#dead acre

Dead Acre: Black Badge #1 (incentive variant) (2026)

[PREVIEW] Dead Acre: Black Badge #1 (July 1, 2026)

adapting the story novel: Rhett C. Bruno and Jaime Castle | writer: Cullen Bunn | artist [penciller & inker]: Riley Brown | colorist: Jorge Fares Maese Ramirez | letterer: AndWorld Design | cover artist: Riley Brown | publishing company: Vault Comics

synopsis: Life isn't simple for a Demon Hunter.

James Crowley met his mortal end in a hail of gunfire. Now, he finds himself in purgatory, serving the White Throne to avoid falling to Hell. Not quite undead, though not alive either, the best he can hope for is to work off his servitude and fade away.

A fanart of James Crawley, from the Black Badge series by Rhett C.Bruno and Jamie Castle, narrated by Roger Clark.

"Vein Pursuits"

Authors: Rhett C. Bruno & Jaime Castle Narrated by: Roger Clark Book Series: Black Badge, Book #2 Length: 11 hours, 2 minutes Release date: May 23, 2023

Listen to a couple of samples below:

Overview:

The path to Heaven runs through miles of icy Hell …

James Crowley has ridden the road to Crescent City before, but never with companions like these. Never with a woman whose very presence jeopardizes everything he’s fought for over the past two decades.

The swamps are a brutal, nasty place filled with creatures most people think only exist in nightmares and fever dreams. When Crowley, along with Rosa, Bram Stoker, Harker, and Irish stumble upon such a creature, and one of their party finds themselves mortally wounded, they must find help in the most unlikely of places.

But that wasn’t James Crowley’s mission. As a Black Badge, a Hand of God, he’s been tasked with hunting down the worst Hell has to offer, and at Shargrafein’s beckoning, he must suss out the Betrayer—a mysterious being about whom no information is given.

What he finds is something he never could have guessed. The city is overrun with vampires, werewolves, and worse, including an old acquaintance with nothing good in mind.

Meanwhile, Rosa has continued her pursuit to reconnect with her dead husband, Willy Massey. With the help of a Voodoo Queen, she must do the unthinkable. Only Crowley stands between her and a choice that would forever scar her soul. But will he be able to escape the clutches of Hell in order to keep her from destroying everything and everyone in her path?

With the question of right and wrong always nagging at Crowley’s undead heart, he must decide where his loyalties lie in this pulse-pounding sequel to the hit Cold as Hell. The Witcher meets The Dresden Files in this weird Western series by the Audible number one bestselling duo behind Dead Acre.

©2023 Rhett C. Bruno and Steven Beaulieu ℗2023 Blackstone Publishing

Vein Pursuits is available from:

Audible ✰ Audiobooks.com ✰ AudiobooksNow.com ✰ AudiobookStore.com ✰ Barnes & Noble ✰ Blackstone Publishing ✰ Downpour ✰ Google Play ✰ Rakuten Kobo

WIP of my next project - James Crowley from the novel Cold as Hell, by Rhett C Bruno & Jaime Castle, narrated by one and only Roger Clark. :)

I got into the Black Badge series simply because Roger was narrating it, but I got hooked. The plot and characters are great and I became obsessed. Can't wait for the next book, which is set for sometime around 2023.

Last time I got to work on this in a nice Cafe in Bucharest and it was great!