A mysterious circus rolls into town by means of neither roads nor train. Its advertisement promises sights and wonders as yet unseen by mortal man. Its owner is a Dr. Lao, a Chinaman (perhaps) who sometimes speaks wonderful English and sometimes, when it suits him, pidgeon of the clumsiest. When there is a parade (that in no way lives up to the advertised glories of the Circus) the citizens of Abalone, Arizona find that contains a bizarre collection of myths, oddities, fables and lore . A chimera, werewolf, (that some think is a Russian) a satyr; the medusa who turns a disbelieving villager to stone; a unicorn; the Sphinx; Socrates; Apollonius, who performs magic tricks, materialising pigs and flowers ; the Golden Ass...

I haven’t finished reading it yet but it has a sensual, seductive richness about it that makes me want to be part of this surreal world, however dangerous.

David Maddox suggests that Finney could be gathering together the last remnants of the Age of Fable that succumbed to the Age of Reason and wiped out such dreams.