Steve the Paladin

Bloodthirsty ghouls. A necromancer. A secret academy that uses Dungeon & Dragons as a training manual. What could possibly go wrong? After recently discovering he's a paladin and that the world of the supernatural is real, Steve Firestone, a divorced late-night radio host, has that first-day-at-school feeling. Only this is no Hogwarts. Being forty, out of shape, and with a mouth that gets him into trouble, Steve must find a way to meet his tutor's exhausting demands and learn to channel divine power to live up to his ancestry. That's if he wishes to stay at the academy and with his party of new friends, including Nymantha, the fearsome wizard to whose flame Steve is a moth. To complicate matters, when a citizen is found torn to pieces, their organs removed, and dozens of bodies stolen from a graveyard, it means only one thing: a necromancer is building an army of ghouls. But to what end? Why is it happening in Steve's backyard? And why is there a goblin stalking him? Steve and his party must embark on their first quest: find and stop the necromancer, because ain't nobody got time for an army of hungry ghouls treating the population like an all-you-can-eat buffet.

A zombie crime boss. Powerful black magic. Demon assassins. Otherwise known as Tuesday. Meet Steve Firestone, late-night radio host and paladin. Since he joined the Arkane Academy for the Gifted and Strange, he's learned our world is full of supernatural monsters ripped from the pages of Dungeons & Dragons-and most of them want to eat or kill us. That's where Steve and his new friends come in. That is, if Steve can learn to channel the divine power of his mysterious patron. Depending on whom he talks to, it's either a Cthulhu-like space-squid or a fallen paladin residing somewhere in Hell. Neither seems like an ideal source. But it's not like he can conjure a god out of his backside, and beggars can't be choosers. Especially now that a zombie crime boss is wreaking havoc across England, gathering together the parts of an ancient journal that promises the rebirth of a dark sorcerer known as the "Deathbringer." If Steve's to stop this resurrection and the inevitable fallout, he'll have to fix his issue with his patron and get to the bottom of a curse that has affected his family line before he too is consumed by it.

What's a little intrusive, magical psychotherapy between friends? After the events of his last quest, the Arkane Academy for the Gifted and Strange have concluded that Steve Firestone's patron is the source of a great curse that has plagued his family for centuries. But there's a chance to fix it-if Steve opens his mind to be ravaged by an ancient dragon shifter who dabbles in psychotherapy and curse-wrangling. If Steve cannot rid himself of this curse, then his days with the Academy and his friends are over and he'll be hunted to the far corners of the world. A fallen paladin is not treated with much sympathy. It should be a stroll in the park. Right? Not when a brutal vampire lord decides to pay Steve a visit and Devon, the cleric of their party, is mysteriously missing. With challenges coming at him from all angles, Steve will have to dig deep if he's to support his friends and resist the very real threat of having his brains turned to jam.