Even if the whole world seems absurd, a good book will keep you from going crazy. People have been telling stories since the beginning of time. They talk about what they saw and what they heard. They talk about what was and what could have been. They tell stories to distract themselves, pass the time, or get through difficult times. Sometimes such stories turn into chronicles, chronicles, monuments to individual periods and eras. This is how “Tales of the Thousand and One Nights”, “The Canterbury Tales” and “The Decameron” by Boccaccio appeared. “The New Decameron” is also a kind of monument to an era that will definitely go down in history. The editors of The New York Times Magazine have collected 29 short stories, essays, fairy tales, tiny sketches and extended discussions. In them, the most famous modern writers tried to capture and comprehend the events that gripped every corner of the world. The collection includes short stories by Margaret Atwood, Colm Toibin, Leila Slimani, Rachel Kushner, Etgar Keret, David Mitchell, Mona Awad and many others.