What do people do all day?

Twelve stories narrated by Peter Cameron – everyday stories about ordinary people. A collection of stories published in magazines and collections over 34 years, from 1980 to 2014, whose characters tackle shortcomings and regrets, relationships and solitude, concerns and secrets. The story that lends its title to the book has readers facing a question that throws them into the life of the protagonists and the vicissitudes that unexpectedly disrupt them. A man keeps a small dog locked up in a cupboard, just to take it out for a walk every night, yet the lack of communication between him and his wife will lead the latter to believe he is having a relationship with another woman, as he won't tell her the truth; a woman comes back from Africa to discover she no longer has a home; another woman sneaks around her ex-husband's house and swims in his swimming pool. These are only a few of the stories Cameron regales us with in his elegant and refined prose and precise and well-chosen language.  

Che cosa fa la gente tutto il giorno? (What do people do all day?)
Peter Cameron
Adelphi, 2023