The sixteen stories in this collection introduce a remarkably diverse parade of characters inhabiting narrative landscapes that range from the comic to the tragic. Most radiate a southern sensibility, though a few reach as far afield as Idaho, Montana, and California. In recognition of the fact that fiction is a collaborative undertaking between writer and reader, and that a narrative come fully "alive" only when it is jointly processed within the alchemy of that partnership, Dick invites anyone who happens upon this collection to join him in the "performance" of these stories.