Trash - Dorothy Allison

http://www.powells.com/biblio/17-9780452283510-1 : This is a collection of short stories by the author of the absolutely phenomenal Bastard Out of Carolina and the good, but not magnificient Cavedweller. Allison's style fits in the genre of "grit lit" - stories set in the "white trash" South, with families filled with unwed mothers, severe physical, sexual, and emotional abuse, and general poverty. The majority of stories in "Trash" center around relationships among women - romantic, as well as familial. The writing is graphic and powerful, often times difficult to read - with images impossible to forget.