Written over a period of three years and across a range of styles and lengths, Walking with Albert is Keith Weaver’s first short story compilation. These stories range from micro-narratives of a few pages in length to what could be called miniature novellas. Weaver’s stories cover a vast territorial expanse, taking the reader from outer space to the minutia of Earth’s countryside, then into the human heart. One story concerns a young man’s unrealised expectation of winning a Fields Medal, while others explore the joys and challenges of rural life, past and present. Probing, experimental, and often funny, this collection includes one story that hints at astrophysics, another about a death on a golf course, and another about a cat that defies anti-Semitism from the past. Weaver’s imagination ranges across the human and animal worlds and extends to the world of things. In one story, two starkly mismatched men find something in common on a summer morning, while another story concerns itself with a pair of toast tongs. Taken together, these stories represent a bold new direction in a body of work that includes three novels, a novella, and works of nonfiction.

Having successfully retired from a long and fulfilling engineering career, Keith Weaver has made the switch to an enduring passion: writing. The present book, Flight, joins his other five novels, one novella, two books of short stories, and the memoir in tribute to his extraordinary wife, Maggie. There are further books in the pipeline. For an addicted reader and someone who has always had an insatiable thirst for knowledge, writing provides the perfect means to integrate all his interests in science, history, philosophy, languages, and technology, and to pursue fresh knowledge on every front. Things that anchor him to the real world are cooking, cycling in Europe, bread making, wine tasting in vineyards, spending time with many good friends, and enjoying the company of his two cats.

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