The Blackest Heart

by Vince Churchill

Death....Descending from deep space like locusts, Yardon Wrath and his murderous band of mutants, the Plague, terrorize an isolated colony. Legendary lawman Thane Bishop is brutally beaten to death in front of his family by the inhuman psychopath he helped create. But the macabre half-man, half-machine's sinister plans call for much more than murder. Much more…Rebirth....Offered an unholy alliance with an entity from an alternate existence, Thane Bishop rises from the grave, his lust for revenge matched only by his adversary's own twisted plans for retribution.Vengeance.... All that's left for two men more dead than alive. The Blackest Heart....Death is just the beginning.

Genres: Horror

286 pages, Paperback

First published April 5, 2004

About the author

Vince Churchill has several published novels: The Dead Shall Inherit The Earth, The Blackest Heart, The Butcher Bride, Pandora, Hyde, Goodnight, My Sweet, Midnight Eternal, Seven, and Prey for the Damned. The Dead Shall Inherit The Earth was featured in XBOX Magazine’s ZOMBIES! Collector’s Edition as one of The 37 Greatest Zombie Triumphs.
Vince’ has a new short story collection, Death and Other Consequences. His short fiction has appeared in anthologies such as The Undead, The Undead II, The Horror Library - Volume One, The Beast Within, and the Black Quill award winning Midnight Walk. He was also a list contributor in the Book of Lists: Horror. Vince’s latest novella, “Condemned”, anchors the Butcher Shop Quartet II anthology.
Recently, Vince had his first children's book published, the scary fun RUN!


Vince invites you to visit his website: www.vincechurchill.com.

Reviews

[Nicholas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cutting to the chase, I'd have to say that I'm very impressed. For one thing, we all know that Publish America is one of the popular self-publishing establishments on the internet, although it doesn't at first appear that way, and out of the many novels I've read that have been published this way, by God, this is the best-edited, most flawless work in the genre of horror/fantasy/sci-fi so far to my knowledge. That does make a difference, although I've read many a good book that succeeds despite the flaws.
My God, though, that's just the beginning. This novel is one of the best examples I've often lectured about concerning great undiscovered works that are out there that traditional publishing houses just don't know what they're missing over. If they did, and they made a deal with Vince Churchill, this would prove to be a fantastic seller for any Book-Of-The-Month club for sure, not to mention commercial book stands if properly marketed.
Let's draw: what we've got here is a space-action-western with chunks of horrific carnage and imagination the likes of which only belongs to a first rate wizard of the genre. This work was absolutely well thought out and was written by a pro who knows how to make these visions works of art on paper. Let me tell you that just by the raw synopsis of a futuristic revenge novel in the lines of High Plains Drifter meets Spawn and The Crow, I wasn't sure what to think. Then again, I approach all the novels I read by virtually unknowns with a clean slate of mind. But Churchill isn't exactly virtually unknown, since his first novel The Dead Shall Inherit the Earth is hard to ignore when internet surfing for horror/fantasy authors.
Elite Star Marshall Thane Bishop is a legend in the galaxy, so much so that children on planets throughout play with action figures of the celebrity of the law and want to be Star Marshals when they grow up. But in a desolate saloon, Thane meets his fate as a group of human/animal mutant space pirates known as The Plague headed by a ruthless cyborg named Yardon Wrath imposes the worst fathomable harm upon a number of helpless victims including Thane himself, his wife and daughter, and other Star Marshals and saloon patrons. Thane's wife is raped, his daughter taken. Thane is killed and tossed into a dumpster. It is in that dumpster where the Nii, an intangible alien species from an alternate dimension who feeds off of the dark essences of evil souls, revives him. The Nii make a deal with Thane: The Star Marshal gets his revenge, stands a chance of being with his wife and daughter again, but the Nii must enter his mind and body in a symbiotic fusion that makes him stronger, more powerful, young, and able to enter into any shadow and reappear from any other shadow. The darkness is his strength. He is to seek out and take the lives of those who have done him wrong, and the Nii get to feed off of the evil essences of his prey.
The universe Churchill creates packs as much of a punch as his protagonist hero, is lively and vivid as it is horrific and dark, full of in-your-face violence and at the same time straight from the heart. As I've said, The Blackest Heart stands as one of the foremost shining examples of the best in the genre the publishing industry hasn't been able to offer; it is their loss, and Vince Churchill certainly has very much to gain. Watch out for this writer and the works he presents, for he may well become a legend in the written word as much as his Thane Bishop is at gunslinging.

[E.M. MacCallum · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nothing seems to snag my attention quite like good vs. evil and "The Blackest Heart" is loaded.

Churchill unveils a colorful story with vibrant characters, violence, vendetta and sex. This futuristic western didn't come close to any of my previous predictions, catching me completely off guard.

Right off the bat, Chapter One had me sucked in. A terrible incident involving Outpost 13 and a group of infamous space pirates crash together outlining the beginning of a revenge story that twists and turns all the way to the end.

I really enjoyed reading this and will be investing in the second book "Pandora" when it comes out.