We’re big fans of John Harrison here at Fango. The filmmaker, producer and composer behind such titles as Creepshow, Tales From the Darkside and Tales From the Crypt is also the author of last year’s excellent ghost story Passing Through Veils. And as the director of SyFy’s Dune miniseries, he’s just the right guy to launch a new horror sci-fi trilogy with this week’s release: Residue: Paramentals Rising.
We’ve had a chance to read the first book in the Residue saga, and believe us when we say that it is made for Fango audiences. This story is thrilling, gory, monstrous and wholly original, and we can’t wait to see where the trilogy takes us. Here’s a synopsis of Residue: Paramentals Rising:
In the aftermath of a catastrophic New Year’s Eve explosion in the heart of the city, Miki Preston embarks upon a treacherous odyssey into the devastated area known as the Quarantine Zone in search of her famous photojournalist sister, Jennifer, who has mysteriously disappeared.
With only the help of a disgraced former homicide detective, a cagey teenage street dodger, and a set of provocative photographs her sister left behind, Miki will come face to face with the manifestations of malevolent psychic energy called Paramentals—and the sinister conspiracy that created them.
We spoke with Harrison about Residue: Paramentals Rising, and he says that he’s always “wanted to find a story that would turn the alien/monster paradigm upside down.” As “black sheep” Miki Preston investigates the disappearance of her successful sister, she learns more about the mysterious blogger Ominosity (the “prescient but dangerous” observer of these catastrophic events) and the Paramentals themselves (whom Harrison describes as “the ominous, omnipresent doppelgängers of human existence,” who “thrive in the nether world of human dread and despair”). Events unfold in such a way that we’re suddenly in the midst of “a mystery and a paranormal thriller at the same time,” as Harrison puts it.
We don’t want to say much more about the book, because it’s a discovery you should absolutely make for yourself. But read on for an excerpt of Residue: Paramentals Rising, exclusive to FANGORIA readers!
Dawn is seeping into these skyscraper canyons with long fingers of sunlight chasing away shadows as Miki comes down Eighth Street to her sister’s apartment. She’s been wandering all night, hoping to catch a glimpse of her night-owl sister. Instead, she’s been haunted by the feedback loop of Mathis’ admonitions. “Obedient child. The one who stayed behind.” He’s right, of course. Jennifer always was the bold one, the one striking out on her own. But why did she let him get to her? Why did she have to start stuttering again? It’s taken her years to get that damn tic under control, despite all the helpful “therapy” her parents forced on her.
“What the hell am I doing here?” she can’t help thinking. It’s a feeling only exacerbated by the sight of that strange graffiti popping up everywhere around the city. This one, a block-letter graphic sprayed across the beams of an elevated subway platform, looms over the boulevard like an omen.
OMINOSITY KNOWS
They’re everywhere these days, these salutes to the cyber oracle who has been using the website theominosity.com to hint at dark mysteries behind the Catastrophe and the quarantine that followed. Speaking of which…
There’s a Quarantine Zone Checkpoint up ahead. Razor wire and cement barricades sealing off a no-man’s land of operations tents and military security, leading to a fifty-foot-high scaffolding wall of curtain-like sheets topped by blinding light fixtures that obstruct a view of what’s beyond, but suggesting that whatever it is can’t be good. No one going in. No one coming out…except for the full-suited HAZMAT teams lugging high-tech environmental monitoring gear. In the distance, she can see the QZ skyline of empty buildings shrouded in plastic. A landscape of evacuated streets. A sterile, lifeless void in the middle of the city. Still. Eerily quiet.
A convoy of military vehicles suddenly rumbles through the gates into the QZ. Patrolling for evacuation refuseniks, vandals or looters. That’s the official line anyway, but there have also been press reports, instantly denied and heavily censored, of bodies still being brought out. Even after Public Safety spokesmen have assured everyone that the evacuation was effective and complete. “There are no more victims or survivors of the Catastrophe”, the official line goes, repeated ad infinitum in press conferences, TV appearances, radio talk shows. Miki still vividly remembers watching TV with her parents as Jennifer’s boyfriend, Jonas Flack, spokesman for the Public Affairs Department, stood right there, at the gates of this checkpoint, flanked by his boss, Angela Rossi, and a phalanx of intimidating military officers and Emergency Services officials, trying to reassure the press and public.
“The focus of our efforts now is to make the area safe for people to return,” Jonas had said. “Unfortunately Emergency Services are still reporting toxic contamination as far away as a quarter mile from the blast site. Until they can assure this office there is no more contamination, the quarantine must remain in effect.”
That was weeks ago.
Miki continues down the street only so far as the small encampment of protestors the authorities have allowed to remain here. Evidence of the deadly riot a week ago is still everywhere to be seen. Broken bottles, bricks and broken furniture, torn home-made signs demanding everything from the resignation of city officials, to the end of the quarantine, to the immediate capture and prosecution of whoever set off the bomb that caused this dislocation.
Miki is paralyzed by the despair hovering over the area.
One of the bitter-enders emerges from his cardboard shack to shamelessly relieve himself on the perimeter fence. “Makes you wonder, don’t it?” he chuckles when he sees Miki there.
“Wonder what?” Miki asks averting her eyes for the sake of his privacy.
“The birds. They fly around it.” He nods to a flock in the sky. “They fly around it, never over it. Ever notice that?”
Miki stares up at the birds abruptly veering off in separate clusters to avoid flying into QZ airspace, as if some invisible wedge had been driven suddenly into their midst.
A scalding white light shoots down over them. The beam of one of those insect-like drones buzzing the QZ vicinity, supposedly surveilling for “malcontents and other bad actors”. One can’t get within a few blocks of the QZ perimeter without falling under their gaze. The thing hovers annoyingly just inside the perimeter fence, only restrained there by judicial injunction. Otherwise, Miki is certain, these robotic spies would be loosed upon the entire city.
“Move on there!” a flack-jacketed soldier shouts, rushing to the fence, his MK40 ominously aimed in Miki’s general direction.
“Just takin’ a piss here, boss. Just takin’ a piss,” the bitter-ender says, waving his junk so the soldier can see.
“Move it!” the soldier insists.
Miki hurries back up the street, but not before catching a glimpse of Mr. Bitter-End offering a middle finger salute to that drone.
Follow John Harrison on Instagram @officialjohnharrison – he’s posting some fun metatextual elements, like glimpses into Miki’s journal, to bring us all deeper into the world of the Quarantine Zone, the Paramentals and, of course, The Ominosity. And order your copy of Residue: Paramentals Rising here – it hits shelves tomorrow!