Winner of the Leapfrog Global Fiction Prize Precise moving writing--a powerful and compelling collection. --Joseph Hurka author of Fields of Light The unadorned sentences often reach a conclusion whose truth makes you catch your breath. This unpretentious book is the work of a master. --Edith Pearlman National Book Award finalist One of the most compelling stories published [by the Yale Review]. . . . A thoughtful reflective sensitive and graceful work. --Kai Erikson former editor The Yale Review These are stories of unexpected encounters far from home told with a vivid sense of place. A white man with more wives than money becomes Africa s least-competent thief two Americans contemplate love s costs and possibilities in Mexico s mountains a seasick missionary bumps into God on the equator. George Rosen s characters seek and sometimes find a reality in which everywhere there is something remarkable.