Goldin Boys: Stories

Dust jacket notes: "You could meet a lot of interesting people in Chicago...or you could meet them right here, in the Chicago of Joseph Epstein's first book of fiction. In these nine tales, the celebrated essayist and editor of The American Scholar unveils his great gifts as a storyteller. Epstein fans will find the precision, wit, and delight in language that have become his trademarks, and relish this new dimension of his work. Consider: a European aristocrat stricken with love for an utterly middle-class suburban woman; the discrepancy between the life and work of a literary lion; a brilliant but soulless young man's bid for power; the strong attraction of a sensible woman to the mobster who was her childhood friend. Through such memorable circumstances, Epstein probes the meaning of ambition, the dark side of immense ability, the relation between an artist's life and his work - and does so with the mordant humor and relaxed expertise that are uniquely his. 'The Count and the Princess' was chosen for Best American Short Stories by guest editor Anne Tyler. Two other stories in this collection were cited by Best American as 'distinguished.'"