Thursday, June 12, 2025

INTERVIEW WITH HUNTER SHEA (WE ARE ALWAYS WATCHING)

 


Today we welcome Hunter Shea to the page, and ask our three favourite questions:

Supernatural Central Short and Quick Interview


1. Tell me a little bit about your main character of this book.

– West Ridley is a teenage boy who has been through a lot over the past few years. His father has a permanent case of vertigo from a car accident, and the family has struggled to make ends meet. Things have gotten so bad, they have to move from New York to his grandfather’s decrepit farm in Pennsylvania. Total culture shock. Making matters worse, Grandpa Abraham is a basic stranger to West, and a cantankerous, mean-spirited curmudgeon to those who know him. He’s not happy West and his family are there, to say the least. Despite all of this, West is old enough to realize whining about his situation won’t make things any better. A complete horror fan (kind of like the author), he immerses himself in his horror magazines and movies as a way to comfort himself. That and his love for the band New Year’s Day (and crush on the lead singer). West is stoic for someone his age, and brave, maybe because he’s absorbed so much horror without flinching. He's the yin to Grandpa Abraham’s yang, that’s for sure. Together, they do start to balance each other out, even if they don’t fully understand one another. The horror and the mystery unfolds through West’s eyes, and perhaps he’s the right person at the right time to cast a light on the darkness that has plagued the farm for generations.  

2. Do you believe in the paranormal and if so, do you have an experience you can share?

– Absolutely. I lived with the ghost of a little boy who would appear like a flesh and blood child in our apartment from time to time. When I first saw him, I was washing the dishes and my wife, who was gravely ill and on a life support machine in our bedroom, was asleep. All of a sudden, I saw this boy standing in the hallway, looking at me. I thought he was some neighborhood kid who came up to our apartment (we lived on the top floor of a 2 family house). When I looked at him, he darted into my wife’s room. I ran after him, worried he would trip over the wires on the floor and disengage one of the machines. When I got there, he was nowhere to be found. I assumed at the time I was just cracking up from stress. I told no one about him because I didn’t want family or friends thinking I couldn’t care for my wife. Turns out, she was seeing him, too. When she first told me about him sitting on the bed next to her, I almost fainted. She described the same boy I’d been seeing. He would go away for a few years, and come back whenever my wife had a health crisis. He was an unofficial part of our family for almost 25 years. That experience, and some others, have proven to me that there is more to come after we die. 

That's a pretty good one! 3. What titles are you working on now that you can tell us about?

I write a lot about cryptids because I grew up a huge bigfoot and Loch Ness monster fan, thanks to shows like In Search Of. Over the years, I’ve written wild horror-action books about bigfoot, skunk apes, orang pendek, Nessie, the Dover Demon, the Montauk Monster, the Jersey Devil and the Texas Goat Man, just to name a few. Well, I’m finally getting around to what I think is the most fascinating cryptid story, the Mothman. That tale from West Virginia in 1967 is about so much more than a winged creature prowling the night. There were lights and objects in the sky, ghostly voices and apparitions, men in black, you name it. So fascinating, and a bit terrifying. I just started writing my Mothman book, setting it years after the 1967 event that culminated with the collapse of the Silver Bridge. It’s a blast writing about my favorite cryptid and setting it in a period of time that was so wonderful for me. If all goes well, it will be out later this year, so stay tuned! 


We Are Always Watching
Hunter Shea

Genre: Horror
Publisher: Dark Wolf Books
Date of Publication: 5/27/2025
ISBN: 979-8895679234
ASIN: B0F3QTH2WK
Number of pages: 353
Word Count: 94K

Tagline: They See Everything. They Know Everything. And They Never Stop Watching…

Book Description:

When West Ridley’s family is forced to abandon New York for a crumbling Pennsylvania farmhouse, he expects misery—but nothing could prepare him for the horrors lurking within its walls. His father’s worsening illness, his mother’s exhaustion, and his grandfather’s drunken ramblings paint a bleak picture of their new reality. But it’s the eerie warnings and shadowed figures that truly unnerve him.

The words “WE SEE YOU” scrawled on his ceiling are just the beginning. Something sinister roams the halls at night, whispering through the silence, watching from the darkness. Grandpa Abraham swears the house is haunted. But the truth is far worse than restless spirits—because in this house, secrets are buried deep, and the Guardians will do anything to keep them hidden.

As the Ridleys unravel the mysteries of their new home, one thing becomes chillingly clear: escape is impossible. No matter where they go, the watchers remain.

A pulse-pounding horror thriller packed with eerie suspense, We Are Always Watching is perfect for fans of Stephen King, Paul Tremblay, and haunted house stories that linger long after the last page. Dare to uncover the truth? Order your copy today—before they see you first.

Amazon    BN     Dark Wolf Books


Excerpt:

His foot crunched on a three-foot long stick. It was gnarled and thick, a perfect walking stick and weed slasher. Whisking it back and forth, he swatted at the wild vegeta tion, heading for the woodpile. It would make a great bonfire. He’d never been to one in person, but he’d seen plenty in movies, especially the flicks from the ’80s with teen campers in peril.

West loved those movies, especially the parts where girls took off their shirts and either went skinny dipping or had sex in the woods or an empty cabin. Actresses took their clothes off a lot back then. He’d never even seen a naked boob until Anthony showed him this strange astronaut/vampire flick called Lifeforce. The girl vampire was totally naked, front and back, for half the movie. West’s mind was blown. Horror, sci-fi, and his first naked woman. The constant flip-flopping between arousal and terror left him both exhausted and too tired to sleep that night.

Something crashed through the brush to his left. He stopped, the hairs on the back of his neck rising. There was a garbled growl. The sounds of two cats tussling gave his nerves sweet relief. Not wanting to get in the middle of their fight, he veered to the right.

Closing in on the haphazard mound of wood, he realized what it was. The farm would have had a barn at one time. It must have collapsed decades ago. The old walls and floorboards were blighted by the sun and elements. The stench of decay grew stronger with each step. Weeds grew through the gaps, some of them so thick, they hid whole sections of the former barn. “I wonder what took you down,” he said, lifting boards here and there with the tip of his sneaker. The ground beneath it was black as pitch and had an odd smell, like something scorched and long forgotten. Could have been a fire. Or maybe it was a storm, some hurricane that sent people to their cellars. That is, if hurricanes happened in this part of Pennsylvania.

Did Grandpa Abraham’s place have a storm cellar? And what about a fruit cellar? He heard about them all the time, especially when it came to places for crazed killers to hide bodies. What was the point of a fruit cellar? Why stick your fruit in some hole?

There was sudden movement in the brush behind him. He waited for one of the cats to slink into view. The sound didn’t repeat itself and no cats came out to play. West felt the hairs stand up on the back of his neck. He had the very uncomfortable feeling that he was being watched.

Out here, surrounded by the tall grass, anyone could be lurking.

He closed his eyes and saw the words on the ceiling over his bed. WE SEE YOU West was suddenly very uncomfortable. All of this was so alien to him, he felt as if he’d stepped into a place where he didn’t belong. “Time to go back inside.”

He trudged away from the collapsed barn, unable to shake the feeling that there were eyes at his back

 

 

About the Author: 

Often called THE KING OF THE CRYPTIDS, Hunter Shea is a lifelong horror hound and NY Times bestselling author of over forty books of monstrous mayhem, ghostly frights, and newfound terrors. Some of his bestselling books include the critically acclaimed Creature, They Rise, and The Montauk Monster, the nostalgic Money Back Guaranteed and One Size Eats All series, and Jessica Backman’s Death in the Afterlife paranormal trilogy. His books have been found in the International Cryptozoology Museum and his face on the Discovery Channel where he talks about, well, monsters.

He can be heard and seen on his two long-running podcasts, Final Guys and Monster Men, both informed and humorous explorations of horror’s best – and worst – movies, books, and video games, as well as interviews with some of the hottest writers, directors and producers in the genre. You’ll also find exciting first-hand accounts of true-life hauntings, UFOs, cryptid encounters and more.

Website – www.huntershea.com








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