The Safety of Objects, A. M. Homes' first collection of short stories, is as hilarious, perverse and extraordinary as all of Homes' books. In one of the stories, a girl's blonde Barbie doll seduces her teenaged brother in an intense episode of erotic obsession; in others a couple go off the rails and smoke crack while their children are staying with their grandmother; and a lawyer seeks revenge on his boss by urinating into his potted plant every evening. The stories are both bizarre and believable, very funny but also frightening and sad.