Guilt and a desperate need to repent drive the antiheroes in Tom Walker's dark (and often darkly funny) stories: A gullible journalist falls for the 40-year-old stripper he profiles in a magazine. A faithless husband abandons his family and joins a support group for lost souls. A merciless prosecuting attorney grapples with the suicide of his gay son. An aging misanthrope must make amends to five former victims. An egoistic naval hero is haunted by apparitions of his dead wife and a mysterious little girl. The seven tales in Signed Confessions measure how far guilty men will go to obtain a...

This book is based on my experiences and observations during a most exasperating and frustrating time as a newly hired Director at Bronx Hospital. Sometimes it takes the uninitiated to see the truth. I do not believe that the shock evoked in me upon my arrival as a police lieutenant in the Four-One Precinct in 1971 will ever be duplicated. But this came damn close. At Bronx Hospital, it wasn't the shock of Fort Apache's violence and mayhem. This time, it was in many ways a much more sinister jolt. Most disturbingly, there was a laissez-fair attitude for the routine and outrageous conduct of...

Cornelius has triumphed in his first battle and climbed to the rank of Peasant, leaving behind the menial labor and brutality endured by the countless serfs slaving away for the comfort and glory of their Duke. Yet Cornelius soon finds the fierce joy of his victory crushed beneath the weight of new cruelty and suffering, almost as if there were unknown high-ranking Climbers determined to make his life miserable. And perhaps he's right... Meanwhile, as the powerful angel listens to Earl Cornelius describe his brutal early life in Manningham-a story she hopes will communicate the loveless...