GLOUCESTER, Maine, July 30, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — John Lukegord recently disclosed a dramatic upswing in sales for his novel series, "The Haunted Trail," after announcing he had finished a screenplay based on the third part. Originally an ongoing series of popular horror skits, Lukegord expanded "The Haunted Trail" into three novels once beta-readers and initial reviewers indicated the series was a hit in the making. All three volumes are available for purchase via Amazon, and Lukegord is currently looking for representation to help him shop the screenplay to various film studios. Interested parties are encouraged to contact the author directly.
Synopsis of "The Haunted Trail" Series
On Halloween night of 1892, an ancient curse ripens in the Dublin Woods of Ireland. Cast by the undead mummy leader of an invading army of Egyptians who came to Ireland two thousand years earlier in search of one of a pair of magical four-leaf clovers, the curse contaminates the nearby Dublin Mental Institution. First to die is a young boy named Dylan McGilicutty, beheaded for the crime of vandalizing the scarecrow of a local farmer, Patrick O’Sullivan, who had been incarcerated in the local asylum after murdering a zoo keeper. The boy is killed on a guillotine made by another mental-institution inmate, Matthew Killington: one of a pair of murdering twins who also served time in the asylum.
That same night, the Patrican brothers – Henry, Wayne, and Mick – sail along Dublin River on their fishing boat, ignoring a soft-spoken warning to turn back. The brothers are attacked by a man named Harry McFloyd, who protects the cursed Woods against intruders. The two older brothers are captured by Harry and his band of homicidal killers, who kill Henry in an electric chair built by another inmate, Miles O’Neill, before taking Wayne to be lynched by a killer named Douglas O’Connor. But the youngest brother Mick escapes and begins fleeing through the Woods. At the same time, a deranged conman named Herman McRandle, who always dresses as a clown, is captured after killing a man at a carnival. McRandle is brought to the Dublin Mental Institution where Warden Thomas Roberts has the clown beaten and locked up, but not before McRandle manages to steal a fork from the cafeteria. A practitioner of Voodoo, McRandle soon kills two asylum guards and escapes. Learning that another inmate, Walter McFrancis, witnessed one of the killings, the warden puts manacles on the frightened man and they go into the Woods in search of McRandle.
These are just the opening events for a wild, ongoing series that slowly uncovers the mystical roots of two magical clovers, before eventually taking readers into the clovers’ genesis: lightyears away with two warring alien races. "The Haunted Trail" is intended as an homage to slasher-gore horror-fantasy – a rollercoaster-mashup of the best in horror fiction and films, while maintaining a gripping and shocking narrative that keeps rapid pace and speed evocative of an immersive video game.
About John Lukegord
A Massachusetts native, John Lukegord is the author of the "Haunted Trail" series of books, based on horror skits created and performed in a small neighborhood in the early 1990s. The skits were well-crafted and highly successful, drawing a large fan base at the time. Lukegord has since expanded each skit, publishing them in a planned trilogy of gory and suspenseful horror stories. Lukegord is also the author of "A Stalker’s Journey," which is available for purchase on Amazon along with "The Haunted Trail."
SOURCE John Lukegord
