The twenty-six always compelling, often astonishing, stories in this collection are published in chronological order, so readers can appreciate the Nobel prize-winning writer’s progress from early experimentation, to full-blown magical realism. Each tale is not just a read, but an experience: you join a community in the thrall of a corpse in ‘The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World’; sail through ‘The Last Voyage of the Ghost Ship’ a five-page story written as a single sentence, and feel your way, blinded, through ‘The Night of the Curlews’.