Foreword
The idea and theory that certain humans have been and are "possessed by the devil" is as old as the bible and has persisted down through the ages.
Even certain sects among America's earliest settlers believed that some members of the community were "witches" and could cast the "evil eye" on those to whom they took a dislike or misguided hatred.
It is on this theme that the author has based this interesting treatise set in our own times in any middle class and middle sized city or town in the United States. The place might even be where you yourself live.
The recent motion picture "The Exorcist" is what started the wheels churning in the mind of the writer and intrigued him with the idea of what might happen were one or more "witches" to infiltrate a community and place it under the complete domination of "The Devil."
In the book the author offers no explanations or firm answers; nor does he come to any definite conclusions on the subject are there or are there not "witches?"
We all know that evil exists in the world. Surely, the "evil that exists in men's souls." as Shakespeare put it, was not born within them at birth or placed there by God. To imagine this would be to deny all the teachings and beliefs of practically every civilized religion. Who put it there then? Does man "acquire" it through living with his fellow man? Or is it rather the work of some mysterious hidden force which we do not understand? Is the "Faustus" story true?
Can man "sell his soul to the devil?" Will he, if given the opportunity?
That is the question raised and discussed so vividly and dramatically in this philosophically penetrating work by the author. Also, if one reads carefully, he might detect rather significant threads of satire interwoven masterfully into the plot. After all, evil is evil, no matter what rationalization we may use to explain its existence. Ergo: the devil may not be the devil, but may be the mind of man himself.
-The Publishers