Tru Lockhart: The Down And Out Prince In The Grim and Grisly Underworlds

TRU LOCKHART: THE DOWN AND OUT PRINCE IN THE GRIM AND GRISLY UNDERWORLDS. TRU LOCKHART tells the tale of a young world-hopping boy grappling with wicked forces beyond his comprehension. Unlike other mainstream fantasy adventures, TRU LOCKHART is more literary, with a twist of the fantastic. It is a psychological thriller in which the protagonist contends with the far more insidious forces that wreak havoc on the modern American family: alcoholism, misguided psychiatry, emotional abuse, psychosis, and alienation. Tru Lockhart is filled with whimsy, humor, adventure, family drama, superpowers, supernatural characters, and elements of surrealism and light teen horror. Young Tru Lockhart has no idea why his biological father is towering over him with a large black flashlight held high in the air, as if the enormous fellow is about to bludgeon poor Tru upside the head. Tru is no stranger to rough handling. He lives with his abusive stepfather and negligent mother. Yet he's never seen anything quite like this. His father's given name is Argus, and he has escaped from an institute for the criminally insane to break into Tru's non-descript suburban home. After tossing Tru's stepfather aside like a rag doll, Argus stomps up the stairs bellowing Tru's name. Argus had tried to kill Tru while he was still in his mother's womb, believing the boy might one day possess the power - and the desire - to destroy the world as we know it. His mother Debbie is negligent, and his cruel and abusive stepfather Jack may have only married Debbie in order to keep a watchful eye on Tru. Tru is certain that murder is on his father's mind. Instead, Argus performs a bizarre ceremony that will trigger a startling chain of events, plunging Tru into many oddball worlds, and into the hands of many outlandish villains, all who want to develop and use Tru's hidden powers for their own dark purposes. From page one, our hero is faced with inexplicable goings-on. Why does his own father want to put an end to Tru's life? Who is the being Tru's stepfather speaks with through the television? Was his transformation into a fish to escape down a toilet a real event, or did it all take place in his mind? As the dramatic events unfold, Tru is plunged into various oddball universes including a topsy-turvy Garden of Eden, the dungeon of a psychiatric institute, and a shocking underworld called the Sinosphere. All the while, Tru is developing a medley of superpowers he is unable to control, and is beset on all sides by colorful villains, each seeking to gain control of Tru in order to put his burgeoning abilities in service to their own sinister ends. As his personal troubles on Earth become more devastating and demoralizing, Tru's dips into parallel dimensions become darker and more momentous. Tru must overcome the despair and hatred that is gnawing into him: not only is his fate in the balance, but the fate of worlds.