Welcome to America at the turn of the twentieth century, where the rhythms of ragtime set the beat. Harry Houdini astonishes audiences with magical feats of escape, the mighty J P Morgan dominates the financial world and Henry Ford manufactures cars by making men into machines.

How do you ever know the whole story? How do you ever know even part of the story? How do you find meaning when chance and coincidence could, just be chance and coincidence? Presenting connections and missed connections, this collection of stories is an inquiry into things ranging from flies and trees and books to sex, art, drunkenness, and love.

A whirling library of ghost story, funny story, love story, scary story, and more. Like Russian dolls, separate yet invisibly linked, they unfold from and into one another.

When penniless businessman Mr Bedford retreats to the Kent coast to write a play, he meets by chance the brilliant Dr Cavor, an absent- minded scientist on the brink of developing a material that blocks gravity.

Free when packaged with any Damrosch World Literature title.