In the same vein as Paul Theroux and Robert Olen Butler, some of these stories take place in foreign countries—Zaire (Congo) and Greece—and center on interactions between a host nation and an American visitor. Others are set in the US in the modes of Alice Munro and Tobias Wolff, focusing on human relationships.

Each story reveals a main character’s moral center in the face of unexpected events, some of which seem trivial, others vital.