The stories in The Neon Wilderness established Algren in the pantheon of American writers and formed the vein that he mined for all his subsequent novels and stories. Included are "A Bottle of Milk for Mother," about a youth being cornered for a murder, "The Face on the Barroom Floor," in which a legless man nearly pummels someone to death, and "So Help Me," Algren’s first published story. "Algren’s short stories are now generally acknowledged to be literary triumphs." — The New York Times