Cemetery Dance “The Devil’s Wine” First Edition, Edited by Tom Piccirilli [Very Fine]

"Poetry is the devil's wine." - St. Augustine

Cemetery Dance 2004. "The Devil’s Wine" Edited by Tom Piccirilli. A landmark anthology. First Edition, First Printing. Hardcover book with dust-jacket. Very Fine without any flaws. Archival acid-free Mylar sleeve. Trade Hardcover Edition bound in full cloth. Original issue price of $40.00 still showing on the dust-jacket flap.

This edition was originally published in the following two state: 

1. Trade Hardcover Edition bound in full cloth
2. Traycased Lettered Edition of 52 signed and lettered copies featuring a handmade traycase, additional artwork, completely unique hand-binding, and signed by the editor and artist 

This listing is for state 1. 

The Devil’s Wine

• Editor: Tom Piccirilli
• Edition: "FIRST EDITION" as stated on the copyright page.
• Artist: Caniglia
• Page Count: 352
• Pub. Date: 2004
• ISBN: 1-58767-070-4
• Status: Out of Print

About the Book

"Poetry is the devil's wine." -- St. Augustine

THE DEVIL'S WINE features contributions from Stephen King, Ray Bradbury, Peter Straub, Graham Masterton, Charles De Lint, Jack Ketchum, Joe Haldeman, Michael Bishop, Jack Cady, Steve Rasnic Tem, Melanie Tem, Peter Crowther, TM Wright, Brian Hodge, Edward Lee, Elizabeth Massie, Jay Bonansinga, and Tamara Thorne.

The Cemetery Dance hardcover is the only edition for this title, and many of the nearly 200 poems have never appeared anywhere else. Stephen King's amazing contributions were originally published in small venues during his college years and these publications now resell for thousands of dollars due to their scarcity. The King poems haven't seen print in over 30 years--this is the only time they have ever been reprinted!

The poetry found within THE DEVIL'S WINE is deeply moving, affecting, and deals with the human condition in a way that only those who've danced along the edge of the abyss are capable of understanding. One of the contributors, Jay Bonansinga, calls THE DEVIL'S WINE "a unique compendium of thriller writers moonlighting in the world of dark verse" and that's about the best description we've heard yet.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Without apologies, 19 masters (and mistresses) of contemporary horror fiction reveal themselves in a poetic mood in this anthology of mostly previously unpublished verse assembled by Stoker-winner Piccirilli (The Night Class, etc.). Known for the nasty violence of much of his fiction, Jack Ketchum shows a gentler side in such poems as "Hoboe" and "Sleeping Woman." Ray Bradbury, whose poetry is by now as familiar to fans as his fantasy, contributes such whimsies as the self-referential "The Other Me," in which he wonders, "Did R.B. write that poem, that line, that speech?" Joe Haldeman brings the same wickedly endearing wit to a poem like "Audience Participation," about an elderly moviegoer's revenge on some annoying teenagers, as he does to his fiction. Other notable contributors include Peter Straub, Charles De Lint, Peter Crowther and Elizabeth Massie. This is a rich feast, fit for a king, and indeed he is here too—Stephen King. Such poems as "The Dark Man" and "Harrison State Park '68," reprinted here for the first time after some 30 or more years, are good enough to make readers hope the Master Spellbinder revisits his muse more frequently.

Tom Piccirilli

Tom Piccirilli is the author of more than twenty-five novels including A CHOIR OF ILL CHILDREN, SHADOW SEASON, THE COLD SPOT, and THE LAST KIND WORDS. He's a four-time winner of the Stoker Award, two-time winner of the International Thriller Award, and has been nominated for the World Fantasy Award, and twice for the Edgar Award. Marilyn Stasio of The New York Tims Book Review called THE LAST KIND WORDS, “A caustic thriller...the characters have strong voices and bristle with funny quirks.” New York Times bestselling thriller writer Lee Child said of Tom’s work, “Perfect crime fiction...a convincing world, a cast of compelling characters, and above all a great story” And Publishers Weekly extols, "Piccirilli’s mastery of the hard-boiled idiom is pitch perfect, particularly in the repartee between his characters, while the picture he paints of the criminal corruption conjoining the innocent and guilty in a small Long Island community is as persuasive as it is seamy. Readers who like a bleak streak in their crime fiction will enjoy this well-wrought novel.” Keir Graff of Booklist wrote, “There's more life in Piccirilli's THE LAST KIND WORDS (and more heartache, action, and deliverance) than any other novel I've read in the past couple of years." And Kirkus states, "Consigning most of the violence to the past allows Piccirilli (The Fever Kill, 2007, etc.) to dial down the gore while imparting a soulful, shivery edge to this tale of an unhappy family that’s assuredly unhappy in its own special way.”