Humor with a touch of the bittersweet is the hallmark of Welcome Thieves, the adult fiction debut of acclaimed young adult author Sean Beaudoin. Edgy and profane, angry, bemused, and sardonic, these stories offer the listener a gallery of unforgettable characters—misfits, losers, fighters, dreamers—all of them variations on a central theme: laughing at the absurdity of life. There is a distinct surreal quality to some (including Exposure and And Now Let's Have Some Fun), a strong sense of irony (as in You Too Can Graduate in Three Years with an Advanced Degree in Contextual Semiotics), and moments of awkward and therefore very real grapplings with sex and romance (most especially in The Rescues and the title story, Welcome Thieves). Sean Beaudoin is the author of five young adult novels which have been praised for their playfulness, their complexity ('Beaudoin plays a Chandler hand with a Tarrantino smirk' . . . Booklist), their originality (' . . . wickedly unpredictable adventure' . . . Publishers Weekly), and for the beauty of their language ('Beaudoin plays language like Hendrix plays a guitar' . . . BCCB). A former rock musician, he is a founding editor of the arts and culture website The Weeklings and lives in Seattle with his wife and daughter.