This is an important book, not only because it marks Wolff's return to fiction following two powerful volumes of memoirs, This Boy's Life (1989) and its harrowing sequel In Pharaoh's Army (1994), but for signs of a looser, more relaxed style. It also reveals him moving clear of his Vietnam experiences which serve only as background in some of these seventeen stories. Balancing off-beat humour with eerie menace, Wolff comes increasingly closer to Saki than do any of his peers. "Firelight", a gentle, funny account of a boy's relationship with his mother, is superb such is the ease of tone. Elsewhere, a lazy reporter pays the price of writing an obituary without first confirming if its subject has actually died. Sharp and exact, Wolff, quite simply, is one of the very best.
E.B.