The Hot Climate of Promises and Grace

"These gem-like tales form a kind of love song to the feminine principle, that aspect of each of us that is irrational, untamed, and intuitive." --Lisa Alther

With these short stories, Steven Nightingale offers testimonies of revelation, mischief, miracles, and grace given him by sixty-four remarkable women who've appeared in his life over time.

These delightful pieces--deeply indebted to Sufi Tales and Jataka stories (as well as to the Brothers Grimm and American folktales)--combine humor and sensuality with surrealism and an oblique spirituality, and each becomes an opportunity of gentle instruction, invention, and entertainment. The book describes a spiritual pilgrimage, beautifully written, a unique offering from the acclaimed author of Granada: A Pomegranate in the Hand of God.

"Charming in the way of Coelho, Nightingale's work is proof of a life lived with both ears open, one to the lives and stories around him and one to what readers want and need to hear." --Tupelo Hassman, author of Girl Child