Sorry Please Thank You: "Sorry" stories

[Bretnie]

This will be for discussing the three stories under "Sorry:"
-Standard Loneliness Package
-First Person Shooter
-Troubleshooting

For anyone ready to discuss, did you have a favorite of the three. What stood out for you?

[Karsten]

I liked the Standard Loneliness Package best.  

In reality, we have seen the outsourcing of physical labor (factory work), and the outsourcing of mental labor (call centers).  In this short story we get a glimpse of next step;  the outsourcing of emotional labor.      I think the whole story has to do with what people are willing to sacrifice in order to survive.    In the extreme case , we even see the father of the narrator and the girl selling their life in order to provide for family.   Whether or not this kind of future comes to pass, this story is a stinging commentary on social inequality throughout the world.  

[Bretnie]

Thanks for getting the discussion going, Karsten!

Standard Loneliness Package was quite a way to start the collection. Bit of a gut punch. A quote that I highlighted:

I don't want to sell my life. I'm not ready to do that yet. So I sell it bit by bit. Scrape by. Sell it by the hour."

Such a powerful statement about our own lives.

[Bretnie]

Even though Standard Loneliness Package was the more powerful story in this set, I liked the balance of having the funny "First Person Shooter" story to follow. Thinking about zombies dating was a nice light change of pace.

[Nadine in California]

I know I'm going to be a gusher about this book since I'm loving it at least as much as the first time.

The three stories are so different, but I hear the same underlying voice - it's kind of wistful and self-deprecating with maybe a little bit of irony too. I wonder if that's why they're in the "Sorry" section? Are the stories in this section existential apologies? Or are we humans a 'sorry' bunch, as in pitiful?

I like the way the first story pulls on our emotions, and then the following story takes a totally different tack and blasts us with absurdist humor from the very first line: (Janine is on line four. "There's a finger in Housewares."). It brought back memories of working in a grocery store in high school - the grown-ups worked during the day, but at night it was just us idiots ;)

I think the third story was my favorite though, once I read it through a second time. The first time I read it the many short sections made it hard for me to follow and it was too easy to race though, enjoying the voice and 2nd person narration without really understanding what it's about. I think it's about many things (and many I'm missing), but basically it seems like it explores human nature through the device of a machine that inputs your 'wishes, desires, thoughts, ideas' and turns them into output in the real world. The story methodically queries your inputs and makes you uncomfortable about them. And the queries can be so witty - here's one of my favorites: Is what you want to obtain a noun? Or is your objective to verb an object? If you want to verb this object, how would you like to verb this object? It's like a madlib ;) At section 22, it starts to become apparent that the 'you' is a specific person, who turns out to be a 37 year old straight man. I'm guessing that number isn't arbitrary - I have a feeling Charles Yu may have been 37 when it wrote it - kind of an inside joke for himself? The last section, #40, is like the moral of the story.

[Bretnie]

Nadine wrote: "Is what you want to obtain a noun? Or is your objective to verb an object? If you want to verb this object, how would you like to verb this object?"

Nadine, I jotted down the same quote! I had the same question about why they are "Sorry."

I had just revisited the last story in the book that has this to say about "sorry":
"Sorry means: That happened to you. That happened to you and it may or may not have been inevitable, but it happened and there are some things that happen that we can only look at and say, sorry. Circular. Sorry for your loss means I am sorry that there is loss, or to put it another way, there is loss. The sorry cancels itself out, and it might only mean this: this happened to you, and I can see that it hurt."

[Mark]

Bretnie, this exemplifies why print is so much better than audiobooks. I consumed Yu's collection as an audiobook, and the mini-essay on "sorry" sailed right through my hearing.

His discussion crystallizes a gut reaction I have had when someone uses "sorry" as a response to some fact that may have come up in conversation. By holding the thought static for contemplation, it lets it "soak in,"

[Bretnie]

Mark wrote: "Bretnie, this exemplifies why print is so much better than audiobooks. I consumed Yu's collection as an audiobook, and the mini-essay on "sorry" sailed right through my hearing.

His discussion cry..."

Yes, Mark, only this year I realized I just can't do short stories on audiobook. Or maybe because of this year. I lose focus and then forget the stories even one story later.

I like that comment - "holding the thought static for contemplation."

[Nadine in California]

Mark wrote: "...the mini-essay on "sorry" sailed right through my hearing...."

I'm reading the print, but I don't see a mini-essay on "sorry"? Where is it?

[Mark]

I was referring to the quote Bretnie cited.

[Nadine in California]

Mark wrote: "I was referring to the quote Bretnie cited."

Ah, thank you. I was getting a little too literal ;)