I'd like to mention my favorite tool to deal with Callback Hell: Streamline, a JavaScript (and CoffeeScript) language extension that can compile to either 1) callback spaghetti 2) Node-fibers or 3) generator code. It basically writes the mess for you. It lets you focus on the higher order concepts and provides configurable parallel array operations as well as many other convenient features. The callback "error parameter" is thrown as an exception to be caught with a basic try/catch. I highly recommend that any Node and JS enthusiast give it a try.