Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World by Mark Waddell: Corporate Horror with a Big Heart

Colin Harris is the office drone you root for: anxious, eager to please, and desperate for a break. He works at Dark Enterprises, a multinational where the absurd has become normal – monstrous things live in stairwells, emotions are commodified, and the HR policies are somehow worse than the monsters. Colin makes a bargain with a shadowy presence to get the promotion he thinks will save him, and suddenly small-city disappearances and creeping doom follow his career leap. The setup is gleefully weird, the world building is gleefully grotesque, and the stakes tilt from satirical office life into full-on apocalyptic farce.

My Review

I picked this up wanting a smart, funny premise and got that plus an oddly tender center. Waddell’s eye for corporate nonsense is ruthless and hilarious – the little details about performance metrics, awful meetings, and passive-aggressive coworkers landed so precisely they made me wince and laugh at the same time – but the book never lets the satire be only surface. Colin’s need to belong and his clumsy attempts at bravery make him unexpectedly lovable, and when the plot careens toward disaster you actually care what happens to him.

If you like your satire with a bite and your speculative fiction with warm human stakes, this is the kind of book that will keep you turning pages while grinning at the absurdities it skewers. You’ll close this one entertained and oddly moved, convinced that even in the most ridiculous places people can find the courage to try to do the right thing.

You can get a copy of Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World by Mark Waddell on Amazon or Bookshop.

If this has you intrigued, read an excerpt from Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World below.

Excerpt Preview

As with most floors in the building, Transportation was far larger than our innocuous office tower in Midtown might suggest. It took almost ten minutes of walking for me to reach the well- appointed waiting area in front of the elevators. Soft Muzak drifted from hidden speakers, blandly inoffensive but filled with strange dissonances that made the hair on my arms stand straight up. A solitary being waited for me there, tall and cadaverous and dressed in a three-piece suit the color of dried blood. It sat primly upright in a chair, a magazine held in front of the unsettling darkness where its face should have been, darkness given form and shape by a fine web of delicate silver chains pulled into a perfect sphere. I cleared my throat, and it slowly lowered the magazine, bringing its attention to bear on me. It felt like tiny spiders with needles for legs skittering across my skin. I tried not to flinch. Some contractors found displays of human weakness extremely appetizing.

“Good morning,” I said as smoothly as I could. “Welcome to Dark Enterprises. I’m here to escort you upstairs to Ms. Kettering.” Long, spindly fingers moved with a mesmerizing grace as the thing slowly closed the magazine and placed it delicately on a table to its left. Wonderful, it said in a cold, sepulchral voice that echoed as if emerging from a deep well. Lead on.

I gestured to the elevators and it rose in a sinuous, unnatural motion. Above the crisply starched collar of its pristine dress shirt, inky blackness pulsed and shifted within that cage of threadlike chains as it took a moment to adjust its cuffs. Its shiny wingtips dangled an inch or two above the floor, and it glided soundlessly after me as I crossed to the elevators. An awkward silence fell between us. The thing turned to study me and my skin prickled unpleasantly once more.

Finally, the elevator arrived. I allowed the being to precede me, folding itself almost in half in order to fit through the door. I pressed the button for the sixth floor. Smoothly, the elevator began to move before a thin finger reached past me and pressed the button labeled EMERGENCY STOP. The car shuddered gently as it halted.

You seem troubled.

Slowly, I turned to look up into the thing’s shadowed face. It gazed down at me with a solicitous tilt to its narrow shoulders.

“Me?” I said weakly. “No. I’m fine.”

Silence fell once more as it continued to watch me.

“Really. No problems here.” I didn’t want it looking at me anymore. “We should probably keep going.” My hand reached for the elevator buttons.

You are afraid.

I stopped, my finger hovering over the EMERGENCY STOP button.

Is it because they plan to kill you?

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I whispered.

I think you do. It held out a black business card. Let me help you.

I stared at the card, unable to move.

Take it, it urged. When you are ready, place a single drop of your blood on this card and then speak the words. I will come to you and give you your heart’s desire. This I promise. 

Mechanically, I reached out and took the card. It was made of heavy, expensive cardstock, but there were no words that I could see. 

All I will ask in return is a single favor. Something small, unimportant. Promise to give me that, and you will have anything you want. That is fair, is it not?

I tried to speak, but my throat was so dry that nothing emerged but a strangled croak.

You are destined for great things, Colin. Let me help you achieve them.

Without another word, it pressed the EMERGENCY STOP button again and the elevator lurched back into motion. Mere moments later, we arrived at the sixth floor and the doors rolled open with another cheerful ding. I stood there, card clutched in my hand, until my companion turned to look at me once more.

“Yes,” I breathed, “right, sorry.” Without looking at it, I scurried out of the elevator and turned to the right, making a beeline for Ms. Kettering’s office. I was so eager to be rid of the thing that I stopped in the middle of the empty hallway and gestured toward her office door. “Here we are.”

This time, I couldn’t hide a flinch as it brushed those long fingers against my shoulder. Remember: I will give you your heart’s desire.

I didn’t reply. Instead, I turned and hurried away, faster and faster, until my skin stopped crawling.

–

Excerpted from Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World by Mark Waddell Copyright © 2025 by Mark Waddell. Excerpted by permission of Ace. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

Ready for More?

If a laugh-out-loud corporate send-up that turns apocalyptic sounds like your jam, grab your copy of Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World. When you’ve read it, come back and tell me in the comments-did Colin deserve that promotion, and which office absurdity made you laugh (or shudder) the most?

You can get a copy of Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World by Mark Waddell on Amazon or Bookshop.