Mason Winfield

Author:
Author, teacher, storyteller, and supernatural historian Mason Winfield studied English and Classics at Denison University, earned a master’s degree in British literature at Boston College, and studied poetry and fiction at SUNY Buffalo with professor emeritus and MacArthur grant recipient Irving Feldman. He has written or edited fourteen books, including the regional sensation “Shadows of the Western Door” (1997) and “Iroquois Supernatural,” co-authored with Michael Bastine, on the traditions of the Six Longhouse Nations (Inner Traditions International/Bear & Company, 2011). Several of his surveys of upstate folklore and paranormal tradition may be found at the website of Western New York Wares: www.buffalobooks.com. He may be reached at www.masonwinfield.com.

An anatomically perfect human jaw fashioned of diamond-hard quartz crystal is uncovered at an Ohio burial mound and sold on the underground antiquities market. Shortly after, three pothunters are found dead.

A mysterious new drug suspected of South American origin surfaces in Buffalo, NY. Its unprecedented psycho-tropic effects include the momentary activation of ESP. 

Blind, speechless, emaciated street people start appearing in many parts of the world. An urban legend-cycle forms around them, and the name of a murderous old cult, “the Whistlers” attaches to them.

An archaeological team at a Mayan site reports finding a bizarre artifact and vanishes. 

An upstate schoolteacher’s book of New York legends and folklore foreshadows these developments and more. 

   These are the threads – plus his affair with a maddening woman – that draw narrator Ward Courier into the international adventure of occultism, terror, Native American tradition and onrushing prophecy that is Mason Winfield’s anticipated new novel THE WHISTLERS. By the time the picture of THE WHISTLERS becomes clear, we are ready to believe in a sinister conspiracy that could predate Atlantis and even hail from another world.

The Whistlers

"This is the last smoke," she said, exhaling with a rueful chuckle. "Last February in Park City I promised him I would quit. I better enjoy this one."


Lys impulsively turned into Main Street and started crossing it diagonally. The speed limit is twenty-five and traffic was light, but this was bold. You really ought to look, especially on an overhung night when you're wearing dark clothing. I caught up with her halfway over, taking a lot more pains to look in all directions.


We walked. She led, two feet ahead of my right shoulder. She knew where she wanted to go.


"So tell me about him," I said. We were in the East End, among the most historic homes in the village.


"A psychologist," she said. "Corporate. Did seminars. Wrote books. Liked the fast life. Fast. Cars, boats, planes, motorcycles." She cleared her throat and smiled. "Women."


Chapter 39: An Arabesque of Motley, Part 39