The Bowl of Night

Mercedes Lackey is a well-known author of fantasy novels and she often collaborates with other authors. She is known for her Valdemar novels (which involve complicated stories about relationships between human and non-human beings) and that bring into the story all manner of cultural issues such as social mores and ethics.

While the structure (outer structure) of Lackey's world in her writing resembles our world as we know it, the world within the world is one that is inhabited by vampires, fire-starters, witches, elves, magicians, sensitives, wizards and the like all who can work powerful magic in our world through different portals (as in this book). Lackey lives with her husband outside of Tulsa, Oklahoma in a house that is a 2 and 1/2 story concrete dome with an octagonal wooden shell placed over it; a house that is as unusual as the stories she creates.