A River in Egypt

Faber Stories, a landmark series of individual volumes, presents masters of the short story form at work in a range of genres and styles. In his masterful story 'A River in Egypt', David Means paints a portrait of a moment. Cavanaugh and his young son are suspended; trapped in what a nurse calls 'the sweat chamber', where the boy will be tested for cystic fibrosis. Cavanaugh has brought distractions - spasmodic action figures, malformed toy trucks - but they do little to alter the frustration of the sick child screaming, or to alleviate the anxiety of the time spent waiting for 'some exactitude in the form of a diagnosis'.

David Means' books have been translated into eight languages and his fiction has appeared in numerous publications. Assorted Fire Events won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for fiction and a National Book Critics Circle nomination. The Secret Goldfish was shortlisted for the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Prize. The Spot was a 2010 Notable Book by the New York Times and won an O. Henry Prize. Means lives in New York and teaches at Vassar College. Hystopia is his highly anticipated first novel., David Means is the author of A Quick Kiss of Redemption, Assorted Fire Events, and The Secret Goldfish. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's, Zeotrope and Best American Short Stories. He lives in Nyack, New York, and teaches at Vassar College.