Recently re-discovered in the archives of the New York Public Library and published here for the first time, these 14 short stories provide an unparalleled look at Truman Capote writing in his teens and early twenties, before he penned such classics as Other Voices, Other Rooms; Breakfast at Tiffany's; and In Cold Blood. In a small Southern town, a teenage girl anxiously waits for her date to arrive. A little boy meets his dream dog in Manhattan's Central Park. A woman fights to save the life of a child who has her lover's eyes. Best friends discuss the theoretical murder of husbands. Capote was always drawn to outsiders—women, children, African Americans, the poor—and here we see his powers of empathy developing as he depicts his characters struggling and yearning at the margins of their known worlds: Young women experience the joys and pains of new love; urbane sophisticates are worn down by cynicism; children and adults alike seek understanding in a treacherous world.

"These ten-plus stories were written when Capote was a teenager and young man and will shed light on his subsequent work while remaining sharply observed pleasures in their own right."—Library Journal