In an elegant and penetrating first short-story collection, "Limbo, and Other Places I Have Lived, " Lily Tuck's characters travel to unknown, exotic places and, while there, find themselves deeply immersed in observation -- of the natives, the local customs, the foreign landscape -- in an effort to discern some elemental truth about who they themselves are. Instead, these women meet with disorientation, confusion, they are disappointed by the people closest to them -- lovers, husbands, family members. Finally, they arrive at the sometimes heartbreaking but ultimately optimistic realization that the answers they seek lie not in other people or places but within themselves. "Limbo, and Other Places I Have Lived" is a brilliant collection from a writer of exceptional poise and insight.