Patricia Highsmith's bleak vision

Tales of Natural and Unnatural Catastrophes is devastating.  I'm encouraged by these stories because they're blunt.  Without getting too exaggerated about it, my writing is like them and a lot of people have said great things about her book: that it's existential and that it's not about crime where people get killed, but about being caught outside in your underwear.  Her imagination is boundless.  It makes me uncomfortable to read stories that I would dismiss as written by a curmudgeon in print.  I'm better than I think.  What are you reading?