Infinite Joe

The stories in The Safety of Objects involve either messed up people, people in the process of becoming messed up, or people doing messed up things. Actually, pretty much all of the stories involve all three.

I read this book as Music For Torching showed up as a Goodreads recommendation, and upon reading a few reviews, I saw that a lot of people absolutely hated the ending of the book, which naturally made me want to read it as soon as possible. I saw that the book was based on one of the short stories that were in this collection, and so I figured I would have to read this one first.

Have I mentioned yet that these are messed up stories involving messed up people doing messed up things?

The one that was the impetus for Music For Torching was a fun read, as were most of the others. They all gave me a odd, surreal feeling, thinking that this stuff was pure imagination and can't really happen, but knowing that somewhere out there, there's probably something that comes pretty damn close. But no story was nearly as good as the last one, which involved a young boy and his sister's Barbie, which was pure insanity, complete outrageousness, and something I couldn't put down.

I'm looking forward to see how her novels translate as compared to her short stories.