The Night Hunter 4: The Shrine by Robert Faulcon

The Night Hunter 4
The Shrine
by Robert Faulcon
1984 Arrow

A local ghost layer uncovers an Arachne shrine in an ancient Roman mine in rural England. The shrine is a psychic battery, draining the energies of several captives held underground.

Dan Brady enters the picture, setting a trap for Arachne agents and the elemental forces under their control. They arrive, four men with rotting animal heads, and the plan dissolves in a rage of death and madness.

Some genuine chills until things go over the top at the end. I've described the Night Hunter as if Nigel Kneale wrote Evil Dead, and we can add a little John Constantine to the characterization, with Brady's single minded focus damning those he comes into contact.

Paperback from Amazon.

Night Hunter 3: The Ghost Dance by Robert Faulcon

Night Hunter 3

The Ghost Dance

by Robert Faulcon (Robert Holdstock)

A woman from a Sioux reservation is embedded with several native American spirits, through bones and totems implanted under her skin, and sent to rural England. Dan Brady follows leads for his missing family to the same town, and connects with another father whose child has been targeted by Arachne, the secretive occult society of the series.

Less focused than the others, and had to read some events in the end a couple times over to kinda follow what was happening. Took a while to get going, but there are some great scenes. As the woman travels to England, she stops periodically for the spirits to feed, slaughtering a cruise ship, a hospital, and an entire town. Great image of a giant grasshopper feasting on eyes pulled from a pile of severed heads, shades of Eat Them Alive.

Paperback from AbeBooks.

Night Hunter 2: The Talisman by Robert Faulcon

Night Hunter 2
The Talisman
by Robert Faulcon (Robert Holdstock)
1983 Arrow Books

Dan Brady continues his investigation of the shadowy Arachne organization and looking for his kidnapped family. His leads point him to a small English town where visitors have been inexplicably obsessed with returning. An archeological dig is linked to disappearances and brutal axe murders as Brady tries to find the connection between Arachne and the spirit of a vengeful Viking.

Notes of folk horror and British style psychical research, and the series balances well between a "monster of the week" and continuing his main search for his family. Some nasty Viking torture, including the Blood Eagle, where the victim's lungs are pulled out of their ribcage and spread like wings. And may be the only story with a reanimated corpse with a sword hilt dangling out of it's ass.

Paperback from Amazon

Night Hunter 1: The Stalking by Robert Faulcon

Night Hunter 1
The Stalking
by Robert Faulcon (Robert Holdstock)
1987 Diamond Books

Suburban England Evil Dead as if written by Nigel Kneale. Paranormal researcher Dan Brady is left for dead after his house is invaded, his wife violated with a golden scepter, and his family kidnapped. Once out of his coma he returns to the house and finds another researcher whose family met the same fate. The two build up the psychic defenses of the house against attacks by astral elementals.

Shades of Quatermass and Stone Tape with the combination of psychical research mixed with ancient folk horror, with the violence ramped up as bodies are ripped apart by unseen forces. Dan Brady is a bit harder edged than your average occult detective type, placing his path of vengeance ahead of uncovering the plot using supernatural forces.

Paperback from Amazon.