Shena Mackay is one of the very best short-story writers in the world. As the "Guardian" said, reviewing her last collection, 'Mackay's observational precision is outstanding; she writes like an angel wielding a scalpel, dissecting her characters with sublime, sharp-edged prose...Her stories are grand entertainment.' Or the "Literary Review": 'The heart lifts at the prospect of a collection of stories by Shena Mackay. You can be certain of various elements: laughter, a touch of the blade, underlying shadows, wit, sharpness of perception.' Her new book contains not only thirteen brilliant new stories, but a selection of twenty-three more from her previous collections, making "The Atmospheric Railway" a delight for her existing admirers and the perfect introduction to her work for newcomers.