'Every volume [Rachel Ingalls] has written displays the craft of a
quite remarkable talent. Tales of love, terror, betrayal and grief,
which others would spin out for hundreds of pages, are given the
occluded force of poetry.' Amanda Craig, Independent
Rachel Ingalls (b. 1940) grew up in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and
has lived in London since 1965.
The title-piece in this collection, first published in 1974, is the
novella The Man Who Was Left Behind, which tells of a retired
lawyer from the American South whose entire family has been
destroyed. His grief drives him to haunt the bars, parks and
laundromats of the town where he was once a respected citizen. The
accompanying stories 'St. George and the Nighclub' and 'Something to
Write Home About' are both set on the island of Rhodes, and both
offer disquieting portraits of marriage.