To most modern readers, Karl Edward Wagner is best known as the author of a series of brutal yet intelligent heroic fantasy novels and stories about Kane, The Mystic Swordsman. However, he was also a master of the horror story, with an almost encyclopaedic knowledge of the genre that was reflected in his many articles on the subject, along with his editorship of the seminal Year's Best Horror Stories series for DAW Books. Having trained as a psychiatrist, Wagner's horror fiction often dealt with themes of paranoia and bizarre eroticism, while also drawing upon ancient folklore and the pulp magazine tradition to create a body of work that has rarely been surpassed among practitioners of contemporary terror tales. Now Centipede Press has brought together all of Karl Edward Wagner's horror and dark fantasy novellas and short stories into two handsome collections compiled by his friend and colleague Stephen Jones. Within these volumes you will discover such classic tales as 'More Sinned Against', 'Lacunae', and 'Into Whose Hands', along with personal and often controversial insights into the writer and his often troubled personal life by those who knew him. With the publication of these two retrospective collections of his work, Karl Edward Wagner's place as one of America's finest authors of regional horror and twisted dark fantasy is assured for many generations to come. This standard hardcover edition of the stories of Karl Edward Wagner, the first of two volumes, collects the following stories: 'In the Pines.' 'Sticks.' 'The Fourth Seal.' 'Where the Summer Ends.' '.220 Swift.' 'The River of Night’s Dreaming.' 'Beyond Any Measure.' 'Neither Brute Nor Human.' 'Blue Lady, Come Back.'