The accursed : a novel / Joyce Carol Oates

Author's note -- Prologue -- Part 1: Demon Bridegroom: -- Ash Wednesday eve, 1905 -- Postscript: Ash Wednesday eve, 1905 -- Narcissus -- Spectral daughter -- Angel trumpet; or, Mr Mayte of Virginia -- Author's Note: Princeton snobbery -- Unspeakable I -- Burning girl -- Author's Note: Historian's confession -- Spectral wife -- Demon bridegroom -- Part 2: Curse Incarnate: -- Duel -- Postscript: Historian's dilemma -- Unspeakable II -- Cruel husband -- Search cont'd -- October 1905 -- God's creation as viewed from the evolutionary hypothesis -- Phantom lovers -- Turquoise-marbled book -- Bog kingdom -- Postscript: Archaeopteryx -- Curse incarnate -- Part 3: Brain, Within Its Groove: -- Voices -- Bluestocking temptress -- Glass owl -- Ratiocination our salvation -- Ochre-runnered sleigh -- Snake frenzy -- Postscript: Nature's burden -- Defeat at Charleston -- My precious darling -- Narrow fellow in the grass -- Dr Schuyler Skaats Wheeler's Novelty Machine -- Quatre face -- Angel trumpet elucidated -- Armageddon -- Part 4: Curse Exorcised: -- Cold spring -- 21 May 1906 -- Lieutenant Bayard by night -- Postscript: On the matter of the "unspeakable" at Princeton -- Here dwells happiness -- Nordic soul -- Terra Incognita I -- Terra Incognita II -- Wheatsheaf enigma I -- Wheatsheaf enigma II -- Sole living heir of nothingness -- Temptation of Woodrow Wilson -- Postscript: Second battle of Princeton -- Dr De Sweinitz's prescription -- Curse exorcised -- Game of draughts -- Death of Winslow Slade -- Revolution is the hour of laughter -- Crosswicks miracle -- Epilogue: Covenant.

In 20th century Princeton, New Jersey, a powerful curse, which besets the wealthiest of families, causes the disappearance of a young bride, and when her brother sets out to find her, he crosses paths with the town's most formidable people, including Grover Cleveland and Upton Sinclair.