Complete Child

In this fiction collection by Sharon Creal, contemporary urbanites explore baffling situations and find even more surprising truths: a mother realizes her son is intimately acquainted with a friend’s death; a woman leaves her perfectly adequate husband for a woman baker who keeps disappearing; a couple arrives at their country house expecting only to grieve by skating; a heavy drinker makes plans; and a photo archivist discovers an apparently perfect man in Florida who turns out to be her New York City neighbor. Set in New York and Los Angeles, these stories feature a variety of strangers – straight, lesbian, married, single, men, women – who might live close enough to jostle each other, deciding where next to step.