Tau Delta
Stephanie arrives at college determined to reinvent herself and join Delta Zeta. But when she lays eyes on Chelsea, she’s captivated. She needs to earn a place by her side. Unfortunately, the entity possessing Chelsea needs her just as much.
Stephanie abandons her sorority interview for Chelsea, and instead, they form Tau Delta. Their sisterhood gathers weekly at Chelsea’s very pink house for truth or dare, which starts innocently enough: eat an entire pizza, streak through the neighborhood. But their gatherings only feed the thing inside Chelsea.
Watching Chelsea’s every move, Stephanie is the first to notice that something’s wrong and the only one to witness a black cloud pouring into Chelsea. Stephanie should be horrified. Instead, she’s enthralled by the beauty she sees in the darkness. Chelsea wants the entity gone, but Stephanie can't bring herself to help. Intoxicated by its magnetic power, she stands by as the entity burrows deeper into Chelsea’s mind. Soon, the dares escalate: break up with your boyfriend, sacrifice a small animal. Tau Delta begins to fracture, and as Chelsea fades, Stephanie must decide whether to save the friend she's obsessed with or surrender to the entity consuming them both.
Mount Pleasant
Alice blames herself for her parents' deaths and has spent years trying to fill the void they left behind. She clings to her boyfriend, Jake, while carrying on a secret affair with his brother, but neither relationship feels like home.
Hoping a bikepacking trip across Missouri will help her untangle her life, Alice instead finds herself stranded in the isolated town of Mount Pleasant, when a violent thunderstorm forces the trio off the trail. Every bed-and-breakfast claims to be fully booked except for a single room, so they take it. Expecting a vibrant town full of visitors, instead, they find empty streets. And the few locals they encounter know unsettling details they shouldn't—where the group camped the night before, where they’re headed next, even Alice’s vegetarian diet.
By midnight, Alice discovers why—the whole town is a trap.
The residents of Mount Pleasant surround the inn, waiting in the rain with weapons in hand. Jake is captured, his brother is killed, and Alice runs…right back into the grasp of the townsfolk, who she learns are a cult devoted to an ancient goddess who doesn’t let outsiders leave alive.
Forced into the cult's deadly ritual, Alice and Jake are given an impossible choice: kill the other and walk free, or refuse and die together. Alice has already betrayed Jake once. To survive Mount Pleasant, she'll have to decide whether saving herself is worth betraying him again.
Lizzie
When Lizzie's garden is destroyed, it breaks her. She's been growing it since childhood, pouring her love into every plant, cultivating larger, juicier, and far fresher vegetables than anything her mother ever grew. And that’s how Lizzie learned a secret—the things you love taste far better than the things you don’t. As a child, she tested her theory on everything—bugs, plants, hair from the cute girl on the playground—and it never let her down. So Lizzie made a pact with the family hog, Rawhead. She ate only what she loved, and he got the rest.
But now, it's more than devastating; it’s a death sentence. Winter is coming, and Lizzie has no other source of food. She heads into town for supplies, but with no money to spend, Lizzie ends up with a job that takes her away from the farm. She returns one day to find Rawhead missing from his pen. Frantic, Lizzie searches far and wide, and learns that a large group of men from town has just left for their annual hogs scalding trip.
Fearing the worst, Lizzie journeys after the men, arriving too late. She finds Rawhead’s decapitated head and bloody bones tossed aside amongst the other waste. Lizzie casts a spell, reanimating her dead hog and cursing whoever stole him from his pen. She follows Rawhead’s reanimated form through the woods as he devours the men, fulfilling their pact even after death. And folks say, deep in the hollows of Taney County, Lizzie still lurks, eating children who wander a little too far. She eats the sweet ones, and Rawhead gets the rest. So naughty or nice, you better think thrice before stepping too deep in the woods where she sleeps.
Based on the folktale "Old Rawhead and Bloody Bones", Lizzie is a dual-timeline novel of love, magic, and a little cannibalism.
These Hollow Hills
When Fern's brother is killed by mysterious shadow creatures, she is willing to do anything for the power to kill them, including joining a coven of witches, but the magic she learns could cost her humanity if she uses it for harm.
She studies the different types of magic under the guidance of her coven. The community and a budding relationship are everything Fern's ever wanted, but healing and plant magic won't get her the revenge she seeks. Fern follows her instincts, a pull deep inside her, and discovers an ancient grimoire buried in the ground. It contains all the spells the coven says are forbidden and the power she'll need to kill the shadows.
Learning the left-hande spells in secret, Fern finds a dark power inside of her, but it's not enough. She nearly gets herself killed, rescued only by her girlfriend, who now knows Fern's secret and refuses to keep it.
Fern is locked up by the coven for their protection and hers, but they can't take what's already inside her.
These Hollow Hills is a witchy story full of Ozarks folklore, magic, and secrets. It's the first in a planned series where the rugged landscape has been deteriorating for millennia, and it's only a matter of time before what's underneath is exposed.
