“Short with a message” ~Sheila

Lucas loves his small world. It consists of working from home, playing video games, drinking evening wine, and his favorite delivery, Pad Thai. In Luke’s opinion, the outside world and all the noise and people were overrated.

Then things change. One day, the Apartment Board knocked at his door, demanding to see his frying pan.
Yes, frying pan.

A frying pan had shown up next to the apartment’s garbage and was not properly recycled, as the apartment contract states. The Board felt that by seeing each tenant’s frying pan, they would be able to determine who did this, by seeing who did not have a frying pan.
Lucas offers two radical thoughts –

1. Wouldn’t someone who throws away a frying pan have a new one? Therefore, be a suspect as well?
2. And offered to pick up the frying pan himself, and be sure it is recycled properly

These two thoughts seal Lucas’s future, and his quiet life of gaming and pad Thai is quickly a thing of the past.

I had just finished Backman’s My Friends, and a friend had mentioned reading this short story. Coming off the warm, fuzzy feelings of that book and not quite ready to move on – another Backman, and a short one at that. For the most part, I do not read short stories – I like more character development, and short stories feel hurried or undeveloped – short reads make me feel like I don’t even get past the dating phase, let alone build any kind of commitment to the setting and those within.

In a word – it’s strange. Probably not something I would have stuck with if I was reading it – however, since I was listening to it on audio, AND at the same time I was mowing my lawn… it worked.
My yard takes me about 2 1/5 hours to mow. The audio is one hour and 49 minutes. It passed the time.

The book is quirky and funny, and I do not know what to compare it to. While I found it to be a bit too out there, Backman had a plan, and in the end, how it all comes together made it worth it.
I think.