John K. Roberts

The power of a long-buried family secret becomes unleashed when the extreme rituals of a young punk rocker catapults his consciousness into the spirit realm in search of his Finnish father, a ship captain who drowned in the Bering Sea. His father's mother was a Sami sorceress whose shamanic powers were passed on to her grandson, powers tested as he enters the mythic dreams of his Finnish grandfather. A surrealistic fable of true love, giant hedgehogs, and the mystical depths of ancestral bonds.

Young mechanical engineer John Ashton is trying to complete the plans for a new submarine. Under pressure to meet a deadline he has been leaning on whiskey to handle the stress which his friend Robert Gray warns him against, but to no avail. His fiancée, Grace, telephones wanting him to take a break and attend a dinner party with her. Against his better judgement and still drinking he accepts but nods off while getting ready. What follows are booze infused visions of loss and degradation so horrifying that upon awaking he swears off "the devil at his elbow”!