Burke expands on the bar-tale theme of his 2005 anthology,
\t\t Taverns of the Dead, in a gripping horror
\t\t novel whose motley cast of characters drink the evening away in a seedy bar,
\t\t Eddie's Tavern, in a dying town called Milestone. Each is stained by—and may
\t\t even have caused—an ugly death that still haunts him or her. Reverend Hill
\t\t acts as judge and jury, ordering the barflies to go punish others in order to
\t\t make restitution for their past sins. But then someone torches the bar,
\t\t revealing the true evil crouched at the core of this beer-soaked corner of
\t\t hell. Sheriff Tom Turner, who just wants "things to be the way they were before
\t\t my wife died... before we all ended up here as slaves to our sins," bargains to
\t\t save the town, but the cost may be too much to bear. At the haunting
\t\t conclusion, escape proves only a brief respite from damnation.
\t\t (Feb.)
