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A deal with the devil, a descent to the underworld to reclaim a loved one, a trek through Hell to witness the suffering of the damned. Mortality Bridge deals with some of the oldest themes in literature, throwing in elements of Dante, the legend of Orpheus, and every deal with the devil story out there. This is a difficult literary legacy to live up to, but Mortality Bridge makes it look easy, creating a story that gains depth and power from the famous stories from which it borrows, but makes it all feel fresh and original all over again.

From publisher's website: Decades ago a young rock & blues guitarist and junkie named Niko signed in blood on the dotted line and in return became the stuff of music legend. But when the love of his damned life grows mortally and mysteriously ill he realizes he’s lost more than he bargained for—and that wasn’t part of the Deal.

So Niko sets out on a harrowing journey from the streets of Los Angeles through the downtown subway tunnels and across the redlit plain of the most vividly realized Hell since Dante, to play the gig of his mortgaged life and win back the purloined soul of his lost love.

Mortality Bridge remixes Orpheus, Dante, Faust, the Crossroads legend, and more in a beautiful, brutal—and surprisingly funny—quest across a Hieronymous Bosch landscape of myth, music, and mayhem; and across an inner terrain of addiction, damnation, and redemption.

(Source: Subterranean Press)