Mavis Gallant (1922-2014) was born in Montreal and worked as a journalist at the Montreal Standard before moving to Europe to devote herself to writing fiction. After traveling extensively she settled in Paris, where she lived until her death. The New Yorker published 116 of her stories.  She was the recipient of the 2002 Rea Award for the Short Story and the 2004 PEN/Nabokov Award for lifetime achievement. NYRB Classics has published three collections of Gallant's stories: The Cost of Living: The Early and Uncollected Stories of Mavis Gallant, Paris Stories, and Varieties of Exile as well as a volume containing two novels, A Fairly Good Time and Green Water, Green Sky. Garth Risk Hallberg is a novelist and critic who resides in New York City with his wife and children. His first novel, City on Fire, was a New York Times and international bestseller, and was named one of the best books of 2015 by The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, The Wall Street Journal, NPR, and Vogue. His essays have appeared in The New York Times Book Review, The Guardian, The Millions, and Slate.