Camouflage: Stories

Superb -- and surprising -- new fiction from the Australian master

A man named Huebler decides to photograph everyone alive. A suburban father perches in his son's tree house to spy on his friends. A dentist recognizes his estranged wife in a famous painting. "The Seduction of My Sister" tells of the increasingly bizarre events involving a boy and his sister when a new family moves in across the street. And in "Camouflage," Eric Banerjee, an unassuming Adelaide piano tuner, is sent north to the center of Australia in 1943 to make his contribution to the war effort.

It is clear in all these remarkable stories that Murray Bail -- already celebrated for his novels -- has also extended the manifold possibilities of short fiction. Each of his stories creates a strange and fascinating new world, and none of them is easily forgotten. Bail's work in this collection is deft, angular, and very entertaining; the mastery of his art is fully revealed with wry humor and haunting power.