El rey ha muerto: Los relatos completos

Walter Tevis -- the master of American letters who, like no other, explored the hidden facets of talent, defeat, and redemption in works such as Mockingbird, The Hustler, and The Steps of the Sun -- brought to the short story the same narrative precision and disarming tenderness that permeate his novels. The King Is Dead gathers, for the first time in Spanish, his complete short stories. Within these pages, a man receives a call from his future self; an actor and a young actress become entangled in a game of masks; an inmate finds solace at a chessboard; and the pool players of the old halls -- among them the legendary Eddie Felson, "Fast Eddie" -- once again confront their destiny. Each story reveals Tevis's lucid and compassionate gaze, along with his profound understanding of loneliness and the impulse to keep playing, even when knowing the game is lost. Talent, failure, and the stubborn refusal to stop trying: Tevis demonstrates in these stories that he was also a master of short fiction.