Texas-born and
Canadian-raised writer of
urban fantasy. The majority of his books take place in an alternate Earth in which
magic has slowly been seeping back into everday life since just after World War Two.
Atheism has become a quaint
superstition as the world beginds to fill up again with
gods,
demons,
ghosts, and
magicians. In the year 2004, the trickle becomes a deluge, and whole parts of cities are swallowed up in a magical cataclysm called the Dream.
Stewart pulls it all off just right. The consequences of the return of magic are unexpected but make perfect sense in hindsight (China rises in power because the Chinese have never forgotten how to do things like appease an angry ghost.) Even more wonderful is that in spite of the gods and demons and such, his stories are often very small, concerned with how a family deals with an impending death, wedding, or birth in the midst of all the supernatural craziness.
Neal Stephenson calls him a cross between Stephen King and Ibsen. I personally have read Resurrection Man, Mockingbird, and The Night Watch (which takes place after the Dream) and I highly recommend them all.