"I am going because I would have no peace if I stayed." So said Donald Crowhurst as he set sail on what should have been a single-handed, non-stop, round-the-world boat voyage. In the middle of the Sargasso Sea, however, his boat falling to pieces, he had a brain-frying idea

When Chris Mikul first heard this curious tale, it inspired him to begin collating information and writing about other strange lives, eccentrics, and "beacons of shining if erratic brilliance in a world of sensible conformity." "Bizarrism "is the result.

Tiffany Thayer, who was prominent in the Fortean Society, wrote many unusual novels in the first half of the 20th century but DOCTOR ARNOLDI is one of the most elusive. Now, for the first time since its initial publication in 1934, it's available. The story is an old one -- what happens when death is defeated -- but no one has ever written about it as Thayer has.