Hi 👋🏻

It is late. I am in bed; the only light in my room the soft glow of the television. Words fail me as I slam the delete button with every letter I type. These three, simple sentences have taken me ten minutes to conjure up. Why are introductions so difficult?

Hi, hello, welcome! I’m Brooke! I’m 23 years old and live in Sydney, Australia. As an avid reader and aspiring author, I am here to share all things bookish! My favourite genres are fantasy/romantasy, gothic horror, young adult, dark academia, and historical fiction! If I had to choose my top three books of all time (as of Feb 1, 2025), I’d have to say: Babel by R.F. Kuang, The Invisible Life of Addie Larue by V.E. Schwab and If We Were Villains by M.L. RIO. I’m hoping to use this platform to not only yap about my favourite things, but also to share my self-publishing journey as I write my book, Hallowed Be Thy Name.

In the beginning…

I wrote my first ‘book’ when I was nine years old. Glued to my mum’s computer, I spent a couple of hours every day typing out William Wood — a Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings knock off, basically. It was about a young boy — William — with magical powers who was hunted by an evil wizard who wanted his magical abilities for himself. I made a cover and even printed it out for my mum to read. I was so proud of it. I went on to write a sequel, but I’ve only kept the first book!

As a teenager, fan-fiction was my calling. I wrote mainly Shadowhunter fanfics (shoutout to Malec), and these are still available on ao3, but you’d have to waterboard the titles out of me. It was fun to build a little readership of people who not only enjoyed the same things as me, but also engaged with my way of storytelling. I wanted to be an author, but hadn’t developed my own original ideas. That is, until my final year of school. I had an untitled fantasy series in my head: a woman with forbidden powers learns she is the most dangerous being in the human realm and is forced to go on the run where she allies herself with a group of outlaws of whom have their own secrets for being hunted. That is a brief summary. I was really passionate about it but beyond some character profiles and a few scenes here and there, I hadn’t gotten very far. Exams rolled around, I graduated, and writing seemed to have been shoved to the back of my mind. I hope to one day return to this idea, I’m sure 16 year old Brooke would be thrilled to return to the magical world she created.

The Birth of Hallowed Be Thy Name

Hallowed Be Thy Name was born in late 2021 whilst I was enrolled in a Writing Fiction class. We were given an assessment task to write a 1000-1500 short story based on a piece of stimuli. There were four options and I selected an image of an old, abandoned house in the middle of the woods, swallowed by greenery. I titled my work The House on North Lane and the opening line is the exact same one as Hallowed Be Thy Name, yet I could never have imagined how this story would change and develop. Following my assignment, I didn’t touch this story for a long time. It became a distant memory, and yet my main character, Augustus Saint, never seemed to leave me. He began to grow and evolve and shape into someone I felt like I knew like the back of my hand. And slowly, Hallowed Be Thy Name as it is today was born.

What is Hallowed Be Thy Name about?

Hallowed Be Thy Name is a gothic piece of fiction with dark academia, religious and psychological horror elements.

The Blurb:

In the ominous gloom of the House on North Lane, Augustus Saint harbours a dark secret: he murdered his mother. Her ghost how haunts every corridor, shackling him to an inexorable descent into madness from which there is no escape.

Tormented by a devil only he can see, Augustus grapples with the chilling realisation that he is on the path to become the very thing he had always feared — the villain of his own story.

The echoes of a traumatic and strict religious upbringing follow him into an adulthood filled with loneliness, self-loathing and guilt, his relationship with God fractured irreparably. The only light in his life is his younger brother Auden, their shared trauma uniting them against a cruel, selfish world. The road to Hell is paved for them, and it seems there is no turning back.

A sliver of salvation infiltrates Augustus’ guarded walls upon meeting Nathaniel Carrington, his academic rival with an exceptional brain and a disarming smile. Forced to collaborate on a university assignment, Augustus’ defences crumble, and he opens up about a life altering trauma that he endured at nine years old. Together, they use their studies as an opportunity to uncover the truth about his history with religion and his abusive mother.

In this tale of psychological turmoil, Augustus must navigate the treacherous depths of his own mind to escape the House on North Lane’s suffocating grasp. Will he emerge from the shadows triumphant, or will be become just another forgotten ghost inside the House on North Lane?

Hallowed Be Thy Name might be the PERFECT book for you if you like:

• haunted houses

• religious & gothic horror

• codependent siblings

• dark academia

• academic rivals to lovers

• sunshine x grumpy

• morally grey characters

• villian pov

• dual timelines

Art: @kristizeyn via instagram - Auden and Augustus Saint in front of the House on North Lane

So,

If you want to learn more about Hallowed Be Thy Name and my writing journey, please consider subscribing to my substack 🫶🏻

I’m also very active on my bookstagram @b.rookishthings where I post books, book reviews and also sprinkle in Hallowed Be Thy Name sneak peeks !!!

Thank you so much for reading and I look forward to documenting this journey!