A shoreside burial coordinator who lives in self-enforced exile as penance for a long-ago mistake and a performer with a floating circus face unexpected life changes and new opportunities in the wake of an offshore storm.

Picking up his late father's arrangement with an anti-religious sect that performs secret burials for marginalized outcasts, an eccentric undertaker in 1970s Beirut confronts perspectives on death in the face of war.

"John Wayne Cleaver is dangerous, and he knows it... He's obsessed with serial killers, but really doesn't want to become one. So for his own sake, and the safety of those around him, he lives by rigid rules he's written for himself... Now, for the first time, John has to confront a danger outside himself, a threat he can't control, a menace to everything and everyone he would love, if only he could."--p. [2] of jacket.

"The giant metal man has stood for hundreds of years, head tilted back, mouth open. All the dead of the town are disposed of this way, carried up the long staircase that winds around him and tipped in. At his toe emerges the Bitters, the lifeblood of the town, keeping them healthy and prosperous as the sick and needy come to buy and drink. McNubbin is a happy man with all he wants in life. He's carried the bodies up since he was 14, a worthwhile respected...

Determined to help her roommate Nikki out of her singles slump, Abby Knight encourages her to give speed dating a try. Of course, Nikki wants the guy at the very bottom of Abby's list, Jonas Treat-a.k.a. "Treat the Cheat"-and figures just one date with him couldn't hurt. But then Jonas is found dead-and evidence points to Nikki as his killer. To clear Nikki's name, Abby enlists the help of her hunky ex-Army Ranger boyfriend, Marco. But Marco's rambunctious...

When Jonathon "Pinebox" Collins loses his lower right leg to a cannonball in his first Civil War battle, the course of his life is forever changed. While recuperating, he learns "The Dismal Trade" of undertaking, the emerging art of arterial embalming, and coffin construction. His first case turns out to be the victim of Wild Bill Hickok's first showdown, and Collins crosses paths with the legendary gunfighter - and occasionally his victims - across...

"An obsessed professor gathers his acquaintances and claims he can prove the existence of God ... by summoning the devil ... An author with writer's block visits a sleepy village in France, only to discover that the town is host to a sinister secret ... A group of Vietnam War draft dodgers stumble upon a monstrous government experiment in the woods ... and it's just been unleashed ... In this debut collection, author Derek Hutchins invites you to...

"Lorena Adler has a secret - she holds the power of the banished gods, the Noble and the Vile, inside her. She has hidden her entire life - both from the world and from her past. She's content to spend her days as an undertaker in a small town, marry her best friend, Julian, and live an unfulfilling life so long as no one uncovers her true nature. But when the notoriously bloodthirsty crown prince comes to arrest Julian's father, he immediately recognizes...