Blending reality and illusion with elegance and precision, Italy's master storyteller weaves into these tales instants of recognition in which cherished deceptions and illusions of love - frequently self-love - are swept away. Three gluttonous burglars invade a pastry shop, a young clerk leaves a lady's bed at dawn, a young woman is isolated from bathers on a beach by the loss of her bikini bottom, two children trespass upon a forbidden garden - each of them discovering hidden truths beneath the surface of everyday life.

Contents:

• Riviera Stories
  • Adam, One Afternoon
  • The Enchanted Garden
  • A Goatherd at Luncheon
  • The House of the Beehives
  • Big Fish, Little Fish
  • A Ship Loaded with Crabs
  • Man in the Wasteland
  • Lazy Sons
• Wartime Stories
  • Fear on the Footpath
  • Hunger at Bevera
  • Going to Headquarters
  • The Crow Comes Last
  • One of the Three Is Still Alive
  • Animal Woods
  • Mine Fields
• Postwar Stories
  • Theft in a Pastry Shop
  • Dollars and the Demimondaine
  • Sleeping Like Dogs
  • Desire in November
  • Transit Bed
• Stories of Love and Loneliness
  • The Adventure of a Soldier
  • The Adventure of a Bather
  • The Adventure of a Clerk
  • The Adventure of a Photographer
  • The Adventure of a Traveler
  • The Adventure of a Reader
  • The Adventure of a Nearsighted Man
  • The Adventure of a Poet