Giorgi has one advantage in tackling such wide dimensions: she is a historian and brings that knowledge to bear. However, her vocation at times proves to be a burden. She has brought the historian’s discipline of exposition too far into some of the stories and at other times (perhaps sensing this) overcorrects and buries important details too deep in others which can be distracting. The ambition to write beyond personal experience means that the dialogue is sometimes clunky and the narration can exhibit a generic quality where a modern sensibility crowds out a feel for the particular.

Nevertheless, some stories are very effective, notably ‘Visitor from Hollywood’, set in ŁÓdź in 1966. Giorgi has created some nicely delineated characters, establishing a small world beautifully but not mawkishly. ‘Soft Ground’, set in Berlin in 1921, builds through layers of emotional dissonance in the interactions between a shy returned soldier, an artist, and a pimp. Giorgi has a fertile imagination, evokes place efficiently within the limits of the medium and has a nose for an engaging premise. The storylines open up auspiciously but don’t always close as ambitiously. Nevertheless, this was an enjoyable collection of stories and a promising beginning.