Norman Matson 2 hr 47 min read

A young would-be painter, cold and sad in the Paris drizzle, is granted a magic ring that will fulfill any single wish, and discovers how hard it is to know what one truly wants.

Norman Matson's 1926 novel is a wry, wistful fantasy about art, desire, and the trouble with wishes, set among the cafés of bohemian Paris. Charming, thoughtful, gently ironic. Read it for a lovely tale that turns a wish-granting ring into a meditation on wanting itself.

In its time

Published in 1926, during the 1920s, the pulp era proper.

Reading it

2 hr 47 min read (a novel-length work, settle in).