On an ordinary night in a quiet, upper-middle-class neighborhood, eighth-grade classmates Chloe Danvers and Spencer Genovese sneak out of their homes to investigate a weird clicking noise. They watch as a shadowy figure slinks through their street, dashes around a house, and disappears. The next morning, they learn that the Hoffman family has been murdered. In their efforts to find out what happened, Chloe and Spencer discover that no one else can see or hear the malevolent being they glimpsed. Only a shared medical condition enables them to sense its presence. Their illness provides a measure of protection from the creature, but not for long. It becomes aware of them and begins taunting them in a series of disturbing events. Now they must determine its weakness … and stop it before it goes after its next victims.
Anthony Hains is a professor emeritus of counseling psychology with a specialization in pediatric psychology. He retired in May 2018 after thirty-one years at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. He is the author of a number of horror novels including Nightshade’s Requiem, Sleep in the Dust of the Earth, and The Disembodied. Anthony lives with his wife in Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin. They have one daughter.
The beginning of a story should grab a reader by the collar and never let him or her go - or so I've been told. My previous three books, despite being horror, start rather gently.For this book, the first sentence jumped onto the screen of my computer with little thought. I think it's quite an attention-getter. You know that somehow Spencer will have to face whatever it is that killed the Hoffmans. I never changed it through all the subsequent revisions. I've never had a story start so easily.
Book Excerpt
Sweet Aswang
ON THE NIGHT THAT THE Hoffman family was killed, Spencer couldn’t fall asleep. He felt edgy, as if a low-level electric charge were coursing through his body. Covers on, covers off, lying on his stomach, side, or back . . . nothing worked.
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