This collection of short stories by Aadhavan is a high watermark in the annals of Tamil fiction. He brought a new sensibility to this genre, which was dominated until then by predictable situations peopled by cardboard figures rather than flesh and blood individuals.

Speaking in a gentle voice, his characters take a detached look at themselves and the men and women they come into contact with. They walk in and out of lives, they dream, they win, they lose, but that gentle voice never goes away. It insists on probing, asking, debating, the rights and wrongs of their actions, their own foibles, and what lies beneath the surface of people - beautiful and ugly, small and big, strong and frail.

You can easily identify with these characters. They are you and me, as the author himself points out. With his superb skill with words, he compels you to pause a while from the business of living. "Come into my parlor and share my worldview, get into the shoes of the characters I have created for you and see if their experiences and expectations match yours", he seems to say.

In these stories, Aadhavan rarely strays out of the social class to which he belonged during his tragically short life. Middle class morality and the little, hesitant attempts by those tempted to breach it, form the basis of most of these stories. Ordinary men and women caught in a maelstrom of emotions, and the pain and ecstasy of love, battling physical urges or succumbing to them, compete for your attention with others who lead somewhat more mundane lives, crushing all desire under the severe compulsions of the need to survive.

Come and enter these magical pages written by one of the most sensitive contemporary writers in Tamil. We promise you that at the end of it, you will yearn for more.