Description:From the Back CoverThis book is a collection of short fiction that deals mainly with themes of childhood and innocence betrayed, is the first book of Pacheco's fiction to appear in English. Here there are no narrative arabesques, no flights of magical-realist fancy. Instead, he confronts the reader with the uglier sides of urban Mexico--its grime, its beggars, its suffocating pollution, the constricted lives of its lower middle class--all with a simplicity and directness of style impeccably shaped and clearly distilled.About the AuthorJosé Emilio Pacheco (1939-2014) is one of Mexico’s foremost poets, novelists, and essayists. A lifelong resident of Mexico City, Pacheco has been a guest lecturer throughout the United States, Canada, Great Britain. Some of Pacheco’s best known collections of poetry include Miro la tierra (which documented the Mexico City earthquake), El reposo del fuego, Fin de siglo y otros poemas, Arbol entere dos muros/Tree between two walls, and Selected Poems. His No me preguntas cómo pasa el tiempo was awarded Mexico’s National Poetry Prize.