THE HOLLOW HOURS SERIES BY BRITT WOLFE
Welcome to Ashridge Hollow.
The air is colder here. The fog hangs low and wide, curling like smoke through the eaves of weather-beaten houses. Somewhere, a screen door creaks without wind. The town is small—just one diner, one church, and one road that loops back on itself no matter how far you try to go. The trees are too tall, the shadows too long, and the stars—when they appear—look just a little too close.
You’ll notice it first in the silence. It’s not empty. Not really. It hums. Like something breathing behind the drywall. Like someone humming a song you almost remember. The neighbours are kind, if cautious. They’ll bring you casseroles and half-truths. They’ll tell you about the annual fair, the founding family, and where the foxes scream at night—but never why the last resident of your house left in such a hurry. Or why no one ever saw them leave.
On the final day of each month, a new story will unfold behind one of these doors—a teacher, a family, a stranger on the run. All of them carrying something they hoped to bury. All of them learning the same truth: the Hollow doesn’t care what you meant to do. It only cares what you did.
So sit still. Don’t answer the knock unless you’re certain you know who is at the door. And if you hear the rope swinging, close your eyes.
It’s safer not to watch.
These are the hours that stain your soul.
These are The Hollow Hours.
Daniel needed a place to disappear. Ashridge Hollow—a small, secluded town lost in the woods—seemed perfect. Quiet streets. Empty houses. Neighbours who smiled politely but never asked too many questions.
It was supposed to be a fresh start.
But the Hollow isn’t the kind of town you find by accident. It’s the kind that finds you.
In the crumbling house at the end of Turner Lane, Daniel discovers something waiting for him: a rope, hanging from the attic beams, that never stops swinging. At first, he tells himself it’s just an old house settling. Creaks. Drafts. Shadows. Things he can explain away.
But the creaking grows louder. The shadows sharper. And the past Daniel thought he left behind begins to unravel around him, thread by thread.
Because in Ashridge Hollow, nothing ever really leaves. Not the guilt. Not the dead. And not the rope, still swinging, slow and patient, waiting for the next.