When the Streetlights Die

Official public synopsis

A complete, unpublished work.

Tampa, 1983. Every evening, the people of Forest Hills bolt their windows before the siren. When nine-year-old Evan Pike vanishes and returns speaking in stolen voices, seventeen-year-old Daniel Mercer learns the Hollow Men do not simply kill: they keep victims alive beneath the city, draining fear, memories, voices, and vitality until the captives become monsters.

To save Evan and find the mother taken eleven years earlier, Daniel must unite a terrified neighborhood, descend into the tunnels beneath Sulphur Springs, and keep Tampa's last streetlights burning long enough to close what is waking in the dark.