Ray Russell was an American editor and writer of short stories, novels, and screenplays. Russell is best known for his horror fiction, although he also wrote mystery and science fiction stories.
His most famous short fiction is "Sardonicus", which appeared in the January 1961 issue of Playboy magazine, and was subsequently adapted by Russell into a screenplay for William Castle's film version, titled Mr. Sardonicus. American writer Stephen King called "Sardonicus" "perhaps the finest example of the modern gothic ever written"."Sardonicus" was part of a trio of stories with "Sanguinarius" and "Sagittarius".
"Absolute Power” was the last book published by Ray Russell before he died, where he presents us with a story of raw, absurd, immoral, and totally inappropriate witchcraft. Despite this, it is very entertaining, easy to read, and with clear intentions of continuing the development of a universe and characters that the author first introduced to us in his novel “Incubus”.