Fiction writer Mark Helprin provides in his short story “The Pacific” the portrait of a woman called Paulette, who is married to a marine lieutenant sailing during wartime (WWII) on the ocean Paulette lives very close to. The Pacific, of course. The woman is a trained welder, spunkily working while her husband is away. Will he return? The ardor of the dutiful in spite of separation, the heavy demands of devotion, war’s threat to marriage—all are themes in this striking piece. And as always, Helprin is fascinated by nature’s display and organizational work and technology.

In “Last Tea with the Armorers,” there is another heroine, Annalise—Jewish and not quite pretty. By 1972 she “had been in the [Israeli] army in one form or another for sixteen years . . .” and has an awful connection with the Holocaust. Unmarried and caring for her father, Annalise does the best she can, with a broken heart. But a possible future marriage is emerging. The dark past gives way to the present, the present to the future. What’s more, belief in God shan’t be rejected. “Armorers” is a unique and lovingly written story.