Tartarus Press:
Leyburn: 2020
Trade paperback, New,
290 pp.


Now a quality paperback. 1918. In the dying days of World War I, the Spanish flu devastates the small town of Incarnation, Texas. The sheriff closes the church and quarantines the dying in the schoolhouse. The townsfolk huddle alone in their houses to avoid infection. Each new day brings fresh corpses. But something worse than the flu is coming. Verge Strömberg, son of the domineering town pastor, is a sickly boy who lives in a world of books. His mother disappeared when he was seven, his older brother ran away. Now his father leaves him to tend a church in another county. That’s when the Muladona begins to visit him. Every night, the Muladona, a doomed soul transformed into the Devil’s mule, visits Verge and forces him to listen to a horrific tale. Each night, as Verge huddles under his bed sheets, the monster’s supernatural tales tear his soul apart. Verge’s search for the demonic creature’s true identity leads him through the dark history of Incarnation, from the murder of the Indians by the Spanish settlers, to the disappearance of his mother. In the end, Verge will have to confront the Muladona alone to rescue the memory of his mother and to save his immortal soul.” This is a print-on-demand edition. #65129

Price: $20.00