Written with a truly original fictional voice, John Dufresne"s powerful debut collection of stories is filled with quirky characters in hours of crisis and flashes of humor in moments of dark despair. A Louisiana farmer sees the image of Christ appear on the freezer door and questions the meaning of faith. In a Maine resort town, Miss Langevin, a spinster who could write a book on disappointment, now gets a chance to help another woman escape it. And in the title story, a science teacher"s modest dreams and painful memories erode his existence like water entering stone.