When noted English writer William Somerset Maugham set off for the South Seas to regain his health, he gathered the materials and wrote the stories represented here. These are among Maugham's best, and the best stories ever written about the exotic South Seas."Macintosh" is a taut psychological study of two officials on a remote tropic island. "The Fall of Edward Barnard" is a brief bildungsroman about what is important in life, a pre-cursor to Maugham's well known novel, The Razor's Edge. Of course, love is always a subject of the tropics, and Maugham's deft, ironic handling of the theme in "Red" and "Honolulu" is masterful. But it is "The Pool" that tells a poignant and tragic tale about the pitfalls for love across cultures. His most famous story, "Rain", about the ironic consequences of obsession, was adapted for both theater and film.