Chet Williamson's The Story of Noichi the Blind blends Japanese classicism with the tropes of contemporary horror to create the most literate yet stomach-churning tale this writer has ever told. Purported to be a possibly lost Lafcadio Hearn manuscript, this Japanese "folk tale" (complete with introduction and scholarly afterword) tells the story of a simple woodcutter whose confrontation with a mountain demon plunges his life into a nightmare of violence, self-delusion, and extreme sexual darkness. Tinged by the blackest of humor, The Story of Noichi the Blind is a work that Williamson fears could get him arrested in several countries and carefully observed in his own.