This collection encompasses the first half of Nobel Prize winner Alice Munro's career and includes some of the best, most touching, and powerful short stories ever written. This initial selection of Alice Munro's stories encapsulates her genius. Her domain is the secrets that cluck beneath the facade of everyday life, the pain and promises, the loves and fears of seemingly ordinary men and women that make them extraordinary and unforgettable. This volume brings together Munro's best stories from 1968 to 1994. The second selected volume of her stories, 1995-2009, will also be published by Vintage Classics.