Middle-aged San Francisco horror writer Franz Westen is rediscovering ordinary life following a long alcoholic binge. Then one day, peering at his apartment window from atop a nearby hill, he sees a pale brown thing lean out his window...and wave. This encounter sends Westen...
In this superb novel, originally published in 1977, Fritz Leiber explores the concept of "paramentals". Leiber makes his definitive statement on alienation within the urban environment and the capacity of concrete, steel, and glass to suck up miseries and spew forth monsters.