Passion and Affect: Stories

“Laurie Colwin was the best kind of master: human and humorous, full of wisdom and love.” —Emma Straub, New York Times bestselling author of All Adults Here

In these fourteen tales, Laurie Colwin explores love and marriage, friendship and loyalty, and obligation and desire with the compassion and wit that earned her the devotion of legions of readers. 

When Passion and Affect was first published in 1974, Colwin was anointed as a young writer to watch. Now, a new generation has the opportunity to encounter some of the most charmingly complicated and beautifully drawn characters in modern fiction: a music critic whose orderly life is threatened by her flirtation with a married cartographer; an ornithologist perplexed by human mating rituals despite his expertise in the natural world; and two young men, best friends and cousins, whose relationship is disrupted by the sudden arrival of Misty Berkowitz in their lives.

Passion and Affect is a dazzling must-have collection from "a wise, big hearted writer. A deft and funny one, too." (Washington Post)

"[Colwin] has single-handedly revitalized the short story." - Los Angeles Times

“I would love. . . to start a Colwin renaissance.” - Elin Hilderbrand, on NPR’s “All Things Considered”