Publisher's Synopsis
Almee Jones refers to herself as An Obscure Writer, who bends the truth a little and enjoys frequent respites in her imagination. She's nearing seventy and finds it easy to maintain her obscurity from life's unpleasantness in the company of her dog Bodhi and a few figments. She also spends her days pondering the meaning of love, loss, and words. Occasionally, she finds herself exasperated by a biographer, who demands elaboration on her twenty-five year liaison with her departed Maya, once known as the Diva of the Art world. Almee waxes on eloquently, dancing with words in her paradisiacal paragraphs, and generally annoying her biographer with digressions into philosophical motifs that may delight the reader, but does tend to leave her biographer hanging from his last nerve. Amid Almee's verbal contretemps, her obscurity is interrupted by the sudden disappearance of a neighbor, Mr. Jeffries. Not to mention, Cousin Lucien makes an unexpected appearance. He's followed by two Treasury Agents searching for a counterfeiter bearing a striking resemblance to Lucien. Only a writer with a vivid imagination and an airy sense of morals finds a solution to everyone's magnificent mess, while fulfilling her own dreams of getting lost in the desert.