Marcus Webb has spent thirty-one years preserving the history of Holt, Tennessee - a quiet town that seems luckier, steadier, and more whole than places like it have any right to be.

Then, while cataloguing the papers of the town's oldest family, he finds a covenant dated 1823.

It is not a metaphor. It is not folklore.

For two centuries, Holt has survived flood, drought, collapse, and decay because something in the ground has been paid what it was owed. Every year. Without exception.

As winter closes in, rats begin appearing across town in impossible numbers, gathering in church pews, lining the streets, and watching. The records point to one terrifying truth: when the tribute is not given, the town itself is collected against.

Now Marcus must decide what a place is worth, what a community is really built on, and whether love for a town can survive knowing the price of its peace.

The Vermin Gospel is a slow-burning folk horror novel about inheritance, civic faith, buried bargains, and the terrible intimacy of choosing what must continue.