Companion pieces

The first novella, "Doing and Undoing," takes Daniel and Simeon Poore back to the setting of their fondly remembered Eisenhower-era childhoods - a grandmother's rambling castlelike house in the Illinois farmlands, where the past still looms, revealing its destructive as well as healing power. "Game of Spirit" finds a young man named Lou living alone across a grimy alleyway from another young man - named Lew. As lonesome Lou accumulates a life for himself, he seems to be mirroring his neighbor's. Dan and Sim, Lou and Lew - like the books they inhabit - are companions, holding secrets from each other even as they disclose deep fraternal bonds.