Surface Children

This collection of brash shorts from blogger Blake covers everything from broken relationships to vanity and horror. And while some stories are unfocused and discursive, the collection proves ironically entertaining and appealingly tasteless. In "The Committee," a group of young adults form a pact to "look perfect from any angle," while in "The Worst Thing Jude Has Ever Done," a salacious man plays a prank on a woman%E2%80%94convincing her that she might have contracted HIV. Other stories examine violence, love, and the fringes of society, and feature a host of lewd, vulgar, and self-centered characters, while a series of eight shorts about a girl named Eva form the backbone of the collection. These gritty stories will appeal to readers with an appetite for blunt entertainment.