Nightmares and hallucinations have plagued Heather Morell all her life, relics of schizophrenia and childhood bereavement.

Until she meets Raine and Evelyn, that is — self-proclaimed bodyguard and bad-tempered magician — and learns she’s not insane at all. The spirits and monsters she sees are all too real, the god-thing in her nightmares is teaching her how to surpass human limits, and her twin sister who supposedly never existed could still be alive, somewhere Outside, beyond the walls of reality.

Heather plunges into a world of eldritch magic and fanatic cultists, trying to stay alive, stay sane, and deal with her own blossoming attraction to dangerous women. But being ‘In The Know’ isn’t all terror and danger. Sometimes the monsters wear nice dresses and stick around for afternoon tea. Sometimes you find you have more in common with them than you think. Perhaps this is Heather’s chance to be something more than the defeated husk she’d grown up as, to find real friendship and meaning among things like herself – and perhaps, out there on the rim of the possible, to bring her twin sister back from the dead.

Katalepsis is an Ancient Greek word which means ‘comprehension’, or perhaps more accurately, ‘insight’.

Katalepsis is a serial web novel about cosmic horror and human fragility, urban fantasy and lesbian romance, set in a sleepy English university town.

New chapters are currently posted once a week, on Saturdays.

It will run for a very long time.

If you are new, start here.

If you just finished the official ebook or audiobook of Volume I, the story resumes here.

The most recent chapter is Arc 24, Chapter 10

If you are enjoying the story and want to see more, please consider donating via the Patreon page!

A list of content warnings for the story can be found here.


Front cover art by Noctilia, header art by Yivel.

Disclaimer/warning: Please note that Katalepsis is intended for a mature audience. This is a horror story, after all. For more information, see the FAQ here.

For those of you who prefer reading your fiction through Royal Road, a mirror of the story can be found here. Royal Road also has a ‘light mode’, for readers who do not like white text on a dark background.