Book excerpt: A brooding Gothic novel of suspense that reaches beyond the grave. Snooky, the retarded black boy, and Crazy Dog, the itinerant hound wander onto the decaying Voshaylee plantation. They witness without understanding, the love between Elizabeth and B.K. outside modern-day Atlanta, battling the power of Elizabeth's mother Maria from beyond the grave, Philip's endless love for his dead wife Maria and the bizarre love of the ever-naked young Travis and the mistress of Gavonlee, well into her eighties, as she attempts to quiet the crying imaginary child locked in her bedroom closet. Around these sick, weird but hypnotic characters revolve Bo Skooter, Miss Lucy's husband who is killed in circumstances as strange as his marriage, The Baby, Miss Lucy's daughter who found so little love as an unnamed child that she enjoys her mother's descent into dementia. Mother, Elizabeth's obese aberrant relative manipulates all. Philip seldom leaves his own rooms…and for very good reasons. Over all these twisted people hovers Maria, effecting more havoc from the grave than ever when alive. And then there is the pet snake. You may hate Crazy Dog Song but you will never forget it.