Written over two and a half decades, the stories in The Bell at the End of a Rope bring to their observations of childhood and parenthood a playful sensuality catapulting the most daily, ordinary events – a few minutes in the eye doctor's waiting room, the folding of a onesie over a towel rod – into things less familiar – a goat freed from an earthquake, a woman sneaking into a forest to hide from her family the smoking of a cigarette - all with a fondness for inviting their readers to join in for a moment in going astray. The author thanks Michelle Dotter and the wonderful and much-missed Dan Wickett for helping her bring these stories to Dzanc.