Lockdown: 1 (Escape from Furnace)

Furnace Penitentiary is the world’s most secure prison for young offenders, buried a mile beneath the earth’s surface. Alex Sawyer is the “new fish.” Convicted of a murder he didn’t commit, sentenced to life without parole, he knows he has two choices: find a way out, or resign himself to death in the darkness at the bottom of the world. Except in Furnace, death is the least of his worries. The prison is a place of pure evil, where inhuman creatures in gas masks stalk the corridors at night, where giants in black suits drag screaming inmates into the shadows, where deformed beasts can be heard howling from the blood-drenched tunnels below. Escape is Alex’s only option. But it’s not just about saving his own skin. The more he discovers, the more he understands that he is going to have to do whatever it takes to expose this nightmare hidden from the eyes of the world. Fast-paced and full of shocks and terrors, Lockdown is the incredible first book in Alexander Gordon Smith’s Escape from Furnace series.

Alexander Gordon Smith, 30, is the author of The Inventors, which was shortlisted for the Wow Factor competition. He writes non-fiction books and articles and is the co-writer of the Scooby Doo: World of Mystery magazine. He also runs his own publishing company, promoting and building talented new writers and poets. He lives in Norwich.