From the jacket flap:
These beautifully fashioned and haunting tales are the work of a writer who has important things to say in more than one of the categories into which writing is arbitrarily divided. Elizabeth Enright has long been famous for the intuitive apperceptions of childhood which have made her books, beginning with KINTU and THIMBLE SUMMER, living creative art.
Now in these mature tales there are subtlety, strength and emotional wholeness which are very rare; they call to mind comparisons as diverse as the stories of Katherine Anne Porter and Dorothy Parker's BIG BLONDE.
In this volume are real people, some nice, some nasty, some neurotic, some normal, but all of them human beings going about their business, worthwhile or otherwise. There is a variety of stories from the sympathetic Sugar for the Old Horse, the frustrating Bureau of Lost and Found to the delicate picture of psychological escape, The Maple Tree. Many of the stories are about women, but not all; the fine title story tells of a man's- an embezzler's- perfect summer.
Miss Enright's observation is always acute and the honesty with which she deals with human beings is uncompromising. In a field of writing which is one of the most demanding on the author and most rewarding for the reader- the short story- here is a shining and memorable talent.
