Stephen Mark Rainey

The Monarchs Stephen Mark Rainey

Devastated and homeless after a personal tragedy, Courtney Edmiston accepts an invitation to stay with her old college friend, Jan Blackburn. Jan lives with her brother, David, and their eccentric aunt Martha on the edge of the Dismal Swamp, near Fearing, North Carolina. There, Courtney soon discovers that the Blackburns have had more than their share of tragedies... and accumulated enemies... of their own. Plus there is the strange, monstrous, looming figure she frequently glimpses in and around the swamp. Is this ghostly entity -- which Aunt Martha calls the Monarch -- a bizarre ally? Or a deadly foe?