In this collection of five novellas, Bates contrasts two comic stories with the atmospheric title story, and includes a complex psychological tale alongside the romantically bleak.

'The Golden Oriole' features a fragile and troubled woman, frozen in a stultifying and unconsummated marriage, who finds her sensuality awakened by a virile admirer.

In 'The Ring of Truth', a man seeks to understand a disturbing and recurring dream, learns the truth about the lives and marriage of his parents, and in the process falls in love.

'The Quiet Girl' sees an isolated seamstress selfishly juggle two passionless affairs, only to fall in love with a man who is just interested in superficial romance.

'Mr Featherstone Takes a Ride' is a comic story featuring an amoral and easy-going swindler and an innocent hitchhiking philosophy student. And 'The World is Too Much With Us' is another comic tale about a reclusive man and a hen, who live together in domestic bliss until a buxom widow disrupts their eccentric liaison.

The collection also features bonus story 'Mademoiselle', the tale of a French maid, hired by an English family, and her romantic escapades.