A son tells a series of stories, most of them about his father and stepfather. As the son describes a robbery that took place at his house in high school and his experiences with his father, a former Jehovah's Witness and current alcoholic, he begins to recall details from his childhood.

Caught between two dimensions of spacetime, a poet shares stories with two women in need of his narrative insight, all the while meditating on the meaning of stories and the intricacies of interpersonal connection.

A man walks with a writer around London who tells him about the novel he wrote that was lost which can never be matched in beauty by any other.

In the depths of his mind, a writer tries to uncover the autonomous, nefarious motivations of his own characters.

A man recalls his intimate friendship with his former English professor, who resolved to fuel his unsatisfied desire for playwriting during the time they were apart. In their reunion decades later, instead of the brilliant play he promised, the professor shows his former student a disturbing product of his mental instability.

A writer struggles to craft a story and begins to lose his own sanity when an idea finally comes to him.

A teacher on the Lower East side meets a friendly man with a presence resembling a dead English poet.

A young girl works to impress her highly critical parents and submits to a terrible fate as she struggles to meet their impossible standards.

A man reflects on the past week while an unexpected storm rages outside, and he compares the events that follow with the fall of the Roman Empire.

A research psychologist visits a peculiar asylum patient who recounts his life story. The patient warns the researcher about how obsession with the pursuit of knowledge can make one lose sight of their humanity until it is unsalvageable.