“Cleverness abounds in the 40 subversions of terms of service, disclaimers, how-to manuals, self-help books, catalogue copy, legal documents, and other quotidian genres…”
— Publisher’s Weekly
“These stories suggest a few future directions for storytelling, and Shields and Vollmer convincingly press the necessity of the task—these pieces represent ‘our oft-repressed language staging a rebellion.’”
— Kirkus Reviews
“These imaginative short stories demonstrate how much plot, character, and feeling can be revealed in documents and ephemera we consider dull and routine.”
— Booklist
“The false artifact seems to be experiencing a renaissance, and David Shields and Matthew Vollmer have done us a favor with the new anthology Fakes, a solid collection that illuminates the possibilities of this form of mimicry.”
— The Rumpus
“For those bored with the more stodgy ‘best of’ collections of literary fiction, this book is an entertaining escape into that absurd realm of writing where ‘fake’ can be a good thing.”
— The Washington Post
“The pieces range from clever to truly ingenious.”
— Bookforum
“It’s a work whose risks have paid off spectacularly, and a reminder of the rich possibilities that faking it offers.”
— Spectator (UK)
“A hell of a party.”
— Buffalo News