From a ghostly Civil War battlefield to a combat theme park in Vietnam, from the omnipotent brain of an autistic boy to a shocking story of psychic vampires, journey into a world of fear and mystery, a chilling twilight zone of the mind. A woman returns from the dead with disastrous results for the family who loves her. . . . An old-fashioned barbershop is the site of a medieval ritual of bloody terror. . . . During a post-apocalyptic Christmas celebration, a messenger from the South brings tidings of great horror. . . . Includes the following stories: “The River Styx Runs Upstream” “Eyes I Dare Not Meet in Dreams” “Vanni Fucci Is Alive and Well and Living in Hell” “Vexed to Nightmare by a Rocking Cradle” “Remembering Siri” “Metastasis” “The Offering” “E-Ticket to 'Namland” “Iverson's Pits” “Shave and a Haircut, Two Bites” “The Death of the Centaur” “Two Minutes and Forty-Five Seconds” “Carrion Comfort”

A woman returns from the dead with disastrous results for the family who loves her.... An old-fashioned barbershop is the site of a medieval ritual of bloody terror.... During a post-apocalyptic Christmas celebration, a messenger from the South brings tidings of great horror.... From a ghostly Civil War battlefield to a combat theme park in Vietnam, from the omnipotent brain of an autistic boy to a shocking story of psychic vampires, journey into a world of fear and mystery, a chilling twilight zone of the mind.

Jeremy Bremen has a secret. All his life he's been cursed with the ability to read minds. He knows the secret thoughts, fears, and desires of others as if they were his own. For years, his wife, Gail, has served as a shield between Jeremy and the burden of this terrible knowledge. But Gail is dying, her mind ebbing slowly away, leaving him vulnerable to the chaotic flood of thought that threatens to sweep away his sanity. Now Jeremy is on the run--from his mind, from his past, from himself--hoping to find peace in isolation. Instead he witnesses an act of brutality that propels him on a treacherous trek across a dark and dangerous America. From a fantasy theme park to the lair of a killer to a sterile hospital room in St. Louis, he follows a voice that is calling him to witness the stunning mystery at the heart of mortality.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1842.