I was honestly a bit hesitant about reading this, because the only other Joyce book I've read before was Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and I did not get on with it. Still, I tend to think authors deserve at least two chances to bore me rigid, and this was shorter than Ulysses, so here we are. And, you know, I actually quite enjoyed it! It turns out that, in short form, there isn't space for Joyce to pontificate on all that tedious philosophical meandering that so turned me off Portrait. Instead, the stories were finely observed character pieces, and if I wasn't absolutely riveted by any of them, I still enjoyed them all and could appreciate the craft that went into them.

Which means, damn it all, I'm going to have to give Ulysses a go sometime, aren't I? That monstrous thing intimidates me. The last time a book made me feel this way was War and Peace, and gentle reader: it was not worth it.