Collected Stories (Penguin Books)

"The Collected Stories" - a stunning volume of William Trevor's unforgettable short stories. William Trevor is one of the most renowned figures in contemporary literature, described as 'the greatest living writer of short stories in the English language' aby the New Yorker and acclaimed for his haunting and profound insights into the human heart.

Here is a collection of his short fiction, with dozens of tales spanning his career and ranging from the moving to the macabre, the humorous to the haunting. From the penetrating "Memories of Youghal" to the bittersweet "Bodily Secrets" and the elegiac "Two More Gallants", here are masterpieces of insight, depth, drama and humanity, acutely rendered aby a modern master.

"A textbook for anyone who ever wanted to write a story, and a treasure for anyone who loves to read them". (Madison Smartt Bell). "Extraordinary...Mr. Trevor's sheer intensity of entry into the lives of his people...proceeds to uncover new layers of yearning and pain, new angles of vision and credible thought".

("The New York Times Book Review"). Readers of "The Story of Lucy Gault" and "Love and Summer" will adore "The Collected Stories".They will also be cherished by readers of Colm Toibin and William Boyd.

William Trevor was born in Mitchelstown, County Cork. He has written eighteen novels and novellas, and hundreds of short stories, for which he has won a number of prizes including the Hawthornden Prize, the Yorkshire Post Book of the Year Award, the Whitbread Book of the Year Award and the David Cohen Literature Prize in recognition of a lifetime's literary achievement.

In 2002 he was knighted for his services to literature. His books in Penguin are: "After Rain"; "A Bit on the Side"; "Bodily Secrets"; "Cheating at Canasta"; "The Children of Dynmouth"; "The Collected Stories" (Volumes One and Two); "Death in Summer"; "Felicia's Journey"; "Fools of Fortune"; "The Hill Bachelors"; "Love and Summer"; "The Mark-2 Wife"; "Selected Stories"; "The Story of Lucy Gault" and "Two Lives".