Described by Anne Tyler as the undisputed master of the short story form, Peter Taylor imbued his stories with a powerful sense of the conflicts between the old rural society and the increasingly urbanized South. Ranging in subject from the story of the exposure of a respected doctor's infidelity by the family's longtime cook to the tale of elderly siblings whose party for young people exposes the town's class divisions, the stories often explore family dynamics within the larger society of the South.