Heartwood #1

A frozen wilderness; A trail of blood in the snow, and something ancient wearing a human face
Heartwood: The Less Dead is a brutal, hypnotic descent into a world where myth, madness, and murder collide. In the remote wilds of northern Minnesota, a series of grotesque deaths—priests torn apart, lovers transformed into beasts—signals the arrival of something far darker than a simple killer. Whispers of “666” echo through the trees, but the truth is more terrifying: predators hiding in plain sight, feeding on the forgotten.
At the center of it all stands Detective Lieutenant Sarah Heartwood: Unyielding, razor-sharp, and carrying scars of her own, as she follows a trail of ritualistic violence. uncovering a bone chilling conspiracy stretching back decades: a network of imitators, a mastermind known only as “the Bear,” and a legacy of missing women deemed “The Less Dead.”
This is not just a hunt... It’s a reckoning.Visceral, unflinching, and laced with psychological horror, Heartwood fuses crime noir with supernatural dread. Every page tightens the noose. Every revelation cuts deeper, because in this forest, the monsters don’t just lurk in the dark......They become it.