These stories are typically a few pages long, and as befits a travel writer are set worldwide.
A problem with reading the stories in this form rather than in a magazine (where most originally appeared) is the need to check when they were originally published; in general they are set in ‘the present’, but just when is that? The dating is particularly critical in the case of the stories set in Russia, and one which seems prescient about the inter-tribal tensions in Rwanda.
The last two parts of the collection concern an American diplomat working in Malaysia and London. The Malaysian stories include examples of a ghost story and a detective story, the London ones are more focused on the world of the American Embassy. Although the stories are mostly independent, the last one contains a resolution which I found surprisingly conventional, especially after the ambiguous endings of many of the earlier stories in the collection.
- Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (July 1, 1998)
- ISBN-10: 0140274944
- ISBN-13: 978-014027494