This Keeps Happening

More about the book

Fiction. Short Stories. A bush party leads to self-immolation. A cab ride ends in warfare. A squirrel is eviscerated. A universally impossible dare is accepted and proves not to be fatal. The weird kid triumphs. The stories in H. B. Hogan's debut collection sizzle like butter on hot cast iron--they're rich and dark and full of scrappy, sordid, and sparkling humanity. "In her darkly entertaining debut collection, H.B. Hogan brings us tales of people who find themselves on the wrong side of the social divide."--Toronto Star "H. B. Hogan's stories are dirty, fresh, and brutally funny, lingering on little human details until they're just uncomfortable enough--then pushing a little farther. Their wickedness will stay with you for days."--Michelle Winters "What I love most about these stories is the many ways that redemption is made completely absurd, as if to point out how rare and how tenuous moments of self-fulfillment really are. I want to avoid spoilers but I'll just say that it's not often that a story makes me gasp in shock and burst out laughing in a single paragraph."--Claire Farley