“Stories That Knocked on My Door” by J Rainsnow is a remarkable collection that fuses philosophical inquiry with emotional depth, told through stories that hover between realism, myth, and speculative fiction. With characters as varied as guilt-ridden generals, immigrant dancers, failed artists, and time travelers, the book explores human longing in all its forms—love that can't be reached, justice that slips away, futures glimpsed but never guaranteed. At the heart of the collection lies a question: What do we owe to ourselves, and each other, in the face of suffering, memory, and the unknowable?

DAPHNE. A poet passionately loves a Russian immigrant ballerina in New York. But a trauma from her past has turned her away from love, keeping him and the whole world at a distance.

TWO IMPERFECT PAINTINGS. Two artists, each with a handicap that prevents them from reaching their full potential, meet in a gallery where their paintings are placed side by side.

THE PLAGIARIST. A professor writes a beautiful book of poetry, which he claims to have remembered from a past life. Or is he just a fraud?

EARTH REFOUND. Survivors of the destruction of the Earth's ecology have rebuilt their world, but now have a terrible premonition that those who destroyed their world are about to return.

THE FRENCH TIME MACHINE. A guilt-ridden French general and inventor who waged war against Algerian rebels in the 1950s and 60s, seeks to travel in a time machine to see if he can bring back good news from the future.

DANCING SALSA. The American husband of a Latin American wife secretly watches her dancing salsa, and feels the heartbreak of all he has failed to do for her.

ROMAN BRITAIN COMES TO EARTH. A confident, old-fashioned professor praises the cultural benefits of ancient Rome's invasion of England - until beings from outer space invade our planet.

HANDCUFFS. A Colombian immigrant to the US faces hardship and finds herself pushed by the dynamics of history and her passion to love onto a path of self-destruction.

THE WATER PITCHER. A discounted man, who is determined to prove himself, loses sight of the consequences of his crusade to be 'somebody.'

THE POWER OF ANGER. Technicians find a way to convert human anger into electricity and must then take steps to ensure that the power source never runs dry.

THE ANGEL'S ARIA. The passionate platonic love between an eccentric, failed composer and an underachieving, yet remarkable opera diva reaches a state of high drama when the composer demands the diva sing a song that is impossible to sing, or else he will blow his brains out.

TAKING OFF THE CAST. A struggling writer is badly injured in a fall, but discovers the liberating effect of temporarily having nothing expected of him as long as he is in a cast.

THE FIRST MAN IN THE VALLEY OF EGGS. A man wakes up in a valley of eggs. He is the only one who has hatched and spends his life waiting for someone else to come out of an egg.

THE VIOLINIST. A violinist arrives in a small town where the people dislike music.

FETTERMAN. A young Native American man is harassed by racists, and is on the verge of ruining his life by shooting them, as his friends desperately search for a way to deter him.

GRACIELA. A young man's brief meeting with an idealistic Mexican woman changes his life forever. Did she save him or destroy him?

THE CASE OF THE MISSING CHEERIO. A piece of breakfast cereal seems to vanish into thin air, precipitating a philosophical battle between a New Age son and a fiercely rationalistic father.

SNOW WOMAN. Musings about a woman who only talks to the man who loves her when it snows.

THE BET. Is the morality we practice on Earth really morality, or just the fear of being punished for following our desires? A man about to be reborn decides to settle the question once and for all.

MYSTERIOUS LITTLE MACHINE. An undercover cop follows a suspicious man, trying to figure out the purpose of the odd device he keeps pointing at people on the street.

THE CLAMOR OF SPIRITS. A couple discovers, to their horror, that their new house seems to be a hotbed for ghosts. Who are they, and why are they here?