"Schorb has an ear for the manifold accents of American speech, and that adds significantly to the amazing variety of this book. As for locale, these narrations will take you from North Carolina Outer Banks to Polynsia and points in between, with sorrowful or merry stays in New York Greenwich Village. A character, Jimmy Whistler, appears in several stories set in the Village, and this recurrence of actor and locale is a skillful esthetic counterpoise...