Retired auto body mechanic Milo St. Lawrence, weeks left to live, flatout refuses hospice care and instead returns to his New England home, a home where his family was destroyed. Dying, haunted by memories, Milo is convinced he must face something buried in his past before the reaper claims him.
Confined to a hospital bed in the house, his repressed memories rise to the surface. He remembers his siblings’ strange illnesses, the rigid Catholic faith of his parents, and the devotion that replaced proper medical care with prayer.
He remembers his sister Marie speaking to an imaginary friend, and then his parents began speaking to the entity as well. He remembers the night he left the house, the night Marie spoke of the many-limbed caterpillar man and the alien hookah device that had been siphoning the life of the St. Lawrence children for decades.
With only his engineering skills and a the resolve of a dying man, Milo figures a way to modify the parasite’s hookah for human operation. Milo has to act fast before he becomes the parasite’s next offering.
Why we’re excited about this book:
When it comes to horror fiction, the weirder the better for Michael Boulerice. The author of Feeding the Wheel, Boulerice’s short fiction has appeared in such publications as the NoSleep Podcast, Cosmic Horror Monthly, and Tenebrous Press among others. With his latest, Boulerice presents a dying man determined to piece together his fragmented memories only to face a nightmarish parasitic horror submerged in his past. Emma E. Murray (Crushing Snails) says: “Inhalation beautifully addresses toxic family dynamics, harmful religiosity, and grief while also delivering a truly chilling supernatural terror that will have you holding your breath until the last page.” David Simmons (Ghosts of East Baltimore) says: “In Inhalation, a dying man goes home to remember why he ran. Some families pray together. His learned how to feed God. Boulerice writes with the confidence of an OG and the recklessness of someone with something to prove. Lock in.”, and B.R. Yeager (Negative Space) says: “It’s a story of memory, families, and faith, all drenched in an oppressively hostile atmosphere, where past and present tangle, culminating in a knot of psychedelic phantasmagoria. By turns horrific and heartbreaking, Inhalation is a fresh and masterful exploration of what it means to be haunted.”
Releasing from Death’s Head Press 16 June 2026, Inhalation by Michael Boulerice is available for pre-order now.
BOB PASTORELLA