These stories - never before published in book form - bring to bear William Styron's unmatched talents, concentrating on things that have preoccupied him during much of his adult writing career. As Styron says in his preface, 'each of these narratives reflects my experience at the age of twenty, ten and thirteen'. The first tale covers Styron's experiences as a Marine in the Pacific at the close of the Second World War. The second tells of his friendship with Shadrach -'a black apparition of unbelievable antiquity, palsied and feeble, blue-gummed and grinning'; the third a portrait of a tidewater town in Virginia on the eve of war in 1939. These are poignant stories of loss and change, written with the full power and distinction of a writer who occupies a preeminent place in modern American literature.