The first story ever told left a scar on the skin of the universe, with its characters doomed to an endless cycle of reincarnation and death. Trapped by his enemies, Daniel Faust — magician, mobster, and newly-minted knight of hell — has been cast in the role of the eternal Thief. Now the story is dead-set on writing his final chapter, the one that ends with a knife in his back.
The curse can’t be broken without tracking down the original Thief. The truth is buried beneath the legacy of a long-dead stage magician and a cache of occult relics from the 1940s, but Daniel and his crew aren’t the only hunters on this trail: so is a deadly new contender who blends sorcery with science, armed with a link to Daniel’s past — and a cult he thought he had destroyed long ago.
The doomsday clock is ticking, and more than Daniel’s own life is at stake. To save the day he’ll have to pull off the most daring heist of his criminal career, stealing a priceless treasure from a reality-bending madman, or die trying.
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Craig Schaefer
Craig Schaefer's books have taken readers to the seamy edge of a criminal underworld drenched in shadow (the Daniel Faust series), to a world torn by war, poison and witchcraft (the Revanche Cycle), and - beginning this winter - across a modern America mired in occult mysteries and a conspiracy of lies (the Harmony Black series).
Despite this, people say he's strangely normal. Suspiciously normal, in fact.
Schaefer lives in Illinois with a small retinue of cats, all of whom try to interrupt his writing schedule and/or kill him on a regular basis. He practices sleight of hand in his spare time, though he's not very good at it.
Daniel Faust :: Series
Las Vegas. It's a city of big winners and bigger losers, where fortunes tumble with a roll of the dice. Under all the glitz and sleaze, though, there's another Vegas: a city infested by monsters in human skin, drenched in occult corruption. It's the kind of place where a dash of black magic and a gun could be the only thing standing between you and the gates of hell. The kind of place a man like Daniel Faust calls home.
Faust is nobody's hero. He's a card-carrying villain by trade, a thief and sorcerer just trying to make a dishonest buck in Sin City. He doesn't have to go looking for trouble, though: trouble finds him. Surviving by his wits, he does his best to save the day (if he absolutely has to), save his own skin (preferably), and beat the odds on his way to the next big score.
