"In a small New England town over half a century ago, a boy is playing with his new toy soldiers in the dirt in front of his house when a shadow falls over him. He looks up to see a striking man, the new minister, Jamie learns later, who with his beautiful wife, will transform the church and the town. The men and boys are a bit in love with Mrs. Jacobs; the women and girls, with the Reverend Jacobs--including Jamie's sisters and mother. Then tragedy...

A monumentally devastating plague leaves only a few survivors who, while experiencing dreams of a battle between good and evil, move toward an actual confrontation as they migrate to Boulder, Colorado.

In the middle of the night, in a house on a quiet street in suburban Minneapolis, intruders silently murder Luke Ellis' parents and load him into a black SUV. The operation takes less than two minutes. Luke will wake up at The Institute, in a room that looks just like his own, except there's no window. And outside his door are other doors, behind which are other kids with special talents - telekinesis and telepathy - who got to this place the same...

This collection of short works is comprised of pieces that previously appeared in such publications as The New Yorker, Playboy, and McSweeney's, in a volume that includes such tales as ""The Gingerbread Girl"" and "N."

The inhabitants of a picturesque, sleepy little town on a small island off the coast of Maine find themselves completely cut off from the rest of the world when they are hit by the worst storm of the century. As snow steadily buries everything familiar and an eerie darkness envelops the town, terror arrives in the form of an enigmatic stranger who somehow knows the innermost secrets of the residents. After a succession of bizarre murders, and with...