The second novella in the book, Ninety-nine Kisses, is about sisterhood and the specific erotic tension it creates during puberty: being one alone, or being whole together (pop-psycho: differentiation or fusion). Four sisters stuck in a seemingly unending puberty fall in love with the same boy. One of them lives through the other three, not willing to part ways, tempted to become what they need so none of them would escape the sorority - then they would have everything they need among them.

Once again, going outside the current doxa allows for a fresh yet not new view onto things. The many names and categories of disorders, dysfunctions, etc. hide the fact that these are very old, human problems, with very old, simple but difficult solutions. The hard part is to make these old things feel new so they can still reach us, and this book manages it well. (There I keep thinking about that IQ bell curve midwit meme)

The pop-psycho bingo card would be: dysfunctional family, adult children, narcissistic abuse, incest, alcoholism, transgenerational trauma, covert incest, ableism, gender dysphoria, sisterhood, patriarchy, people pleasing… (yes, this is some sort of trigger warning).