091113 #human #writing The guileless hyperbole. The oblivious failure to empathize. The assumption that other people are fine. The overplaying of the solo in the first break. The scattered ore of lucidity. Joyce Carol Oates nails adolescence in *Big Mouth & Ugly Girl*. The epiphanies are authentic because they are incomplete and flawed, subject to revision though spoken in hard words. The meta is as invisible as excellent typography. You awaken with the characters, not ahead of them.