Publisher's Synopsis
Mixed Gauges is a collection of short stories about trains. Some of them have ghosts. It's also about getting lost and discovering yourself...to be lost. Stories filled with mystery, whimsy, obsession, ambivalance, and a sprinkling of wit. Stories about losing control, learning from the mistakes of the past, and failure. Nine short stories each with different passengers, each on their own journey in life, including a seven-year-old lost in a subway train named Sent who is not sure how he got there, or why the other passengers always stare straight ahead in a daze. There's Hannah in "Along the Valley Line" who lands in Hartwell, a small mining town with a murky past, corporate overlords, and shady locals. She's given a story from a by-gone age and an offer too good to refuse. Ravi and Ben are on the run from the police in "Well-Tested Men". They've just stolen jewels, but on their way into the mountains their loyalties to each other are put to the test. Then there's George (he went to war), college kids keep getting hit by the Union Pacific, and Carla would tell you it's not always cushy in a wood-paneled stately carriage on a diplomatic mission. Christopher Zamora writes characters looking for the possibility of getting away, but ultimately find themselves snared. Like it is on the rails as the landscape passes by: a prospect for freedom, but the dependency on a fixed itinerary.
