“I’ve been a Stephen Mark Rainey fan for more than 30 years now, and there’s good reason for that—he’s a consummate storyteller who cares deeply about his craft. Fugue Devil: Resurgence represents Rainey working at the top of his game and is cause for celebration. These stories frighten and dazzle, chill to the bone and linger. Fugue Devil: Resurgence should be at the top of everyone’s list this year!”
—Richard Chizmar, publisher and editor of Cemetery Dance, author of Chasing the Boogeyman, Gwendy’s Magic Feather (with Stephen King), and others
“Fugue Devil: Resurgence is a modern masterpiece. The sense of place, the deceptively laid-back quality of the narrator’s voice, the legend of the Fugue Devil itself, the familial disintegration, the feelings of alienation and guilt and helplessness, all combine to weave a genuinely scary story.”
—Gary Braunbeck, author of In Silent Graves, Prodigal Blues, Coffin County, and others
“Stephen Mark Rainey is a master of stories featuring ordinary, recognizable, often flawed people who unwittingly or sometimes intentionally and defiantly encounter extraordinary, terrifying circumstances and creatures. The Fugue Devil is one of the scariest supernatural beings ever to grace fiction’s pages. Its legend precedes it: ‘If you know about it, it knows about you. If you see it, it comes for you.’ Rainey gives the reader glimpses of this monster, building the horror, page after page, until it hits the characters and the reader square in the face—and heart—with a clawed and bloody fist.”
—Elizabeth Massie, author of Sineater, Hell Gate, Madame Cruller’s Couch and Other Dark and Bizarre Tales, and others
“I’ve been reading horror for over forty years. In the ’90s, I discovered Stephen Mark Rainey and I was blown away by his fiction. His prose is as impactful now as it was then. Fugue Devil: Resurgence is a testament not only to Rainey’s genius horror sensibilities, but to his staying power. Rainey is truly one of horror’s classic authors.”
—Tony Tremblay, author of The Moore House, The Seeds of Nightmares, and others
“Stephen Mark Rainey’s skills as a storyteller—honed over many a year and many a book—are best exemplified in a tale like ‘Fugue Devil,’ which combines his penchant for folklore with a talent for sketching conflicted characters, whose psychological turmoil almost seems to become externalized in the supernatural monsters they are forced to confront. Even more genuinely terrifying and suspenseful than that story is its sequel, ‘The Devil’s Eye,’ which again forces a morally complex character to face demons both inner and from beyond. These are just two especially solid examples of Rainey’s considerable ability.”
—Jeffrey Thomas, author of Punktown, Letters From Hades, Monstrocity, and others
“The pacing of Rainey’s stories is damn near perfect—not too slow and not too fast. The author takes a good amount of time setting up his characters and their environments before bringing in the supernatural. This works to connect the reader to both the story and the main character. Each plot is original; I can’t recall ever reading anything like any of them. I devoured the entirety in one sitting.”
—Dark Rose Reviews
“Rainey’s pulp-style approach makes him a close relative to H.P. Lovecraft and Robert W. Chambers, a distant one to Robert E. Howard, and a family all his own with his vision of the Fugue Devil, on which three of these stories directly pivot. Through all these stories, other-worldly music, bizarre sounds, and big and little monstrous things that should not be seen or heard in a normal world intrude upon the woods, the towns, and the cities with their deadly intentions. This is not a book for those who like happy endings. Horror fans will appreciate that.”
—John M. Cozzoli, The Horror Zine
