What really sets the gun apart from others of similar size is its profile. With a width of just one inch at the slide stop lever (its widest point) the PPS is extremely slim while the 3.2-inch barrel keeps the gun quite small; its overall length is just 6.3 inches. According to my postal scale, the PPS weighs 19.4 ounces, so the gun will be very easy to carry concealed for long periods of time without undue burden.

The Walther PPS has a safety lever in the face of the trigger. Instead of a mag release button, the Walther PPS uses a contoured magazine release lever underneath the trigger guard.

The three magazines offer not only varied capacity but also add to the length of the PPS's grip frame. The six-round magazine is flush with the bottom of the grip and is obviously intended for the greatest level of concealment while the seven-round magazine offers a small pinky rest that is reminiscent of that found on the PPK. The eight-round model has an even bigger floorplate and will likely be favored by those who have large hands.

I admit to having mixed feelings about short grip frames as I have long felt that a short grip offers nothing but a false sense of compactness. Yes, the pistol is actually held in place with the middle finger, but the ring and pinky fingers help cam the muzzle down during recoil, and having the pinky finger hanging out in space also complicates magazine changes. Switch to an extended magazine and you lose the compactness that might have attracted you to the pistol in the first place, and extended mags can make swift, sure reloads a bit harder to achieve.

These issues can be overcome, but you should understand the downsides of extreme compactness before buying such a gun and be prepared to spend a little more time familiarizing yourself with how it handles--both shooting and reloading--if you do get one.

As I said, the PPS is a striker-fired gun, and it's similar to the Glock in several ways. The trigger offers a safety lever in the middle of its face that is deactivated once the trigger finger is placed on it. The action is reasonably smooth with a bit of stack and breaks my trigger scale at 61⁄2 pounds. The reset is relatively short; length of travel is just under half an inch.

The concept of "riding" the trigger reset is hotly debated these days; many of the big-name competition shooters advocate releasing the trigger and then "catching the link" on the way back before pressing the trigger through. I have tried this and found that it does not work for me, so I like the idea of a short trigger reset.