BryonySeries: Limbo Trilogy

I think vague ideas for the BryonySeries Limbo trilogy started coming into my mind in 2018.

I wanted to explore what happens when a place becomes frozen in time.

But I didn't start jotting thoughts (none saved anyway) until spring 2019.

However, I realized as I wrote the three books in the Limbo trilogy ("The Phoenix," "Call of the Siren," and "House on Top of the Hill") that the value of this series was more than a fun exploration of the activity in a seemingly stalled and stagnant locale.

The Limbo series actually connects the ends of the original "drop of blood" young adult vampire trilogy and its prequel (the five-installment "Before The Blood"), filling in the blanks, answering (and raising) questions, and creating a seamless story loop without any real beginning or end.

As I wrote at the end of my second writing retreat in 2024:

Now, I could be wrong about “House on Top of the Hill” being the last novel. But at age sixty-three, I want to be sure I finish these other BryonySeries books, while I’m still able to finish them. So I'm definitely not bidding creative writing good-bye. I have plenty of book projects to last me a long time.

Also, for anyone who has read the BryonySeries, this "House on Top of the Hill" brings the series to a nice full circle. 

You see, if one starts with the drop of blood trilogy (“Bryony,” “Visage,” and “Staked!”),  the five installments of “Before The Blood” becomes a terrific prequel to the series. Limbo then fills in the time period between “drop” and BTB, the eighty years when nothing seemingly happens.

Or if one reads the books in chronological order – beginning with “Before The Blood,” and then moving onto to Limbo and then “drop of blood,” the novel “Staked!” gives a nice finish to the series. 

And if you start with Limbo, you can read BTB and “drop” to see what happened before and what happens after, which also works quite logically, especially since "drop" seamlessly follows "House on Top of the Hill."

Now, I don’t want to forget HOW to write a novel. And who knows? I might have another lurking in my brain somewhere, just waiting for the right time to show itself.

Or perhaps I’ll co-write a novel or helps other authors polish theirs. But from my viewpoint on this Monday morning, “House on Top of the Hill” is likely my last novel.

Of course, I did say that after “Before The Blood,” too. 

And if we want to travel down that path, I really only intended to write one novel, “Bryony.” But the story was too big for one book. 

Fine, I thought. I’ll write a sequel. But the story was too big for THAT book, too.

Fine. A trilogy then. Except now I had all this background backstory and my little band of fans for “drop of blood” wanted to read the series back story, which turned into an eight-year project for the five installments.

So there you have it. A series that overtook itself much like the poisonous bryony took over Simons Mansion, the Simons estate, and worked its way into the woods (which wasn’t Simons Woods after all, as you shall see in "House on Top of the Hill").

And with that, here is a summary of the trilogy, along with the back cover copy of all three books.

Limbo

Its tagline reads: "What happens when time stops in a fishing village in Northern Michigan? The supernatural reigns."

This BryonySeries trilogy - in three separate and very unique novels - explore the time period of the very late nineteenth century through nineteen seventy-five, when all progress appears to stop in Munsonville, Michigan, giving the illusion that times has stopped.

The first novel spans a few short months. The second two span approximately forty years each. 

The third has an unusual structure: each chapter is (almost) a separate short story that (most of the time) moves the greater story forward. You would have to read it to know what I mean.

The Phoenix

Late 1895 in Munsonville, Michigan is all about survival and rebuilding: for the fishing village still reeling from deadly tragedies, for twelve-year-old Marie Clare who is grounded at Munsonville Inn with her dying father, and for two newly turned vampires foraging their meals from a dwindling supply of villagers. 

But to rise strong and unscathed, some will be sacrificed along the way. Who gets to live and thrive? And who decides?

Call of the Siren

Sue Bass is haunted by dreams of her father, who died in a boating accident before she was born, alluring dreams of water and song. But then a soft-spoken outside man with an inside plan comes to town, and Sue's sleepwalking fades, only to resurface with greater magnetism when he leaves. 

Two voices beckon. Which one will she heed?

House on Top of the Hill

Change comes slowly to Munsonville, and for Steve Barnes, who spends his entire life in the village, that's just fine. From boyhood to manhood, he savors the slow pace and friendly smiles, even while working by his parents' side from sunup to sundown to run the family diner.

The only blight is this fishing village's preoccupation with an empty mansion in the woods, whose tales of former glory and catastrophe fueled a rampage of ghost stories. Steve doesn't believe them, but some do – and no one can deny the power the crumbling old building holds over them.

Especially when it changes everyone, including Steve, forever.