And Darkness Fell

By David Berardelli

It's the undetermined but near future. America's population is plunging, beset by a mysterious plague that robs individuals of their mental faculties before causing catastrophic respiratory failure. One by one, the institutions of society are also failing. Electric power, media, and law enforcement have become nearly nonexistent. Only a small force, of military origin but exhibiting strange behavior and superhuman abilities, seems to be functioning.

Amid this dark and disturbing world, former soldier Alan Moss, who remains unaffected by the disease, struggles to survive the roving bands of murderous thugs—of both sexes—who are preying on the dead and dying. As he undertakes a thousand-mile drive from his home in Orlando to his mother's farm in western Pennsylvania, the highways become concrete battlefields that expose him to horrors he had not encountered even during his difficult military service. Along the way he hooks up with Reed McCallum, an ex-schoolteacher and recent victim of a mugging; and Brooke Fields, a nurse who has left the disintegrating medical system at Walter Reed Army Hospital. Together, the trio faces danger at every turn.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mountain Lake Press
• Release date: Mar 20, 2013
• ISBN: 9780988591929

David Berardelli

David Berardelli was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and grew up on his grandmother's farm in Gibsonia. Formerly a jazz musician, he studied music at Duquesne University for one year before being drafted into the U.S. Army. He was a member of the 80th Army Band at Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, Georgia, and also performed in the Third Army Soldier Show at Fort McPherson in Atlanta, Georgia. He also served as a bugler at nearly two hundred military funerals between 1970 and 1971. He has been a caricaturist, nightclub musician, and data-processing associate. He presently lives on a thirty-acre horse ranch in southern Mississippi with wife Linda, their horses, and two very bright and spoiled Aussie dogs, Kylie and Wiffle. David is the author of many novels, among them, The Apprentice, Wagon Driver, Demon Chaser and The Funny Detective as well as Stepping Out of My Grave. He is presently at work on several other projects. His email address is [e-mail]. He also is listed in Facebook. His web sites are: www.writersownwords.com/daemons/ www.davesdemons.weebly.com