After Robert Aickman's death in 1981 the manuscript of The Model, a wintry rococo fable set in Czarist Russia, was located among his papers. Aickman had told a friend he considered this novella to be 'one of the best things I have ever written, if not the very best.' It was duly published for the first time in 1987. The Model tells of Elena, a grave girl inclined to losing herself in dreams of becoming a student ballerina or coryphee. Her dolour darkens further when she learns she is to be sold into marital slavery by her father so as to settle the family's debts. Refusing an unendurable future she sets out to the city of Smorevsk to pursue her dream. First, however, she must traverse a landscape crowded by highly curious characters and creatures.“The late Robert Aickman was up to something, and quite consciously. He did not title his little book The Model for nothing. What he has done (and knew he had done) is discover a new wonderland I would bet that the number of people w ho have done that is less than one tenth the number w ho have discovered actual islands, inhabited or treasure; we must now add Aickman to that short list I le has told us what I think none of us had realized before — that czarist Russia can be just as viable a wonderland as. say. Baghdad under the Caliph And he has not merely told us; he has proved it by leaving us a model.”— Gene Wolfe