From the Publisher
"Stirring! Superb! Bravo!" -- Ray BradburyR. Andrew Heidel makes his literary debut with a collection of original short stories and poetry entitled BEYOND THE WALL OF SLEEP The first book to be published by the small press MORTCO
"A collection of magical and surrealist works…"--Cited under Single-author Story Collections in The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror, Volume 11 edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling.
"...quite addictive."--SF Site
"The prose is quite good, and several, particularly "'The God Makers"', impressed me."--Science Fiction Chronicle
The nine richly imaginative and original stories inside Beyond the Wall of Sleep examine profound realizations and sublime truths yet defy categorization. They run the gamut from esoteric to experimental fiction, drawing upon R. Andrew Heidel's personal mythos on life before living and after dying, as well as the immortality of the soul and the creation of gods. In the short story "Dead Drunk," the personification of Death is found alone in a bar after she has quit her job; in "The God Makers," a simple fisherman is unwittingly responsible for his village deifying the sea; and "Interview with God" is a tale about a soul applying for a Birth Visa before his incarnation on Earth. The poetry, unconventional in form and style is eclectic to say the least, reads more akin to Zen meditations conveying a sense of wonder about life and the universe in which we live.
