Booth Tarkington, the great Hoosier author, was amazingly prolific. This collection of vignettes about politics and the human faces behind the scenes and around the edges was probably inspired by Tarkington's one term in the Indiana General Assembly. This is a surprisingly good collection, funny in a home-spun way, poignant and tragic, especially the story about an Italian vendor who loved a German waitress with sad consequences. ( )

I just grabbed this off the shelf since it was next on my Tarkington list having no idea what it was about. It turned out to be not only a short story collection, but it was all about politics! How timely! And it is interesting how little some things change....like hardly at all! As always, Tarkington spins a good yarn and clearly captures the dilemmas that constantly crop up when political loyalties conflict with other loyalties. There are a few period references to African Americans in what seem today to be inappropriate ways, but having encountered that before in his work, i was not quite so startled this time. I enjoyed these stories very much, and am glad that my random book grab was so timely. ( )