First published by Subterranean Press in 2007, Kealan Patrick Burke’s novel Currency of Souls introduced the dying town of Milestone, a place that for all its desolation may harbor a very sinister and unusual kind of life.

In “The Star of the Show,” a new novella, the story returns to Western times to follow Judd Mallick, a dangerous outlaw with a trail of bodies in his wake. When he crosses the border into Milestone, he is unaware that the invisible barriers of the town have closed behind him, and will stay shut until Judd plays his role in the madness that’s to come. From the gunslinging dandy named Cadaver, to Iris Gale, a woman who claims to be from another time, and a lawman convinced the town is a god, Judd soon finds himself embroiled in a heist where the prize might be his very soul.

Because Milestone has been dormant a long time. Now it’s waking up, and it’ll take nothing short of a miracle for Judd to make it out of there alive. But as everyone who lives there knows…there are no miracles in Milestone.