As of mid-April, Isaac Thorne’s latest novel Hell Spring has landed in the Inbox of a professional editor Isaac has contracted for the work. After the editing process is complete, the novel will go to layout and design. In addition, it will most likely become available for preorder through IsaacThorne.com, Amazon.com, and other retail outlets.
“I expect for pre-ordering for Hell Spring to become available in July 2022,” Isaac says. “For the first time, you’ll be able to pre-order signed copies directly from me in addition to ebooks and print copies from other retailers.”
Advance review copies (ARCs) of Hell Spring will also become available when pre-ordering begins. ARCs enable reviews to obtain early access to digital (and in many cases printed) copies of books before they become available to the general public. If you’re a book reviewer, you can obtain an ARC of Hell Spring by either signing up for Isaac’s ARC email list or by joining his reviewer team on BookSprout.
“My hope is to get the word out about Hell Spring in a much more methodical way than I did with either The Gordon Place or Road Kills,” Isaac says. “Although The Gordon Place exceeded my expectations in many ways, I don’t feel like I did that book justice on the marketing and reviewing side of things.”
Similar to The Gordon Place, the idea for the new novel had been simmering in the back of Thorne’s mind for years. It wasn’t until he adopted a new, non-linear process of writing that the story really grew legs, though.
“I didn’t write this one front-to-back,” he explains. “I followed the characters instead. If I wasn’t feeling a particular character’s presence on a given day, I’d write a scene or a chapter for another one. Most of the book was written this way. You’d think it would be more difficult to tie together an overall arc for the story, writing it in the same way film companies shoot movies. For me, it worked well. Any holes or inconsistencies or continuity issues that developed from that process were then ironed out in the rewrites.”
Hell Spring tells the story of eight small-town neighbors who converge on the local general store as a means of shelter from a severe storm and flash flooding. None of the eight are everything they claim to be, but only one of them hungers for human souls, flesh, and blood. This is Isaac’s second novel. It takes place in the same small town of Lost Hollow in which the events of The Gordon Place occurred. However, Hell Spring takes place almost entirely on the day and night of March 21, 1955.
“I’m really looking forward to releasing this one,” Isaac says. “It’s been a long time coming.”
