Poet Paul Nelson's fiction debut is the swirling, hyperkinetic portrait of two friends and neighbors from now-vanished worlds: Sam, an elderly sailor haunted by recurring images of a beautiful heiress rescued from the sea, and Tom, a daydreaming "back-to-the-lander" in 1970s Maine who watches the gradual disintegration of his marriage.

PAUL NELSON was born near Boston of Norwegian and Finnish immigrants and was raised mostly in Maine. He attended Dartmouth College on an athletic scholarship and was an officer in the U.S. Navy for three years. After graduate work at Colgate University, he taught high school in Hawaii, and was a college teacher in Vermont, Indiana, and Colorado before becoming a Professor of English and Director of Creative Writing for Ohio University. He has published nine books of poetry, including the critically acclaimed DAYS OFF (University Press of Virginia, 1982 AWP Winner). He and his wife, the painter Judith Nelson, currently live, write and paint on the Olympic Peninsula, near the necessary ocean and in the northern light of their forebears.