The second collection of blazingly original short stories from Booker prize-winning, Sunday Times-bestselling author Ian McEwan. A two-timing pornographer becomes the unwilling object of one of his
Taut, brooding and densely atmospheric, these stories show us the ways in which murder can arise out of boredom, perversity can result from adolescent curiosity, and sheer evil might be the solution to unbearable loneliness.
"A man went to knock at the king's door and said, Give me a boat. The king's house had many other doors, but this was the door for petitions. Since the king spent all his time sitting by the door for favours (favours being offered to the king, you understand), whenever he heard someone knocking on the door for petitions, he would pretend not to hear..." Why the petitioner required a boat, where he was bound for, and who volunteered to crew for him and what cargo it was found to be carrying the reader will discover as this short narrative unfolds.And at the end it will be clear that what night appear to be a children's fable is in fact a wry, witty Philosophical Tale that would not have displeased Voltaire or Swift.
Life Before Man explores the lives of three people imprisoned by walls of their own construction and in thrall to the tragicomedy we call love. Elizabeth, with her controlled sensuality and suppressed
