Incubus - Softcover

Incubus begins with Cora Whitman's preface to the "case study" that is the novel. It's an almost scientific warm-up for the paranormal roller coaster that lies ahead. Arensberg's Dry Falls is a typical, small New England community, except during the summer of 1974 when the weather got unusually hot, the rain refused to fall, and the town was gripped by a sinister sexual spirit. The first signs of the incubus were relatively innocent--the town eccentric lost a few hours of her day, husbands became uncharacteristically ardent, schoolgirls saw a "ghost" in a graveyard. As the story progresses, the incubus grows more sinister, until it stirs up a supernatural hurricane with Cora Whitman trapped in its eye.

Arensberg, whose other works include Group Sex and Sister Wolf, has created a sophisticated work of literary horror with Incubus. She raises many questions about religion, marriage, and the supernatural, and handles the subject matter with unflinching objectivity. Her prose is simultaneously elegant and pointed, and her characters both unusual and familiar, making the story irresistible. --Mara Friedman

"Incubus has the style and wit of a Dorothy Sayers novel [and] it conjures up a horror."--John Casey

"It's a bold retro notion to make a post-modern ghost story."--Janet Burroway, New York Times Book Review

"A gory gothic thriller [with] all the elegance...of any 'straight' volume. The most finicky reader will find himself drawn in by the cool narrative style."--Carolyn See, Washington Post Book World

"Barbara Pym meets Stephen King, and it proves to be a heavenly union, though what transpires in Ann Arensberg's proper Maine village is the devil's doing."--Shirley Abbott

"The territory that was long ago ceded to Stephen King--ghostly goings-on in rural Maine--is entered to stunning effect in this absorbing tale of demonic possession...This is much more than a horror story...one of the finest contemporary novels of the supernatural--the best since Clive Barker's The Damnation Game." -- Starred "Kirkus" review

"A tale of shape-changers and exorcism written with intelligence, restraint and style...another impressive example of this talented writer's work...Despite the rapture of the tale, Arensberg's greatest gifts here are not the plot or the research supporting her tale of the occult, but her precise insight into character and the portrayal of the workings of a small community, the life of a pastor and his wife and a marriage in many seasons." -- Starred review in Publishers Weekly