Review: Ghost Mine by Hunter Shea

Deep in a Wyoming mine, hell awaits. Former cattle driver, Rough Rider and current New York City cop Nat Blackburn is given an offer he can’t refuse by President Teddy Roosevelt. Tales of gold in the abandoned mining town of Hecla, in the Deep Rock Hills, abound. The only problem-those who go seeking their fortune never return. Roosevelt’s own troops are among the missing, and the President wants to know their fate – and find the gold. Along with his constant companion, Teta, a hired gun with a thirst for adventure, Nat travels to a barren land where even animals dare not tread. Along the way, they are joined by a Selma, a fiery and beautiful woman in search of her brother who was swallowed up by Hecla years earlier. Hecla is an eerie ghost town, its cemetery filled with crooked tombstones, the dusty streets scored by tumbleweed, the windows of the abandoned houses like eyes, following their every move. Terrifying wraiths flit throughout the town at night. Settling into a vacant home, Nat, Teta and Selma are approached by strange, black eyed children who then disappear like twin vapors. A trip to the mine ends with them galloping for their lives, chased by immense, hairy wild men. No, Hecla is far from abandoned – it’s teeming with the supernatural, strange beasts and phantoms both luring them deeper into the mystery and driving them away from the mine. Only when a strange preacher and his hulking mute assistant arrive (on a Godly mission after hearing the blaring horns of Revelation) do they realize they cannot leave the town’s borders, an invisible wall refusing to let them go. There’s only one thing to do – plumb the chilling depths of the ghost mine and find the source of Hecla’s bizarre power. What they stumble upon is a hellish battle of underworld forces while being tortured by the ghosts of their checkered pasts. There’s a mystery in Hecla thousands of years old. Solving it could spell the end of the world.