A name you know. A mood you’re in. Ten minutes to yourself. Start anywhere.
How the prose reads.
While Easter bells summon the city outside, an impoverished clerk spends another holiday night trapped in a smoky office.
Driving his gravely ill wife through a blizzard, a drunken turner discovers remorse only when time is almost gone.
A penniless painter prepares to leave his summer lodging while dreaming of fame and avoiding the young woman who believes in his future.
A landowner confides his fear that ordinary life is incomprehensible, unaware that his closest friend desires his wife.
Two chance encounters with remarkable young women leave a traveler pondering why beauty can bring as much sadness as delight.
A Sunday animal market in Moscow becomes a crowded portrait of commerce, expertise, affection, and cruelty.
During Holy Week, an ailing bishop longs to meet his visiting mother as a son rather than as the distant office everyone sees.
A cattle merchant crosses Russia by freight train, paying at every stop while schedules, regulations, and neglect consume his profit.
Unable to sleep in a provincial chemist’s shop, a lonely young wife welcomes two officers whose late-night errand becomes open flirtation.
On Easter morning, a newly married farmer passes a sick soldier on the road and cannot quiet his conscience afterward.
An impoverished old man can no longer feed the horse and dog that depend on him, yet neither anger nor dismissal can break their attachment.
One enormous eelpout under a riverbank root draws workers, a shepherd, and their master into the water.
A society hostess dazzled by artistic celebrity overlooks the quiet distinction of the doctor she has married.
A stranded hospital assistant seeks shelter at a rural inn and finds himself drawn to the dangerous freedom of its notorious guests.
A laboring woman meets the husband who rarely comes home and asks him to stay, if only for a day.
One accidental kiss awakens a shy officer’s hope that his ordinary life might contain love after all.
A practiced seducer meets a married woman at a seaside resort and discovers that their affair has become more serious than either expected.
On Easter Eve, a worried deacon asks a learned priest to condemn his wayward son in a letter neither man can truly own.
On New Year’s Eve, a young woman peers into a mirror for a glimpse of marriage and sees far more of its demands than she expected.
A possible lottery win gives a comfortable couple a sudden view of riches—and of each other.
A widow’s annual temperance luncheon drives her respectable guests to increasingly elaborate errands.
At an isolated railway tavern, two devout cousins clash over faith, money, and family rights as resentment turns dangerous.
A wealthy engineer and a poor village try to become good neighbors, but suspicion and small grievances steadily undo their goodwill.
A pregnant hostess endures a long name-day party while resentment, jealousy, and fatigue expose the strain in her marriage.
