Inkberry Books: February 21st at 7:00 PM

or corpse spirit, to serve him; the young king must do as he is told, and soon enough he is also under the sway of the no less malevolent spirit. Like a bat, the spirit hangs from the branches of a tree, and the king is condemned to bear it on his back through a dark forest as it whispers a riddling story in his ear. These are tales of suicidal passion, clever deceit, patriarchal oppression, and narrow escapes from death, and as long as the king can resolve the problems they pose, his bondage continues; the vampiric creature goes on commanding his attention in the dark. Only when the king is out of answers will he at last be free, though when that comes to pass--well, that’s when the whole story takes a new turn.

Douglas Penick’s re-creation of this ancient work brings out all its humor and horror and vitality, as well its unmistakable relevance in a world of stories gone viral.

Agni, Kyoto Journal, The Utne Reader, Cahiers de l'Herne, etc. His book of essays, The Age of Waiting on resonances of ecological collapse, was published in 2021 by Arrowsmith Press. In 2025, Punctum Books published Winter Light--On Late Life's Radiance, essays on old age. Loss and unexpected discoveries.