You won’t find Knicksport, Long Island by any map, GPS, or main road. To get there, you must lose your way along lonely, tree-shadowed back roads that wind through grooves of time and reality, byways that trace the glacial hills, marshlands, and wooded pockets tucked into the suburban landscape growing like verdigris clinging to rock. You must step out of the daylit world into a town haunted by the lost and the missing, the hidden and the hunted—because Knicksport is full of witches and monsters.

If you can find your way there, you can walk down Main Street, admire the ships moored in the harbor, stop in at Raker’s for a drink and soak up some of the local lore; stroll past the town’s historic buildings and houses—though you might not like what watches you from behind their curtains; sample the local fare—though you might not like how it changes you; dig into the local history—if you’re not afraid of dark secrets; and even hike the hills at night—if you’re not worried about ever finding your way back.

A Bright and Beautiful Eternal World collects a dozen tales of cosmic horror and monstrosities lurking beneath the civilized veneer of this mythical town, where artists, fishermen, scientists, writers, and everyday people (not all of them entirely human) live in the shadows of entities and powers beyond their comprehension, where the echoes of history never cease ringing, and if you hike into the hills at night or linger too long by the harbor, you might never find your way back.

Stories include: "Odd Quahogs," "A Song Left Behind in the Aztakea Hills," "All’s Well that Ends," "Refugees," "Mother of Monsters," "Dropped Signal," "The House in the Picture," "Echoes from the Ice," "Stars on the Fringe of a Black Hole," "The Private Estate," "Basement Gin," and "A Bright and Beautiful Eternal World."