From the preface: Written twenty-five to forty years ago, these works evoke a time when economic decline for those who actually make and do things began as an ominous whisper and gradually increased to the now-familiar dull roar. They are the products of a society in chronic distress as experienced by one who couldn't buy his way out of participating in it. The collection might be summed up as Maupassant and Kafka go looking for the cask of Amontillado. The individual works: "The Position" the right man for the right job. Talking Heads: out of the frying pan .... In No Wise: Coming of Age meets the Bureaucracy from Hell. Some horror, some satire, and maybe a little science fiction here.