In the title story a young man waiting in the Hotel Eden discovers - as many others have - that Eden is not a permanent domicile. In "Zanduce at Second, " a baseball player turned killer-by-accident undergoes a surprising transformation. We root for escaped felon Ray ("A Note on the Type") as he carves his name on a culvert wall. We drive through the sweltering summer streets of Phoenix as a nineteen-year-old narrator goes through an unsettling sexual awakening ("Oxygen"). In these and other stories, whether his characters are getting sabotaged by nightcaps or encountering nudists on a rafting trip, Ron Carlson takes us to a generous array of places in a new way. Finally, in "The Chromium Hook, " he takes us to a lovers' lane where he solves an ancient mystery. Carlson's work has always made a difference. His men and women are resourceful creatures, driven and derided by conscience, comforted by the possibility of love, and at all times ready for the next thing.
- ISBN10 0140273891
- ISBN13 9780140273892
- Publish Date 27 August 1998 (first published 17 May 1997)
- Publish Status Unknown
- Out of Print 19 August 2009
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Penguin Books Ltd
- Format Paperback
- Pages 224
- Language English