Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 113051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 565(@200wpm)___ 452(@250wpm)___ 377(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 565(@200wpm)___ 452(@250wpm)___ 377(@300wpm)
Aspiring mycologist Sydney Denik is getting a second chance. When a dream opportunity presents itself with a prestigious foundation doing promising Alzheimer’s research, Sydney leaves the shambles of her old life to join a dozen other grad students at an isolated lodge hidden away in a remote, fog-shrouded inlet on Vancouver Island.
But the Madrona Foundation harbors more than brilliant minds. Everyone around her is hiding a terrible secret—including the resident psychologist she’s falling in love with. A student disappears, and no one but Sydney seems to care. Ghosts walk the halls. Snow falls in the middle of summer. Dead animals move like the living. The more Sydney uncovers about the foundation, the more she begins to question her own sanity. And if Sydney isn’t going mad, then the horrors in the surrounding forest are real, and the Madrona Foundation may be the biggest monster of all.
NOTE: This will be a live release on Amazon for paperback, ebook and hardcover on October 23rd 2024. The paperback and ebook cover is different from the case-laminate and dustjacket hardcovers. This is a standalone novel. Check content warnings inside the book or author's IG closer to publication.
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PLAYLIST
The following songs (in no particular order) helped me write this book, though I also listened to various soundtracks, including The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross, Westworld: Season 3 by Ramin Djawadi, and Inception by Hans Zimmer. The playlist can also be found on Spotify by scanning the code on the next page.
“The Beginning of the End” - +++ (Crosses)
“The Day the World Went Away” - Nine Inch Nails
“Change (In the House of Flies)” - Deftones
“Dissolved Girl” - Massive Attack
“Alibi” - BANKS
“Bury a Friend” - Billie Eilish
“Cinnamon Girl” - Lana Del Rey
“The Wake-Up” - How to Destroy Angels
“This is a Trick” - +++ (Crosses)
“Summertime Sadness” - Lana Del Rey
“We Come 1 (Radio Edit)” - Faithless
“Is That Your Life” - Tricky
“Butterfly Caught” - Massive Attack
“Sour Times” - Portishead
“Girls Float, Boys Cry” - +++ (Crosses)
“The Space in Between” - How to Destroy Angels
“The Night Does Not Belong to God” - Sleep Token
“Matador” - Faith No More
“Cadavre Exquis” - +++ (Crosses)
“How Long?” - How to Destroy Angels
“Body Electric” - Lana Del Rey
“Snow on the Beach” - Taylor Swift
“We’re in This Together” - Nine Inch Nails
“Vivien” - +++ (Crosses)
“Ashes to Ashes” - Faith No More
“Head Like a Hole” - Nine Inch Nails
“Tomb of Liegia” - Team Sleep
“Runner” - +++ (Crosses)
“Into My Arms” - Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
CHAPTER 1
The girl I was talking to the entire flight has disappeared.
I’ve stepped off the floatplane, the propellers still sputtering in rotation as I take the hand of a lanky man in a rain jacket who introduces himself as David Chen, manager of Madrona Lodge. But as I look behind me for the bright and bubbly Amani in her pale pink hijab, who I just spent an hour conversing with in the seat across from mine, she’s no longer on the plane. The two other passengers are still on board—a bushy-browed man and a thin-lipped woman whom the co-pilot told me were new staff at the Madrona Foundation—sitting in the back row and watching me with idle curiosity.
But no Amani.
“Are you alright?” David says, giving my hand an unsettling squeeze, which brings my attention back to him. “I said I’m David Chen.”
“Oh. Sydney Denik,” I absently introduce myself, pulling my hand away from his as subtly as possible as I find my balance on the dock, meeting his inquisitive dark eyes for just a moment before I start scanning the plane again. “Sorry, I…I was just talking to someone on the plane, and now she’s gone.”
“Amani?” he asks, and I nod. “She went up ahead of you.”
I look up the dock. There’s a steep ramp, thanks to the low tide, and a long wharf leading to the land, but there’s no sight of her. I frown. How is that possible?
“You likely didn’t notice,” he goes on. “Wouldn’t be the first time a new student has become enraptured by the scenery here. We’ve even had a person fall off the dock because they were so distracted. It was quite the welcome, I’m sure,” he adds with a chuckle.
But I was the first to step off the plane, I want to tell him. I swear I was. But I realize that arguing with the manager of the lodge wouldn’t be the best start for me, especially when things are already so precarious. And perhaps he’s right. Maybe I didn’t notice Amani disembarking before me. Already, my brain feels a little fuzzy, probably from the relief of finally getting here without a hitch.
Amani talked the entire flight about how excited she was about being selected for the Madrona Foundation’s student program, and I could hardly get a word in edgewise, which was fine by me. I try to stay silent when I first meet people, trying to figure out how to wear my mask, what kind of person I need to be for the conversation. So I listened and stared out the window at the scenery for the flight from Vancouver to this remote inlet on Vancouver Island’s northwest coast, soaring over glittering straits dotted with white ferries, thick green forest, milky blue alpine lakes, and craggy, snowcapped peaks that have yet to thaw in the May sunshine.
But the further north we went, the more the landscape was blotted out by clouds and fog. In fact, our pilot had to circle for about twenty minutes before we landed, waiting for the mist to clear enough for a clear view of the water.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” David remarks. His hands go behind his back, and he rocks on the heels of his fancy dress shoes, which seem out of place on the dock. He sniffs the air in a perfunctory way, as if he’s encouraging me to look at the scenery.
I expected the location to remind me of home—I grew up in Crescent City, California, so I’m no stranger to fog, ocean, and towering trees—but here, the elements are amplified, as if they have an edge to them. The fog is more corporeal yet delicate, reminding me of cobwebs that don’t seem to move but stretch across the tips of the trees. The trees themselves—Douglas fir, western cedar, Sitka spruce—aren’t as wide as the redwoods, but they’re taller, their boughs are heavier, their trunks rich with moss and lichen. The undergrowth, too, is wildly overgrown, and my eyes have a hard time taking in all the different vegetation in riotous shades of green—salal bushes, Oregon grape, wild ginger, and massive sword ferns.