From early on, American literature has teemed with tales of horror, of hauntings, of terrifying obsessions and gruesome incursions, of the uncanny ways in which ordinary reality can be breached and subverted by the unknown and the irrational. As this pathbreaking two-volume anthology demonstrates, it is a tradition with many unexpected detours and hidden chambers, and one that continues to evolve, finding new forms and new themes as it explores the bad dreams that lurk around the edges-if not in the unacknowledged heart--of the everyday. Peter Straub, one of todays masters of horror and fantasy, offers an authoritative and diverse gathering of stories calculated to unsettle and delight. This first volume surveys a century and a half of American fantastic storytelling, revealing in its 44 stories an array of recurring themes trance states, sleepwalking, mesmerism, obsession, possession, madness, exotic curses, evil atmospheres.
