This collection of novellas is about journeys. In The Last Long Walk of Noah Brown, a young man leaves his home in Annapolis in 1965. A complete innocent, he trusts the people he encounters along the roads who give him direction until he settles in New Orleans where he eventually rescues people and animals caught in the flood. The King and the Clockmaker examines questions about the genesis of evil, the role of art and the nature of time. In The Vast Darkness, a young woman student of anthropology reflects upon the influence of isolated mountain living upon her neighbors.