Inferno: New Tales of Terror and the Supernatural

For Inferno, Ellen Datlow asked some of her favorite authors to write stories that, as she says in her introduction, “provide a frisson of shock or a moment of dread so powerful it might cause the reader outright physical discomfort; or a sensation of fear so palpable as to compel the reader to turn on bright lights and play music or seek the company of others to dispel the fear. . . .”Twenty masterful authors, including Elizabeth Bear, Pat Cadigan, Paul Finch, Jeffrey Ford, Christopher Fowler, Stephen Gallagher, Glen Hirshberg, K. W. Jeter, Joyce Carol Oates, and Lucius Shepard, to name but a few, answered her call. These powerful, deeply affecting, sometimes disturbing tales confirm Datlow’s standing as a preeminent editor of modern horror.