The laughter of a dead child echoes down the winding streets of a town in Spain... A mysterious stranger makes increasingly disquieting visits to a lonely English instructor in Central Europe... A woman experiences her own literal disintegration as someone - or something - from her past takes over her life...but who is the possessed and who is possessing? In return for the ability to touch the miraculous, the residents of an isolated mountain community are busily manufacturing items they don't understand in preparation for a future they cannot imagine... With eight reprints from the pages of such publications as Black Static, The Third Alternative, and Supernatural Tales and three original tales, this chilling debut collection by Lynda E. Rucker will fill you with unease and unsettle your dreams. "Lynda Rucker's great talent is that she is able to carefully build a perceptive portrayal of the real world and in the process of that exploration find that edge where the everyday dissolves and the numinous begins. Her compelling execution of this transition strongly echoes the work of Robert Aickman." - Steve Rasnic Tem