A framing story is told in the first person by Darrell Standing, a university professor serving life imprisonment in San Quentin State Prison for murder. Prison officials try to break his spirit by means of a torture device called "the jacket," a canvas jacket which can be tightly laced so as to compress the whole body, inducing angina. Standing discovers how to withstand the torture by entering a kind of trance state, in which he walks among the stars and experiences portions of past lives.
- ISBN13 9781780945187
- Publish Date 21 August 2015 (first published 1 December 1998)
- Publish Status Postponed Indefinitely
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Hesperus Press Ltd
- Format eBook
- Language English