Featuring the Locus Award?winning novelette, ?By Moonlight” The extraordinary stories in this new contemporary fantasy collection show a mature, darker side of the author of The Last Unicorn in modern parables of love, death, and transformation shadowed lightly with melancholy. The Angel of Death enjoys newfound celebrity while moonlighting as an anchorman on the network news; King Pelles the Sure, the shortsighted ruler of a gentle realm, betrays himself in dreaming of a ?manageable war”; an American librarian discovers that, much to his surprise and sadness, he is also the last living Frenchman; and rivals in a supernatural battle forgo pistols at dawn, choosing instead to duel with dramatic recitations of terrible poetry. Featuring previously unpublished stories alongside recently published classics, this is a lovely, haunting, and wholly satisfying read.

"Claudio Bianchi has lived alone for many years on a hillside in Southern Italy's scenic Calabria. Set in his ways and suspicious of outsiders, Claudio has always resisted change, preferring farming and writing poetry. But one chilly morning, as though from a dream, an impossible visitor appears at the farm. When Claudio comes to her aid, an act of kindness throws his world into chaos. Suddenly he must stave off inquisitive onlookers, invasive media, and even more sinister influences" -- provided by publisher.