Winesburg, Ohio is a short story cycle by the Sherwood Anderson. The work is revolves around the life of George Willard, from the time he was a child to his growing independence and abandonment of Winesburg as a young man. It is set in the fictional town of Winesburg, which is based loosely on the author's childhood in Clyde, Ohio. The stories were "...conceived as complementary parts of a whole, centered in the background of a single community." The book consists of twenty-two stories, with the first story, "The Book of the Grotesque", serving as an introduction.