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Historian and Bram Stoker Award nominee W. Scott Poole traces the confluence of history, technology, and art that gave us modern horror films and literature.

In the early twentieth century, World War I was the most devastating event humanity had yet experienced. New machines of war left tens of millions killed or wounded in the most grotesque of ways. The Great War remade the world's map, created new global powers, and brought forth some of the biggest problems still facing us today. But it also birthed a new art form: the horror film, made from the fears of a generation ruined by war.

From Nosferatu to Frankenstein's monster and the Wolf Man, from Fritz Lang, F. W. Murnau, and Albin Grau to Tod Browning and James Whale, the touchstones of horror can all trace their roots to the bloodshed of the First World War. Historian W. Scott Poole chronicles these major figures and the many movements they influenced. Wasteland reveals how bloody battlefields, the fear of the corpse, and a growing darkness made their way into the deepest corners of our psyche.

On the one-hundredth anniversary of the signing of the armistice that brought World War I to a close, W. Scott Poole takes us behind the front lines of battle to a no-man's-land where the legacy of the War to End All Wars lives on.

W. Scott Poole, who teaches at the College of Charleston, has written widely about American history and pop culture. His books include Wasteland, Vampira: Dark Goddess of Horror, and the award-winning history Monsters in America, which received the John G. Cawelti Prize from the Popular Culture Association.

Andrew Eiden is an actor and winner of the AudioFile Earphones Award for narration. He has been acting since the age of four, working at regional theaters, in national commercials, and on numerous television shows.