An accomplished but ineffectual columnist searches for fulfillment, until a death in the family causes him to question the family he took for granted.

A woman dealing with conflicting emotions resorts to deliberately putting herself in danger to learn to value the life she's been given - but these unorthodox methods leave her more desperate than ever.

A disillusioned candy store owner feels burnt out with his current life and begins to project his past mistakes on the actions of a young thieving customer.

A man tells his life story leading up to his suicide, attempting to explain the seemingly-inescapable mental paradoxes he found himself facing in his quest to be an authentic person, which reinforced, time after time, his belief that he was a fraud.

A man recalls his intimate friendship with his former English professor, who resolved to fuel his unsatisfied desire for playwriting during the time they were apart. In their reunion decades later, instead of the brilliant play he promised, the professor shows his former student a disturbing product of his mental instability.

A minorly successful writer allows his insecurities to drive him to dramatic actions.

A man contemplates suicide after losing his high-paying job that supported his lavish lifestyle and he finds an unlikely therapist in a slow-witted townsperson.

A research psychologist visits a peculiar asylum patient who recounts his life story. The patient warns the researcher about how obsession with the pursuit of knowledge can make one lose sight of their humanity until it is unsalvageable.

A famous novelist emotionally manipulates a young artist in order to write about him and inadvertently causes the artist to commit suicide.

A middle-aged man ruminating on his past failures witnesses a canoe accident and considers sacrificing himself to save two drowning girls.