Mortal Coils is a collection of five short fictional pieces written by Aldous Huxley in 1921. ''The Gioconda Smile'' is a mixture of social satire and murder story, which Huxley later adapted into a film called A Woman''s Vengeance (1948). ''Permutations Among the Nightingales'' is a play concerning the amorous problems encountered by various patrons of a hotel. ''The Tillotson Banquet'' tells of an old artist who was thought to be dead, and is ''rediscovered''; a not entirely successful honorary dinner is organised for him. ''Green Tunnels'' is about the boredom of a young girl on holiday with her family. She develops a romantic fantasy, and is ultimately disillusioned. ''Nuns at Luncheon'' is a second-hand story told of a nun falling in love. The story mocks the writer''s process, a concept Huxley used in his novel Crome Yellow.
