“Dragging a body through six inches of snow is even harder than I expected.”

This chilling line begins the terror that Brian McAuley has conceived for his thrilling new novel, BREATHE IN, BLEED OUT. It also brings Hannah back to the moment when her fiancé, Ben, was accidentally killed during a wilderness trip. She has not been able to shake herself clean of these memories, which now haunt her dreams as well as her waking hours.

"BREATHE IN, BLEED OUT reads like a ’90s horror movie, with elements of slasher films and thrillers like the Scream franchise. It is a fun and memorable novel that will keep you both guessing and hiding under the covers."

Hannah is on personal leave from her job at a hospital. Her use of Xanax led her to make a mistake with a patient’s medicine, which almost killed him. Her friend, Tess, takes this opportunity to invite her to a spiritual retreat located in the desert near Joshua Tree, California, where they will be joined by some close friends. Along the way, they stop at a bar where they have the misfortune of running into a serious military type who reminds them of the Punisher and might come back to haunt them later on in the story.

The mysterious Guru Pax runs the Avidya Healing Retreat. He and his assistant, Kimi, establish the group’s expectations during their visit. He also states that this place is a thin veil where the spirits are loud and the supernatural world clearly exists. When members of the party begin to disappear or suffer horrific accidents and deaths, Hannah realizes that her desire to escape her own demons may have forced her to rush head-on into a different type of horror that she easily could become a victim of herself.

Secrets about Avidya and its small staff eventually will be revealed and only add to the mounting terror that McAuley is building, chapter by chapter. When a supernatural figure of local legend is allegedly spotted by various guests at the retreat, the situation turns unimaginably creepy. Hannah and her friends believe that Guru Pax may have more sinister motives and that everything happening in and around Avidya could lead to their demise.

Meanwhile, Hannah is gaining more clarity on Ben’s death and how it actually happened.

BREATHE IN, BLEED OUT reads like a ’90s horror movie, with elements of slasher films and thrillers like the Scream franchise. It is a fun and memorable novel that will keep you both guessing and hiding under the covers.