Search Worlds Without End

Interviews with writers of modern horror, including Richard Matheson, script writer of "The Twilight Zone" and authors William Peter Blatly ("The Exorcist"), Robert Bell ("Psycho"), James Herbert ("The Rats" and "The Fog") and Stephen King ("Carrie" and "Salem's Lot").

WFA nominated novelette. It originally appeared in the anthology Dark Love (1995), edited by Nancy A. Collins, Martin H. Greenberg and Edward E. Kramer. The story can also be found in the anthologies The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror: Ninth Annual Collection (1996), edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling, and The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 7 (1996), edited by Stephen Jones.

Pestilence, floods, war, social upheaval, drug crime, wicked leaders, conspiracies, corruption even visions of death-dealing aliens -- this superb collection of stories takes an unforgettable imaginative journey into terror and transcendence. Each decade of the twentieth century is assigned to one of the top fantasy/horror authors of the modern age who evokes the particular madness of that decade as it contributes to a prophecy for the next century. Decade by decade as the millennium approaches in these powerful, chilling tales, the tension builds toward a dramatic revelation that is both a prophetic warning and a visionary answer for all humankind.

Table of Contents:

• Chiliad: A Meditation: Men and Sin - (1997) - novelette by Clive Barker
• The Big Blow - (1997) - novella by Joe R. Lansdale
• If I Should Die Before I Wake - (1997) - novelette by David Morrell
• Aryans and Absinthe - (1997) - novelette by F. Paul Wilson
• Triads - (1997) - novella by Poppy Z. Brite and Christa Faust
• Riding the Black - (1997) - novelette by Charles L. Grant
• The Open Doors - (1997) - novelette by Whitley Strieber
• Fixtures of Matchstick Men and Joo - (1997) - novelette by Elizabeth Massie
• Whatever - (1997) - novelette by Richard Christian Matheson
• Dismantling Fortress Architecture - (1997) - novelette by David J. Schow and Craig Spector
• The Word - (1997) - novelette by Ramsey Campbell
• Chiliad: A Meditation: A Moment at the River's Heart - (1997) - novelette by Clive Barker
• The End (An Afterword) - (1997) - essay by Douglas E. Winter

The buyers find us. Establish their bona fides. Then, and only then, we run.

Burdon Lane is a businessman living out the American Dream in a shiny suburb of Washington, D.C. His business card lists him as Executive VP of UniArms, Inc., a legitimate arms dealer that's a front for a gunrunning empire. His girlfriend thinks he's a salesman. His best friend thinks he's a role model. His boss thinks he's a good soldier.

This weekend's run should be business as usual -- guns for money, money for guns -- moving the product north on the Iron Highway from Dirty City to Manhattan. But this weekend is going to teach Burdon something he doesn't yet know about who he is ... and isn't. When the meet in Manhattan turns into a five-alarm fire and an all-out war on the tenth floor of a New York hotel, there is only one way out: an uneasy alliance with a hard case named Jinx and the street gang known as the U Street Crew. And once the heat is on, with a cadre of killers and every police officer and Federal agent on the eastern seaboard on their tail, Burdon gets the chilling sensation that, one way or another, this so-called milk run may be his last.

This is the story of the last run, the run where no one -- criminal, cop, or civilian -- is who or what they seem.

Douglas E. Winter's debut novel blasts into the dark heart of America's culture of guns and violence with breathtaking velocity.Runis a streamlined tour de force of full-throttle action and high-tech weaponry, a brilliantly controlled ride through America's most brutal terrain, with a surprising moral message -- fantastically harrowing, relentlessly cinematic, impossible to look away from.

WFA nominated short story. It originally appeared in the anthology Masques II (1987), edited by J. N. Williamson. The story can also be found in the anthologies Silver Scream (1988), edited by David J. Schow, and The Year's Best Fantasy: First Annual Collection (1988), edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling. A limmited edition chapbook appeared in 1987.

Stoker and World Fantasy Award nominated novella. It originally appeared in the anthology Dark of the Night (1997), edited by Stephen Jones. It can also be found in the anthology The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 9 (1998), edited by Stephen Jones.

This stunning collection of novellas and short stories by masters of the macabre brings to fans and newcomers an unrelenting spell of horror and suspense. These are tales that strike beyond sheer terror, as their disturbing visions capture the dark reality we all fear. Features works by Stephen King, Clive Barker, Peter Straub, and more.

Douglas E. Winter presents a collection of all-new, tantalizingly terrifying stories by masters of horror.

Table of Contents:

• Introduction - essay by Douglas E. Winter
• The Reploids - short story by Stephen King
• Sneakers - novelette by Stephen King
• Dedication - novella by Stephen King
• Metastasis - short story by Dan Simmons
• Vanni Fucci Is Alive and Well and Living in Hell - short story by Dan Simmons
• Iverson's Pits - novella by Dan Simmons
• The Skin Trade - novella by George R. R. Martin

The Life and Fiction of the Master of the Macabre.

This is an early critical look at the life and work of Stephen King.