Carnival of Lost Shadows

In the decaying coastal republic of Veridia, the annual Carnival of Masks promises redemption through anonymity. When Marcus, a war veteran with a prophet’s scarred tongue, returns to his hometown, he senses that the revelry conceals a darker liturgy. As the city surrenders to drums and delirium, a uniformed mob cloaks a ritual sacrifice inside the legal violence of the state. Told through the eyes of a disillusioned detective, a masked reveler, and the victim’s widow, the novel unspools a harrowing chronicle of collective awakening—where every crime scene sketch tries to trace the shadow God forgot, and where the line between law and demonic possession dissolves under the weight of a thousand intoxicated souls.