A casual introduction, a challenge to a simple game of chess, a lovers' reunion, a meaningless infidelity: from such small seeds Zweig brings forth five startlingly tense tales--meditations on the fragility of love, the limits of obsession, the combustibility of secrets and betrayal.

To read anything by Zweig is to risk addiction; in this collection the power of his writing--which, with its unabashed intensity and narrative drive, made him one of the bestselling and most acclaimed authors in the world--is clear and irresistible. Each of these stories is a bolt of experience, unforgettable and unique.
Five of Stefan Zweig's most powerful novellas, containing some of his most famous and best-loved work:

• Burning Secret
• A Chess Story
• Fear
• Confusion
• Journey into the Past
(Stand alone paperback editions of individual novellas from Pushkin and New York Review of Books will remain in print.)