Lorrie Moore’s best-known story is probably ‘People Like That Are the Only People Here’, which won the O Henry Award in 1998 and was included in the annual Best American Short Stories collection. Portraying parents agonising in hospital while their young son is treated for a tumour, it was recently picked again by Richard Ford as Moore’s contribution to his New Granta Book of the American Short Story.

Yet any anthology reader who assumes that ‘People Like That’ has been chosen as typical of her work is in for a surprise, as nothing else she’s written is as straightforwardly moving, as close to non-fiction, or as conventional as its main narrative – which makes it revealing that it’s