sucker on the end of the still yet writhing tentacle threatened to slice her suit, but she carefully slid by unharmed. Despite her resolution that the unsettling nature of the thing was all in her mind, she continued to face it as she put her back to the wall and started up the steps sideways.
Some quality of the stone around her, Victoria assumed, caused the lightning flashes to seem more subdued, softer. Several flashes followed her up the stairs, and some childlike part of her brain believed the statue had shifted position every time one came. Bit by bit, the sinister creature melted back into shadow until somehow only the face remained. And then, with a smirk, that too slipped into darkness.
Interested?
Learn more about Fear of the Dark on Goodreads, Storygraph, IndieStoryGeek and Amazon.
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Cover image: Photo on Unsplash
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