For Caren, it’s another day, another bounty…
…till shit gets personal…
…and then fucking apocalyptic.
When hard-bitten professional “ratcatcher” Caren Navarrete accepts the job of hunting down Lex, the mysterious ganglord who ritually slaughtered eleven Martial Magi in Philadelphia on the night of the winter solstice, it’s way more than just another bounty. Lex’s twelfth victim, for reasons unknown, was Caren’s childhood friend and former love, Luke Langit—so this one’s fucking personal.
Caren teams up with Ashton Grenville, an aristocratic teen-prodigy alchemist who is, in his own words, “a walking crime lab,” and together the motley pair scour the Philly magic underworld for clues that could lead them to Lex. Caren soon finds herself dangerously caught up in a war between the city’s magic gangs—Meillassoux’s Boys, the Leeches, and the Wyrms—while Ash follows a trail of breadcrumbs left for him by the alluring androgynous influencer known simply as “Valentine,” who shares Ash’s illicit quest for the Elixir of Life.
Their investigation gradually reveals an ancient plot to unravel the fabric of the universe itself…with the richest tech mogul in the world at its center. Keys to the coming apocalypse lie with Caren’s own hidden past—with a long-lost half-sister and a mythic power passed down from her precolonial Filipino ancestors—and with Valentine’s horrific secret, which Ash hopes he can uncover before it’s too late.
If you’re ready to devour an epic switchblade-and-sorcery adventure with a thoroughly unhinged queer cast, a wildly zigzagging plot, and hard-hitting themes of trauma, grief, guilt, mysticism, and redemption, subscribe to get a hefty new episode of The Dread Eclipse in your inbox every other Wednesday. It’s free, though you can sign up for a paid subscription if you want to support what we do! ✨ For $8/month or $80/year, you’ll get instant access to all previous posts, new episodes three months early, and audio commentaries with us authors (Mabel and Epiphany, a.k.a. Weaver) every other Wednesday.