The Book of Counted Sorrows was originally a nonexistent book "quoted" in many of Dean Koontz's books. Koontz subsequently wrote a book of poetry by the same title. The introduction takes up most of the small volume (around 100 pages) and gives a darkly humorous history of the book's previous owners and how they met their ends. The actual "book" is only the remaining 1/4 of the volume, and includes the poems referenced in his previous novels along with some new interesting new ones.