Blog Archives
Wistman’s Wood – A Tale of the Moors and Beyond
Wistman’s Wood is a mystical, idea-driven novel that begins with one man’s walk into an ancient Dartmoor oak wood and grows into a story about human consciousness, planetary responsibility, and the possibility of change. Michael Trelawny’s quiet ramble through Wistman’s Wood turns strange when he encounters a mysterious woman whose presence unsettles him and pulls him toward something far larger than local legend. The book has the feel of a spiritual quest wrapped in folklore, with the moor itself acting less like a setting and more like a living intelligence.
The strongest part of the novel is its atmosphere. The early chapters move slowly in a good way, letting the reader settle into the landscape: the granite, the twisted oaks, the stream, the old pub, the sense that Dartmoor is watching. The line “Entering the woods was almost like saying hello to an old friend” captures the book’s relationship with place beautifully. Wistman’s Wood feels ancient, protective, and not entirely knowable, which makes Michael’s growing obsession with the woman of the wood feel natural rather than forced.
As the story expands, it becomes much more than a ghostly encounter on the moors. Clair’s arrival gives Michael someone to question, challenge, and believe alongside, and their connection grounds the more cosmic elements of the plot. Through Enchantment, the novel introduces the grey mist, an ancient constraint woven into human consciousness, and the story moves into an ambitious blend of myth, environmental concern, artificial intelligence, sacred sites, and spiritual awakening. It’s a big swing, and the book clearly wants readers to think about empathy, long-term responsibility, and what humanity might become if it could get out of its own way.
What’s interesting is that the novel doesn’t treat transformation as instant perfection. Even after the solstice ritual, the world still has conflict, doubt, media noise, and people trying to understand what happened. That choice gives the final third of the book a more reflective feel. Michael’s realization that “The correction has been made. The rest is up to us” sums up the heart of the story. The mystical event matters, but the real focus is what people do afterward, in their ordinary choices and relationships.
Wistman’s Wood is a contemplative novel for readers who enjoy folklore, metaphysical fiction, and stories that ask large questions through a personal journey. It starts with mossy stones and strange laughter in an ancient wood, then opens into a vision of humanity standing at a turning point. Its voice is earnest, its concerns are deeply human, and its best moments come when the mystery of the moor and the hope for inner change meet in the same scene.
Pages: 152 | ASIN : B0GT25WNRX
Mine-Shift
Mine-Shift, by John Kitchen, is a time-slip adventure about Joel Penberthy, a teenage Cornish miner whose life is split between the brutal reality of the eighteenth century and the strange brightness of the twenty-first. Joel first stumbles into the future through an old mine passage, carrying with him fear, guilt, superstition, and a fierce loyalty to his injured father. His first clear reaction says a lot about the book’s heart: “I don’t belong here.” That feeling of being out of place drives the story, but so does Joel’s growing sense that belonging can change.
The novel is especially strong when it keeps Joel close to the physical world he knows. The mine is hot, dangerous, cramped, and full of old beliefs, while modern Cornwall feels almost magical through his eyes, with cars, phones, medicine, surfing, bright shops, and easy friendship. Kitchen gets a lot of mileage out of that contrast. The future isn’t treated as a joke or a simple rescue. It’s confusing, dazzling, and sometimes frightening, and Joel has to learn it piece by piece.
Joel’s friendships with Cass, Karl, and Ewan give the book much of its warmth. Cass is curious, bold, and kind, and her bond with Joel gives the story a tender pull without taking it away from adventure. Karl and Ewan help widen Joel’s world, while Dr Greaves brings practical hope through medicine. What’s nice is that these modern characters don’t just teach Joel things. They give him room to become more himself, and that makes his transformation feel earned.
At the same time, the story keeps one foot firmly in Joel’s old life. His father’s injury, Hab’s anger, the Pellar’s influence, and the suspicion of “black arts” create real pressure around every trip through the portal. Joel isn’t simply choosing between misery and comfort. He loves people on both sides of time, and that makes the ending land with a quiet sadness as well as relief. By the close, when Joel is described as “a twenty-first-century boy,” the line feels less like escape and more like the final shape of a hard choice.
Mine-Shift is a thoughtful adventure about courage, change, and the shock of seeing your own world from the outside. It blends Cornish mining history, folklore, friendship, and time travel into a story that feels accessible for older children while still carrying some emotional weight. Joel is easy to care about because he’s scared, stubborn, decent, and often overwhelmed, which makes his journey feel personal rather than merely fantastical.
Pages: 225 | ASIN : B0FP4C1DDY
A Postcard From the Adirondacks
A Postcard from the Adirondacks begins with a mysterious postcard bearing one word, “Come,” and sends its narrator, Edward Storie, into a strange Adirondack adventure where journalism, folklore, philosophy, and canine loyalty collide. Ed, a cub reporter and aspiring fiction writer, is drawn into the orbit of Dr. Zorba Kildeere, a pseudo-scientific visionary whose plans for chemically pacifying humanity come with one monstrous condition: a future without dogs. When Melony Noon escapes Kildeere’s Rookery, Ed and his talking dog, Skipper, enter a wilderness populated by cryptids, phantoms, tricksters, and old mountain magic in a rescue mission that becomes far larger than one missing woman.
What I enjoyed most about this book is its refusal to behave. It’s part tall tale, part backwoods quest, part satire of scientific hubris, and part love letter to the Adirondacks. Pontacoloni writes the forest as if it has a pulse, a private vocabulary, and a sly sense of humor. The narrative wanders, but often in the way a wooded trail wanders: taking detours toward local lore, odd taxonomy, old literary ghosts, and the metaphysics of dogs. Skipper is the book’s great engine of charm. He’s funny, learned, prickly, brave, and exactly the kind of dog who could make a reader accept the impossible before breakfast.
Readers who want a clean and swift plot may find themselves occasionally caught in the underbrush of digression. Yet I came to appreciate that abundance as part of the book’s peculiar spell. Pontacoloni isn’t merely telling a rescue story; he’s building a private Adirondack cosmology where Sasquatch, tarot phantoms, oxytocin, Emily Dickinson, James Fenimore Cooper, and a French Brittany can all share narrative oxygen. The prose can be playful and philosophical, but beneath the whimsy is a sincere moral center: a world that loses its dogs has already misplaced its soul.
This book will best suit readers who enjoy fantasy adventure, cryptid fiction, magical realism, satirical science fiction, talking-animal stories, and folklore-infused literary quests. It reminded me at times of Douglas Adams filtered through James Fenimore Cooper, with a dash of Christopher Moore’s comic irreverence and a muddy pawprint all its own. A Postcard from the Adirondacks is a strange and spirited romp through myth and mountain shadow, carried by the kind of loyalty only a good dog can teach.
Pages: 229
Long Leg: From the Blighted Earth: Book II
R.M. Tembreull’s Long Leg: From the Blighted Earth: Book II is an ambitious work of environmental fantasy that blends mythic adventure, eco-fiction, and climate fiction into a sweeping speculative tale. Set in a damaged world where the Natural Order struggles against Chaos and the Force Corrupted, the novel moves north into the Great Plains and centers its conflict on drought, water, ecological collapse, and the fragile bonds that connect all living things. It’s a book with large stakes, but its emotional pull comes from small, unlikely heroes carrying the fate of the world on their shoulders.
At the heart of the story is Long Leg, a Gifted burrowing owl whose loyalty to the earth elemental Okaraxta gives the novel both intimacy and purpose. Through Long Leg’s journey, Tembreull turns animals, elementals, fungi, water, wind, and land into active participants in an ongoing struggle for balance. The result is a richly imagined mythic fantasy world where the natural world isn’t just scenery; it’s alive, wounded, watchful, and capable of resistance. The book’s use of Lakota-inspired themes, especially the idea that all beings are related, gives the story a spiritual framework that feels central to its identity.
The novel’s strongest quality is its sense of scale. Tembreull writes with the scope of epic fantasy while grounding the story in recognizable environmental concerns: drought, wildfire, overuse of water, disappearing habitats, and humanity’s troubled relationship with the planet. Water becomes both a sacred presence and a force of renewal, which gives the adventure a clear emotional and thematic current. The prose is often expansive and philosophical, but that style suits a story designed to feel like a legend, a warning, and a quest all at once.
Readers who enjoyed Richard Adams’s Watership Down may find a familiar appeal here: animal protagonists move through a dangerous world shaped by forces larger than themselves, and their courage matters because they’re vulnerable. Tembreull’s book is more overtly supernatural and environmental in its focus, but it shares that sense of small creatures becoming central to a vast struggle. The journey also carries the feel of an eco-fantasy quest, where survival depends not on domination, but on cooperation, memory, sacrifice, and respect for the living world.
Long Leg is a thoughtful and imaginative speculative fiction novel for readers who appreciate mythic worldbuilding, animal-centered adventure, and environmental themes woven into epic fantasy. It’s not simply a story about a broken world; it’s a story about connection, responsibility, and the possibility of restoration. Tembreull delivers a distinctive continuation of the Blighted Earth series, one that invites readers to care deeply about the smallest beings and to see the natural world as a powerful, sacred community.
Pages: 338 | ASIN : B0GVPT5DMM
The Crash of Worlds
The Crash of Worlds by Alisse Lee Goldenberg is a fantasy adventure about what happens when disaster, grief, politics, magic, and family loyalty all collide. The story opens with the destruction of Coralnoss after Marcus’s warnings are ignored, then follows Zayna as she tries to save what is left of her people, Lucas as he searches for a way to reach her, and Audrina as she faces hard questions about love, duty, and whether she truly wants the throne. It’s a deep fantasy novel, with kingdoms, spells, royal conflict, sea voyages, and magical communication, but its real weight comes from human problems: fear, prejudice, pride, loss, and the need to ask for help.
I like how grounded the book feels, even when the world is full of magic. Goldenberg does not treat the disaster as a quick plot device. Zayna’s chapters linger in the mud, hunger, ruined homes, and the awful silence after a community has been broken. It gives the fantasy stakes a physical heaviness. At the same time, the writing is direct and accessible, which makes the emotional turns easy to follow. Some moments are blunt, but that plainness also works in the book’s favor. Grief is not always elegant. Sometimes it’s just one foot in front of the other, carrying supplies, calming a baby, and trying not to fall apart.
I also found myself thinking a lot about the author’s choices around leadership. Audrina’s storyline is not just about being a princess in love with Gertrude. It’s about the cost of being visible in a world that may not accept you. Her conversations with Navor are some of the warmest parts of the book, and they give the story a tender center. Then there’s the contrast with Parven, whose cruelty shows how family and power can become dangerous when pride is mistaken for principle. The book is curious about what makes a ruler good, but it’s also candid about how institutions fail people. The council ignores Marcus. Coralnoss pays for it. Later, survivors still hesitate to accept help because old fears are hard to shake. That felt painfully believable.
I would recommend The Crash of Worlds most to readers who enjoy character-driven fantasy with royal drama, found family, queer representation, and emotional stakes that matter as much as the magical ones. Readers who like sincere storytelling, big feelings, and a fantasy world built around loyalty and survival will likely appreciate it. It’s best for fans of accessible YA-style fantasy who want adventure, heart, and a reminder that rebuilding after loss is rarely clean, but it’s still possible.
Pages: 282 | ASIN : B0GY65N8BK
Fly Stone, Fly
Fly Stone, Fly by Dust Kunkel is a feral, river-haunted dark fantasy about Clayton Bergmann, a boy left alone in the Idaho wilderness after his parents disappear, who grows into grief, prophecy, and revenge with a foul-mouthed dog named Dammit, a Shakespeare-soaked mind, and a family curse snapping at his heels. The story moves from survival tale to Western Gothic blood-feud, with Big Jim looming as both villain and nightmare, and with stoneflies, river water, old stories, and bad dogs carrying more meaning than they first seem to bear.
I admired how strange this book is willing to be. Its voice has burrs on it: funny, wounded, profane, lyrical, and sometimes gloriously overgrown. Clayton narrates like someone trying to lash a broken raft together while already in the rapids, and that urgency gives the novel its pulse. The Shakespeare references could have felt ornamental, but here, they’re weighty, private, and handled often. The book’s best passages do not merely describe wilderness; they make the canyon feel sentient, accusatory, almost liturgical.
What I enjoyed most was the book’s refusal to sand down pain into easy nobility. Clayton’s loneliness is not pretty. His friendships are not tidy. Dammit, Lina, MK, and the rest feel carved from contradictions: loyal and dangerous, comic and damaged, ridiculous and mythic. The novel’s maximal style asks for patience; it can wander and double back. But that excess is also part of its charm.
The target audience is readers who want dark fantasy, Western Gothic, revenge fantasy, mythic coming-of-age, and literary fantasy with a rough comic streak. Readers who like Neil Gaiman’s myth-in-the-modern-world sensibility or Stephen King’s gift for giving childhood terror a local address will find something kin here they enjoy, though Kunkel’s voice is more backwoods-baroque and river-drunk.
Pages: 498 | ASIN : B0DTDDG3T8
Honesty and Exploitation
Mortal Vengeance: A Grim Tale is an origin story that frames the development of a Dominican folklore figure born of a Jesuit-run Academy’s cruel character- building discipline. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
The direct inspiration came from a beta reader I used to work with. She deeply enjoyed Mortal Vengeance, but she pointed out that certain elements felt underdeveloped—particularly the lore surrounding the Grim Cojuelo, the psychological drivers behind key characters, and the extent of Profesora Lourdes’ cruelty. Her critique lingered with me, and she was right. There were emotional and mythological layers I had only hinted at.
I also knew I hadn’t fully examined what pushed Marcos, right from Chapter 1 of the original novel, to declare that “the old hag has to pay.” That line carries weight. I owed readers the institutional and psychological conditions that made such a statement inevitable.
The setting itself is personal. I attended an all-boys Jesuit school for twelve years. While my experiences were not identical to those of my characters, the cadence of the speeches, the moral framing, and the rhetoric of “character formation” delivered by figures like Padre Ángel, Padre Ignacio, and Profesor Malagón are drawn directly from memory. The language of discipline. The idea that suffering builds virtue. The subtle humiliation disguised as moral instruction. That framework became fertile ground for psychological horror. A Grim Tale became a space to explore the Grim Cojuelo’s birth not as a monster, but as the consequence of repression and cruelty.
What is the most challenging aspect of writing a psychological thriller? The most rewarding?
The hardest part is control.
With Mortal Vengeance: A Grim Tale, I was navigating heavy subject matter—grooming, institutional abuse, suicide, and psychological collapse. The challenge was not whether to go dark. The story demanded darkness. The challenge was how to confront it responsibly. There is a thin line between honesty and exploitation.
When addressing suicide, for example, I had to think carefully about what to depict and what to withhold. The aim was to portray the emotional and systemic forces pushing a character toward that edge without turning the narrative into spectacle—or instruction. That balance—showing the consequences of corruption, violence, and humiliation without veering into sensationalism or “torture porn”—was difficult, but essential.
Tonal balance was another challenge. The original Mortal Vengeance functions as a slasher/whodunnit. A Grim Tale is pure psychological horror. There is no mystery engine asking “who did it?” If readers come from the main novel, they already know how this ends. Suspense had to emerge from inevitability. The question becomes not what will happen, but how it becomes unavoidable. Ensuring readers care about the journey rather than the destination was crucial.
Then there are the rules of horror itself. How much do you explain when the Grim Cojuelo appears? Is it supernatural? Psychological? Symbolic? How does Julian interpret what he sees? How does the world respond? Balancing that supernatural-psychological axis without tipping too far in either direction required restraint. Over-explain, and the horror collapses. Under-explain, and coherence dissolves.
The most rewarding aspect is precision.
While I’m not aiming for a Shyamalan-style twist, there is a final reveal—a reframing—that has been quietly telegraphed throughout the novel. Every clue is there for readers willing to pay attention. When they reach that final moment and realize it was always in front of them, that recognition is deeply satisfying.
Psychological horror works best when the reader feels implicated in the discovery. When that happens—when the realization feels earned rather than imposed—that’s the reward.
Obviously, you took great care in describing the settings throughout your story. How do you strike a balance between perfecting the mood in your thriller and developing the plot?
You have to paint a picture. If the reader can’t see it, they won’t feel it. And in psychological horror, feeling is everything.
It’s often said that “an image is worth a thousand words.” I believe that’s true—but the reverse should also hold: “a thousand words must paint a clear image.” Description isn’t decoration—it’s infrastructure. In a psychological thriller, the inner world and the outer world are constantly mirroring each other. The setting isn’t just where things happen; it’s how things are perceived. If a character is unraveling, the environment should feel unstable. If the institution is corrupt, the architecture should feel imposing, suffocating, immaculate in a way that hides rot.
In A Grim Tale, the surroundings—especially Excelsior Academy—had to function as a character. Many readers may not be familiar with the Dominican Republic beyond resort postcards. I wanted the setting to feel lived-in, specific, textured. The marble, the crucifixes, the stained glass, the speeches about virtue—those details aren’t aesthetic indulgence. They establish atmosphere, yes, but they also drive the plot because they shape the characters’ psychology. The institution becomes the pressure cooker.
The key is that mood must serve movement. If a scene doesn’t deepen tension or push a character closer to transformation, it doesn’t belong.
And transformation is crucial. Horror isn’t about the final form—it’s about the process. The unsettling part isn’t the monster fully realized; it’s watching the fracture happen in slow motion. It’s seeing the body, the mind, the belief system crack and reform. If readers don’t feel that breaking point—if they don’t sense the dread building inside the character—then the plot reveal won’t matter.
So the balance comes from intention. Atmosphere isn’t separate from the plot. It is plot. When done correctly, every description tightens the noose a little further.
If it doesn’t, it’s just pretty writing. And pretty writing has no business in horror unless it’s hiding something.
What is the next book you are working on, and when will it be available?
I’m currently about 80% through the first draft of the sequel to Mortal Vengeance. It’s titled Mortal Vengeance II: To Reel or Not Too Real? — and no, that’s not a typo. The novel continues the slasher framework established in Book 1, but this time it leans harder into satire. It’s slightly less oppressive in tone than A Grim Tale, but not lighter in stakes. This installment examines media, performance, and the blurred line between spectacle and truth. The horror remains — it simply evolves.
At the end of Mortal Vengeance, a character drops a seemingly casual hint that longtime readers will recognize as more significant than it appears. In A Grim Tale, I subtly expand on that thread. Without giving too much away, let’s just say a piece of fruit becomes symbolically important. Returning readers will understand. New readers will soon enough. It’s a genre blend, and yes, it’s a risk. But this series has always interrogated power structures — this time, it asks what happens when violence, trauma, and justice become content.
As for timing, I’m aiming to complete the draft soon, followed by revisions. If all goes according to plan, readers won’t have to wait long, perhaps fall of 2026.
At the same time, I’m developing a children’s series titled IMALIVE. And while that may seem like a sharp contrast, thematically it isn’t.
If Mortal Vengeance explores what happens when institutions silence young people, IMALIVE is about empowering children to believe their voices matter.
The project began as something deeply personal. When my eldest nephew turned eight, he asked me to write him a story as a birthday gift. That request became a larger idea. The core message is simple: imagination is powerful, but agency is transformative. Children can dream, yes — but they can also build, create, and shape their world.
So while one series dissects the consequences of repression, the other celebrates possibility.
They may look different on the surface. At their core, they’re both about power — and who gets to claim it.
Author Links: GoodReads | Facebook | Website | Alejandro Torres | Amazon
Mortal Vengeance: A Grim Tale is a queer psychological slasher thriller set in an elite Catholic academy in Santo Domingo, where money, faith, and reputation always come first—and students like Julián Díaz are disposable.
Julián is a scholarship kid in a world of ski trips, private drivers, and last names that open doors. His parents have bet everything on Excelsior Academy, certain that if he keeps his head down and excels, he’ll escape poverty and make their sacrifice worth it. Instead, he becomes a convenient target: a vicious math teacher obsessed with breaking “weak” students, priests more interested in image than souls, and rich classmates who treat him as both mascot and threat. Under that pressure, Julián begins to **dissociate**. When reality becomes unbearable, his mind slips sideways into nightmarish visions of the Grim Cojuelo, a horned figure from Dominican folklore that stalks the school’s halls, churches, and dreams with a scythe and a mirror full of other people’s sins.
Around him, other students are fighting their own battles. Lucía, a razor-sharp debate star, can dismantle any argument but can’t quite untangle her feelings for the boys circling her: Alex, her brilliant, morally outraged debate partner, and Enrique, the charming golden boy whose courtly manners hide something colder underneath. Fernando, a popular athlete with a soft center, is falling for Julián in a place where the wrong kiss could destroy both of them. Behind classroom doors and church altars, girls like Melissa endure “perfect” boyfriends who leave bruises where sweaters and makeup can cover them.
When a Christmas show erupts into a brutal act of dating violence in the school parking lot, the moment is caught on shaky phone cameras and explodes across social media. Overnight, Excelsior’s glossy façade cracks. Parents demand answers, the administration scrambles to control the narrative, and students learn in real time how easily the truth can be edited, weaponized, or buried. In whispered conversations, secret group chats, and late-night plotting sessions, Lucía, Alex, Fernando and the others begin to question whether playing by the school’s rules has ever protected anyone but the powerful.
As the year spirals, Julián’s dissociative episodes fuse with the legend of the Grim Cojuelo until he can no longer tell where his trauma ends and the monster begins. The Cojuelo doesn’t hunt at random; it hunts the people who have built careers, reputations, and fortunes on other people’s pain.
Blending dark humor, queer romance, and slow-burn dread, Mortal Vengeance: A Grim Tale explores class rage, religious hypocrisy, gendered violence, and how institutions teach kids to either disappear… or become something frightening enough that no one can ignore them. When the Grim Cojuelo finally steps out of legend and into the headlines, the question isn’t who the killer is—it’s how many people helped create him.
The Wizard’s Apprentice
The Wizard’s Apprentice follows sixteen-year-old Prince Lucas of Colonodona as he studies magic with the sharp-tongued wizard Kralc and tries to live up to a heavy family legacy. Night after night, he relives a vision of his kingdom burning, a dream that feels far too real, while a mysterious girl named Lettie walks into the royal orchard claiming to search for her missing father and quickly wins the trust of Princess Audrina and Lucas himself. As the bond between this royal family and their guest deepens, secrets from past generations come to the surface, Kralc’s own hidden history matters more than anyone expected, and Lucas has to face the question that sits under every lesson and every nightmare. Is he the cause of the disaster he sees, or the one person who can stop it.
As a reading experience, I had a good time with this book. I liked the way the story keeps circling back to small, domestic moments in the castle, like breakfasts, walks in the orchard, and quiet scenes in Sitnalta’s salon, then lets those moments crack open into bigger tensions. The character work is the biggest strength for me. Lucas reads like a very believable teen boy, hungry for praise, prickly about being treated like a child, heart first and brain later. Kralc is gruff and very funny in that “I hate feelings, now drink this potion” way, and I enjoyed every scene where his care slips through his bad attitude. Audrina’s mix of entitlement, kindness, and cluelessness feels honest, and her attraction to Lettie has a real spark to it without ever being turned into a joke. The writing itself is clean and very readable. The author likes straightforward descriptions and clear dialogue, and that kept the pages moving. I felt the middle of the book slow a little because Lucas repeats the same pattern of doubt and defensiveness, and Lettie’s coyness about the truth goes on a bit long, yet I still turned the pages because I wanted to see this family finally sit down and tell each other everything.
The nightmare that opens the book is not just a spooky hook, it turns into a question about fate and choice, about what it means to see a terrible future and then decide how you will live with that knowledge. Lucas’ fear that he will be the one who burns his own home felt very raw to me, especially in a world where he has real power and no full control over it. The book also plays with class in a simple, clear way. Lettie carries the anger and shame of growing up poor and illegitimate, and when she walks into this kind, shining royal family it’s easy to see why she wants both love and payback. The story is also about legacy. Kralc’s bond with the dead Learsi and the magic coin that holds pieces of all three of them gives the ending a quiet, emotional punch. Their little conversation in the green field, and her message to Sitnalta, gave me that warm ache you get when a fantasy story lets its ghosts speak with love instead of just horror.
I would recommend The Wizard’s Apprentice to readers who enjoy classic, character-driven fantasy with a strong family focus and a light, hopeful tone. It feels right for teen readers who are ready for themes of grief, guilt, and complicated loyalty, and also for adults who grew up on older school series and want something familiar yet emotionally honest. The Wizard’s Apprentice reads a bit like Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, with a young hero learning magic and facing a dark destiny, but it trades the bustling school setting for a more intimate focus on royal family drama and personal legacy. If you like training sequences, prickly mentors, messy siblings, and magic that always has a cost, this is a solid pick.
Pages: 290 | ASIN : B0GMK611PR
