Hitting Trees with Sticks "Rogers, Jane"

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

A gifted young textile designer leaves Britain to work for a Nigerian women's refuge, confident in the conviction that this is her one chance to make a difference; a 16-year-old accepts a low-paying job as a window-cleaner for the opportunity it affords him to peer into other people's lives, and carefully plan his own; and a leading scientist risks his career by taking a secret lover back to his house one night, driven by a passion to share his new theory. The characters in this short story collection are unashamedly defiant. Buoyed by their self-belief, they enthuse, take calculated risks, and refuse to be beaten by situations. Offering an object lesson in how fine the balance can be between self-confidence and self-delusion, this compilation demonstrates how individuals, caught momentarily off-guard, drunk on the smallest drop of confidence, are ultimately brought down by their own belief in themselves.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Red Enters the Eye (p. 1)
• Conception (p. 17)
• Morphogenesis (p. 27)
• Where are You, Stevie? (p. 39)
• Tale of a Naked Man (p. 69)
• My Mother and her Sister (p. 79)
• Saved (p. 85)
• The Ghost in the Corner (p. 97)
• Sports Leader (p. 103)
• Kiss and Tell (p. 113)
• The Disaster Equation (p. 123)
• Ivory Bird (p. 149)
• You Want? (p. 157)
• The Anatomist's Daughters (p. 169)
• The Runaway (p. 179)
• Lucky (p. 187)
• The Road (p. 197)
• Birds of American River (p. 201)
• Ped-o-Matique (p. 211)
• Hitting Trees with Sticks (p. 225)