The Overneath
New and uncollected short fiction from the beloved author of The Last Unicorn.
An odd team patrols a county full of mythological beasts only slightly more problematic than the locals. A familiar youngster from the world of The Last Unicorn is gifted in magic but terrible at spell-casting. A seemingly incorruptible judge meets his match in a mysterious thief who steals his heart.
Lyrical, witty, and heartbreaking, The Overneath is Peter S. Beagle’s much-anticipated return to the short form. In these uniquely beautiful and wholly original tales, Beagle once again proves himself a master of the imagination.
Peter S. Beagle
Peter Soyer Beagle (born 1939) is an American fantasist and author of novels, nonfiction, and screenplays. He is also a talented guitarist and folk singer. He wrote his first novel, urban fantasy A Fine and Private Place (1960), when he was only 19 years old. Travel book I See By My Outfit (1965) is a nonfiction classic. Today he is best known as the author of The Last Unicorn (1968), a modern fantasy classic.
Beagle's work as a screenwriter interrupted his early career direction as a fiction author, but in the 1990s he returned to prose fiction. Beagle's own favourite is a literary fantasy novel The Innkeeper's Song (1993). Four years later Beagle returned to the land that was the novels setting for a collection of short stories The Magician of Karakosk and Other Stories (1997, known as Giant Bones).
In 2005 Beagle finally published a coda to The Last Unicorn, a novelette entitled ”Two Hearts,” and began work on a full-novel sequel. In 2006, ”Two Hearts” won the Hugo Award for Best Novelette and in 2007 it won the Nebula Award in the same category. The story was also nominated as a short fiction finalist for the World Fantasy Award. In 2006, Beagle won the Inkpot Award for Outstanding Achievement in Science Fiction and Fantasy.
Peter S. Beagle lives today in Oakland, California.