Determined to leave behind the dull values of her small hometown, an opera singer devotes increasing amounts of energy to developing her art.

From the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature and author of the Booker Prize–winning novel The Remains of the Day comes an inspired sequence of stories as affecting as it is beautiful.  
 
With the clarity and precision that have become his trademarks, Kazuo Ishiguro interlocks five short pieces of fiction to create a world that resonates with emotion, heartbreak, and humor. Here is a fragile, once

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Ending her relationship with a man who turns out to be in love with a reclusive singer, Annie initiates an e-mail friendship with the musician that reveals their mutual loneliness, his concerns about his young son, and his plans to release an acoustic version of his most successful album.

A talented songwriter, Shawn Gallagher spends his days lost in reverie and wonder, oblivious to the wiles of women and the ways of the world. He claims that he's content with his life, but his music tells a different story--one of loneliness and desperate longing... No one understands why Shawn doesn't put his musical gift to profitable use--least of all Brenna O'Toole, a fiercely independent tomboy who has been secretly in love with him for years....

A tale of immigrants centered on an accordion brought to America in the 1880s. After its Italian owner is murdered, the instrument passes into the hands of other ethnic groups--German, French-Canadian, Mexican, Polish, Norwegian--and the novel describes their ceremonies, dreams and hates. By the author of The Shipping News.

John Nickel, an African American blues musician managing a Memphis bar, hires a white brother and sister even though he knows they mean trouble, as he pines to be reunited with his son.

It is 1939. Lavender--La to her friends--decides to flee London, not only to avoid German bombs but also to escape the memories of her shattered marriage. Settling in as small town, she organizes an amateur orchestra from the village and the local RAF base and falls in love with one of her prized recruits.

In a part sequel and part retelling of "The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love," the inspiration for the Mambo Kings' biggest hit, Maria, now 60 years old, reminisces about her days and nights in Havana, offering a completely different perspective on the Mambo Kings' story.