Gary Ballard

The Stepping Stone Cycle Gary Ballard

In 2013, Gary Ballard introduced the world to Dr. Jack Carter, a forensic psychologist specializing in FBI cases involving serial killers. Returning from a fugue state, Jack learns that his wife, Sarah, has disappeared and he is the prime suspect in the case. Jack's memory of their disappearance is a blank slate, and he has vowed to find her alive or dead, and to clear his name. Over the course of six novellas, Jack has relentlessly searched for her, finding only more questions at every step. Who is the mysterious Sleeper that calls to those damaged souls who commit savage, ritualistic murders? What are the strange runes that appear at all the crime scenes, despite the perpetrators having no contact with each other? Who or what is the entity Bob speaking to Jack through other people, claiming to know what happened to Sarah Carter? Who is the dreaded Cthulhu, the mysterious being who sleeps dreaming of death in his lost prison city of R'lyeh?Take a journey through space and time, sanity and mystery, through the six novellas of the critically-acclaimed Stepping Stone Cycle, compiled here in one volume. A modern-day retelling of the Cthulhu Mythos created by H. P. Lovecraft, the Cycle is an exploration of one man's descent into madness set against the backdrop of cosmic horror.