The City That Drinks Shadows

Genre

Dark Sci-Fi

Dystopian Steampunk

Sci-Fi Noir

Mystery Thriller

Psychological Horror

Short Book Description

In the vertical abyss-city of Ouroboros-on-the-Chasm, power does not come from coal or fire—it comes from human shadows.

Every night, the city’s monstrous core harvests fragments of memory, identity, and soul from its citizens to keep the lights burning and the copper veins alive. Jessamine Hartwyn, a maintenance engineer assigned to the upper industrial struts, has learned to survive the loss. Names vanish. Faces disappear. Entire years of her life dissolve into empty spaces she can no longer reach.

But when she discovers evidence of deliberate sabotage hidden inside the city’s steam network, Jessamine uncovers something far more terrifying than rebellion: the handwriting behind the attacks is her own.

Hunted by Enforcers, haunted by memories that no longer exist, and drawn toward a masked saboteur who seems to know the person she used to be, Jessamine descends into the dark underworld beneath the city. There, among abandoned shafts, forbidden schematics, and the endless hunger of the core below, she must uncover the truth before the city consumes the last pieces of who she is.

Because in Ouroboros, forgetting is survival.

And remembering is treason.