This rewarding short fiction collection includes moving tales on the themes of sibling love and its vicissitudes. A child's precocious contemplation of war in Ireland and war in Germany promotes a disturbance in the imaginative lonely boy. A woman's playful New York adventure turns on a confrontation with external reality. A dramatic monologue from one of Jane Austen's bitter relatives is directed at the famous female writer. A deceptive, subversive intelligence emerges beneath the lightness and simplicity of the stories in this dazzling volume.