There are 5 stories in this collection, all featuring Yoshimoto's usual themes - lonely women, betrayal, difficult relationships, and community. The stories are effortlessly profound, stripping away the minutiae of life, and getting straight to the essential issues and truths. They are economical, quite formal in tone, and pack an emotional punch.

This lovely, nostalgic, beautifully observed novel tells the story of Robert Appleyard, who one day at the age of 16, just after World War Two, sets out on foot from his home in Durham to seek adventure and experience. He walks for days, sleeping under hedges, picking up casual farm work here and there. He eventually finds himself at the house of Dulcie, at Robin Hood's Bay on Englands north east coast. She is eccentric, worldly, older, and with a mysterious past. She takes Robert under her wing, introducing him to poetry, interesting food, sea swimming; and they become friends.

Gregory McNamee was born in 1957, and is a writer, editor and photographer, who specialises in ecology and natural history. He lives in Tucson, Arizona, and has spent his life exploring and writing about the desert South West. This book is a collection of essays on that and related topics. From the development and legacy of the atomic bomb , to the history of dispossession of the Indians by the arrival of Europeans, to conflict over water rights, to the lives of local animals, it's a passionate and moving collection.

Gregory McNamee was born in 1957, and is a writer, editor and photographer, who specialises in ecology and natural history. He lives in Tucson, Arizona, and has spent his life exploring and writing about the desert South West. This book is a collection of essays on that and related topics. From the development and legacy of the atomic bomb , to the history of dispossession of the Indians by the arrival of Europeans, to conflict over water rights, to the lives of local animals, it's a passionate and moving collection.

Gregory McNamee was born in 1957, and is a writer, editor and photographer, who specialises in ecology and natural history. He lives in Tucson, Arizona, and has spent his life exploring and writing about the desert South West. This book is a collection of essays on that and related topics. From the development and legacy of the atomic bomb , to the history of dispossession of the Indians by the arrival of Europeans, to conflict over water rights, to the lives of local animals, it's a passionate and moving collection.

Stanley Crawford was a travel writer, essayist, and garlic farmer from northern New Mexico. He died earlier this year. He left behind a number of significant books about the natural world in northern New Mexico, and the process and value of small scale farming. This is a selection of short essays around those themes, and they are always well observed, passionate, and delightfully well written, wry and self effacing. A lovely book.