Fulton Books author Jesse Rosenbaum has completed his most recent book āThe Condemnedā: a chilling novel that follows Michael and his endless strings of nightmares that horrify and push him to the brink. With each passing dream, he gets closer to the dark figure who has brought him to these horrific dreamscapes while seeking answers and unraveling the mystery of his role in this dark figureās plot.
Published by Fulton Books, Jesse Rosenbaumās book is a suspenseful tale that will draw readers into the shadows of Michaelās nightmares and where they further take him. Here, in his story, Michael will face a bunch of encounters that could change his life. Will one of these encounters save him from his long, unending agony?
Fulton Books author Jesse Rosenbaum has completed his most recent book āThe Condemnedā: a chilling novel that follows Michael and his endless strings of nightmares that horrify and push him to the brink. With each passing dream, he gets closer to the dark figure who has brought him to these horrific dreamscapes while seeking answers and unraveling the mystery of his role in this dark figureās plot.
Published by Fulton Books, Jesse Rosenbaumās book is a suspenseful tale that will draw readers into the shadows of Michaelās nightmares and where they further take him. Here, in his story, Michael will face a bunch of encounters that could change his life. Will one of these encounters save him from his long, unending agony?
Michael always loved spring semesters at college. The sun would shine most days behind white fluffy clouds and skies of blue. The energy on campus was always higher, more electric and upbeat. The winterās in the area were bitter and cold, so when the warmth came, everyone was affected by it. More of the local hotspots would open up early for the coming summer season. People would be studying outside, and the overall vibe was just better. But most importantly, it was that part of the semester where it was almost time for final exams.
It was a Tuesday, and in just about five more weeks, he would have completed his finals, have walked in his graduation commencement, and earned his bachelorās degree, a seemingly insurmountable mountain of debt from the student loan and would most likely need to still work summers at the grocery store back home. One of Michaelās professors said that she could try to get him a paid internship over the summer and see if it could develop into something more, but he wasnāt going to hold his breath for that. Not that he didnāt think she could help, but from what he heard from other classmates, the internship was hard to get, and a bunch of people already applied for it. He was nervous about starting a job where he would actually have to put his time at university to use.
Like most people, he worried if he would do well or not. He worried if all this time here would be for nothing in that he wouldnāt be able to get a job. He thought about how a cousin of his ended up not even getting a job in her area of study, which was fine for her ultimately as she was happy in her work, but it was a worry nonetheless. What would his parents say if that happened? He worried about letting them down after they had done so much for him to get to this point. Plus, he would finally be on his own once college was finished. His parents were paying for his apartment on campus, but he knew that wouldnāt last. They were only doing that so he would have less of a debt to pay off from college loans. They wouldnāt be able to keep paying for that apartment past graduation, and if he couldnāt find a job that paid well enough, he wouldnāt be able to afford rent. The thought of moving back home did not sit well with him, but that was plan C. Plan B was to rent a place with his friend, Tom, whom he met freshmen year here. Despite the uncertainty and worry, the coming change excited him. The anticipation of it all was growing in him like the days when he was young lying in bed on the night before Christmas, wondering what the morning would bring.
Michael had just finished his last class of the day and was washing his hands in the bathroom. He looked up in the mirror to check his face. He was of average build but slightly over average in height at five feet, eleven inches. Michael looked into the mirror closely to check his face but saw nothing and used his hands to fix his hair. It was a little wavy, and he debated getting it cut soon because the longer he let it get, it started to curl up on the edges, and he didnāt like the way that it looked. He opened his green eyes wide and looked at them as well. He noticed the bags under his eyes from lack of quality sleep recently. The late-night studying was part of it, but for some reason he just hadnāt been sleeping well. He dried his hands and walked out of the bathroom. He was starting to head back to his apartment on campus when his phone rang. He pulled the phone from his pocket and saw that it was his mom, so he tapped the answer button.
āHi, Mom,ā he said.
He could tell that his mom was smiling when she spoke, āHi, sweetheart! How you doing today?ā
āIām good, thanks, Mom. How are you? Howās Dad?ā
āIām just fine. As for your father, heās okay too. Heās out fiddling with that ride on lawn mower he bought himself.ā
āOh, is that the used one that you told me he bought at a yard sale? Did he get that working yet?ā
āWell, it was working, bless him, but it stopped about twenty minutes ago. I just wanted to check to make sure you got your check for this month. I checked. and it hadnāt cleared yet.ā
āIām sorry, I got it. Iāll deposit it from my phone when I get back to the apartment. I need to get groceries this week anyway, so Iāll remember to do it.ā
āOkay, sweetheart, thatās good.ā Michaelās Mom paused for a moment. āSo, are you ready for your finals?ā
Michael smiled. āIām getting there. The real late-night studying starts in a couple weeks, but I feel good about my classes this semester, so Iām not that worried.ā
āThatās good, sweetheart. Well I wonāt keep you. Say hi to Tom for us okay?ā
āOkay, Mom. Talk to you soon.ā
āOkay, sweetheart, but make sure you call. I know you get distracted and are off enjoying college life, and I donāt expect you to call me every day or even every week, but itās nice to hear from you aside from once a month.ā
āOkay, Mom. Iāll call you soon, promise. Love you. Say hi to Dad for me.ā
āOkay, I will. Love you too, sweetheart. Bye.ā
āBye, Mom.ā
Michael hung up the phone and headed to his apartment to deposit that check, and after that he would head out to the grocery store near campus to restock his apartment. He opened the notes app on his phone to check his grocery list to see if he forgot anything. Bread. He forgot to put bread on the list, so he typed it in. He returned his phone back to his pocket and continued on to his apartment.
Later that night, Michael awoke suddenly and shot up in his bed. His eyes flew open, and sweat dripped from his chin while his breath traveled fiercely in and out of his mouth. His torso convulsed to the rhythm of his breathing. He pivoted his arms behind himself, palms on the mattress, keeping himself up. He closed his eyes and began to breathe slowly with a fluttered rhythm in his exhale. After feeling more composed, he lay back down and just stared at the ceiling. He closed his eyes, but he couldnāt return to sleep as the visions from his dreams kept flowing through his mind.
They started with Michael staring at the back of a man who stood on the floor of a canyon, which was the middle ground between the cliff that Michael stood on and a higher mountain cliff across the canyon that arched up over the canyon floor like a wave curling over about to crash. The distance between him and the other side seemed like hundreds of feet away. He couldnāt recall how he knew that the figure he was staring at was a man, but he could just sense it somehow. He looked over to the cliffs and noticed that the trees that were growing straight down out of the earth on the curl of the cliff. Their roots were exposed under the earth of the curl, which had seemed to be eroding away from itself. The trees slanted left and right under the cliff, and he saw what appeared to be lines coming down out of the trees. At the end of these lines, he saw odd shapes slowly banging into one another. As he moved closer and focused in more, he could see that they appeared to be naked bodies. He walked closer still, and as he shortened the distance, he noticed something peculiar. Some of the bodies were missing limbs and some didnāt even have heads. He recalled feeling frightened as he stared at the ravaged bodies that hung upside down, swaying slowly from the trees growing down from the curled cliffs above. Many hung by their necks, but a few hung by their ankles. He even saw one with no upper body, just legs cut off at the waist.
He remembered then how his focus shifted, and he started to stare at the man still standing on the middle ground in the distance. The manās back was to Michael as the man stood staring up at the cliffs. Michael then started looking out at the canyon floor, watching the back and forth movement of what appeared to be a variety of light to dark sphere-like shapes. He could swear that he heard the voices of what seemed to be hundreds of people screaming from the canyon floor, but he could see no one. He remembered then how now he was watching himself as if removed from his own body listening to that sound. It was then that he realized that the man on the canyon floor was him. In a flash, he was now standing on the canyon floor. He stood there listening to the sound of people crying, cursing, and screaming. Some were muffled and others were rather loud. He listened as the sounds echoed off the canyon walls. The echoes started to grow louder, and they swirled around him.
Standing on the canyon floor, his vision focused, and he could see exactly where the sound was coming from. All around him, he saw people who were buried up to their necks in the soil screaming as ants, scorpions, centipedes, and other insects crawled upon them eating and stinging their flesh, traveling in and out of the ears, mouths, and noses. Across the canyon floor, there were pools of blood on the heads and ground below the high curled cliff from the ravaged bodies hanging from the descending trees above. Then his attention was refocused as he heard a clear voice, one without the sounds of suffering, without the sounds of pain. As he turned his head toward the right, he saw a dark figure. It stood solemnly, and even though the area was illuminated, the light seemed to miss this dark figure. Michael could not make out any type of definition on its body. It seemed almost like a shadow just standing there, waving to him as if it wanted Michael to come closer.
Michael began to move forward, but then he looked up and saw what he could only rationalize as demons. The kind he had seen in comic books or cheap horror films. That was the only possible explanation he could tell himself. Their misshapen forms, some with horns, many with jagged, sharp teeth. Some had wings like that of a bat or dragon while others had insect like wings, like a dragonfly. Their wet, leathery skin were the colors of the earth, dirt and clay. He could sense the loneliness, fear, and rage emanating from them. He watched as the winged ones and even other demons with no wings above the canyon floor floated along the breeze.
Looking back down at ground level, he could now see that there were other demons walking along the canyon floor. Some had the bodies of screaming people on their shoulders. The demons were carrying those people off into the distance, like bags of mulch. He began to move closer to the dark figure, but then he was knocked down by a demon that looked as if he had been burned in a chemical fire. Its skin was all together blistering, appeared to be melting and oozing puss in some places. There were sores all over its body with large scarred welts across its chest and abdomen. Michael stared as the demon continued to walk as if unaffected by the collision. It was then that Michael noticed the demonās arms or the lack thereof. There were stitches and scars around the demonās armpits. It seemed as if its arms had been removed and replaced with something inhuman, something unnatural. If he had to describe it, it seemed like charred tree branches. Something Michael had never seen or could comprehend. It was then that he awoke so suddenly.
Even now that he was awake, that clear voice kept running through his mind. āI shall become of your world,ā it said. The dark figureās voice sounded almost angelic. Michael recalled how when hearing that voice, the tone seemed to put Michael at ease, but it was what was said that filled him with confusion, and now for some reason, that ease he felt was vanishing as he felt a sense of fear replacing it. Who or what was this figure in his dreams and where was that awful place? He remembered his friend, Jeanie, telling him about how dreams were sometimes a reflection of how one might be feeling or perhaps a glimpse of whatās to come in oneās own life. Michael thought to himself, Perhaps thatās all it is. But a part of Michael felt that was too simple of an answer. He got up to get a bottle of water and drained half the bottle in what felt like no time at all. He returned to bed where he lay awake tossing and turning for about an hour before he drifted off back to sleep.
3.5 stars
CW: descriptions of violence/gore
The Condemned is a dark and unique novel that takes readers inside a young manās horrific nightmares. Inspired partly by Danteās Inferno, as well as vampire mythology, Rosenbaum crafts a hellscape that will terrify its readers.
Readers follow protagonist Michael, a college student who begins having hellacious nightmares of a dark figure. As the visions intensify and spiral, so does Michaelās grip on reality. When those closest to him are hurt, and Michael learns of the dark figureās malicious intentions, he has no choice but to follow the voiceās demands lest he loses his loved ones.
Rosenbaumās talent for vivid descriptions evokes a visceral and emotional reaction from readers. As a horror fan, I loved the creativity that went into the graphic scenes. The characters felt dynamic, tangible, and easy to become invested in. Their dialogue moved between scenes seamlessly, and established individual identities for each.
The element I appreciated the most from the novel was the ending: it does not conclude happily. Completely surprised me, but I applaud the author for traveling the dark road, as this showed an experimental approach to the genre while still maintaining its chilling allure.
I struggled with the novelās pacing. The Condemned is a quick read, and as a horror fan, I was expecting more suspense to prepare for the climax. There are moments where Michael attempts to wrap his head around whatās happening, followed by conversations with his friend or sequences of routine that linger for longer than necessary. The villainās backstory is revealed quickly, and the plot twist emerges without forewarning.
There are scattered moments where I also wouldāve loved more detail on Michaelās surroundings, senses, and feelings. I wanted more from phrases like āemotion-filled eyes,ā ā[his] voice now had signs of irritation,ā and āTom was starting to get frustratedā on both a language level and an emotional one. Rosenbaumās writing is engaging, though with the intricacies of the plot, characters, and supernatural elements, more emphatic and thoughtful craft choices wouldāve made The Condemned more gripping.Ā
The Condemned is well thought out with interesting characters and a solid storyline. Iād recommend this book to horror fans who love strong supernatural elements. Speed readers might find this novel too fast-paced, but fans of creepy and harrowing tales will find a home with this novel.