Book excerpt: The fulfillment of your every desire… That's the enticing yet dangerous promise of Sweet Candy, the new designer drug making the rounds through the community of club kids, neo-Nazis, drag queens, prostitutes and punks who populate the mean streets of Sweetville. With its chewable hearts and candied lips threatening to forever transform the delicate social balance and the very lives of each and every member of the city's underground, Sweet Candy is poised to ignite the tenuous powder keg that is life, love and lust in Sweetville. But could the enigmatic back-alley surgeon Julius Kast and his partnership with a peculiar cult be the spark that lights the fuse once and for all? And how will their actions affect the life of a young woman named Trixie who is seeking salvation through transformation? Take a remarkable journey that's equal parts irreverent social commentary, revisionist dystopia, dark fantasy and horrifying reality when you travel to the unforgettable world of Sweetville's counterculture where a host of sometimes dangerous, often deviant and always dark secrets are waiting to be revealed. Such secrets refuse to be confined to Sweetville. But instead will come home with you. Changing everything. Forever… Praise for Secrets of the Weird: "Secrets of the Weird is a harrowing walk through a landscape populated by modern horrors and lit only by failing neon, where the only saving graces are whatever bravery we can summon up from within and whatever kindness we can muster toward our fellow outcasts, and Chad Stroup is the best possible guide a reader could ask for." -- Jeremy P. Bushnell, author of The Insides and The Weirdness "I found Secrets of the Weird to be an engaging and fascinating read. It is a highly unusual, admirably creative foray into a deeply, deeply disturbing world of fiction which nonetheless resonates with modern reality." -- Hal Bodner, author of The Trouble with Hairy and Bite Club! "Insane in the most amazingly sublime hallucinogenic way. Every word, every setting, every character is a garishly intelligent choice. This is the most bizarre but incredible mash up of New Jack City, Blade Runner and Game of Thrones. In an era of non-binary gender and fluid sexuality this is a relevant and timely tale." -- Tracy Lee Palmer, Signal Horizon Proudly presented by Grey Matter Press, the home of multiple Bram Stoker Award-nominated volumes of horror. Grey Matter Press: Where Dark Thoughts Thrive