Michel Faber is not only a master storyteller but a daring innovator as well. Here are the pitch-perfect prose, indelible characterizations, and deep empathy for which he has been highly acclaimed. Here also is a satirical streak that depicts individuals at uncanny and all-too-familiar turning points in their lives. The alienated find sanctuary in "The Safehouse," their histories and diagnoses written like endless ads on their T-shirts. In "Andy Comes Back," a man awakens after a five-yearcoma, only to flee his home. In "The Smallness of Action," a distressed mother "breaks" her baby in increasingly more severe ways while her husband remains oblivious. In "The Eyes of the Soul," perpetual televised beauty replaces the derelict view from a suburban picture window. In these sixteen stories, Faber levels his gaze at humanity in all its despair, its madness, and its hope, moving from unspeakable sadness through moments of exquisitely distilled happiness.