The dark side of life lurks just around the corner from the safe avenues of the familiar. In <i>Mistresses of the Dark</i>, twenty-five leading female writers dare to stray from the path of the ordinary and venture into the shadows. Nadine Gordimer imagines a nightmare relationship between a father and son. Eudora Welty and Flannery O'Connor conjure grim Gothic visions of private desperation. Specters of loss haunt tales by Alison Lurie and A. S. Byatt, and an atmosphere of unease blows through stories by Shirley Jackson and Doris Lessing. The contributors include a Nobel laureate, a Pulitzer Prize winner, and recipients of the Booker Prize and the National Book Award.<br> <br> In subtle and sophisticated stories, these authors find moods of menace and tremors of dread in the most unlikely settings: the home, the office, the neighborhood, the bedroom. Unsettling encounters sure to stir the soul await the reader of these uncommon literary masterpieces.