Fifteen of the stories included in this collection were written before my twenty-sixth birthday and published in August Derleth’s Arkham House edition of my first book DARK CARNIVAL. This book has been out of print for some years and I welcomethe opportunity given me by the editors of Ballantine Books to select, edit, and in some cases rewrite my favorite stories from that early work. For my later readers, THE OCTOBER COUNTRY will present a side of my writing that is probably unfamiliar to them, and a type of story that I have rarely done since 1946. Looking back on those years I cannot help but express again my gratitude to August Derleth, who was my first publisher-editor, and to my hardest-working and most patient teachers, Leigh Brackett and Henry Kuttner.
