A brilliant performance. There's an assured and terribly macabre depravity about Ian McEwan's short stories - as if some of the characters from early Angus Wilson had been painted by Francis Bacon - Observer 20020218

Winner of Somerset Maugham Awards 1976.

"A talented and genuinely imaginative writer, McEwan's details often grow into strange, powerful images... the ironies, throughout this impressive collection are tellingly weighted." -- Julian Barnes "A brilliant performance... There's an assured and terribly macabre depravity about Ian McEwan's short stories... as if some of the characters from early Angus Wilson had been painted by Francis Bacon." -- Anthony Thwaite, "Observer" "Ian McEwan writes to shock and succeeds -- All his stories have a feeling of impending evil -- It is a tour de force of concision, and funny, too, in a deadpan manner." -- "TLS""A brilliant performance -- There's an assured and terribly macabre depravity about Ian McEwan's short stories -- as if some of the characters from early Angus Wilson had been painted by Francis Bacon." -- "Observer""His writing is exact, tender, funny, voluptuous, disturbing." -- "The Times""The Maestro." -- "New Statesman""McEwan has -- a style and a vision of life of his own...No one interested in the state and mood of contemporary Britain can afford not to read him." -- John Fowles "A sparkling and adventurous writer." -- Dennis Potter

Ian McEwan has written two collections of stories, as well as many novels and screenplays. He won the 1998 Booker Prize for Amsterdam, and was shortlisted for the 2001 Booker Prize for Atonement.