“You people who have survived childhood don’t remember any longer what it was like. You think children are whole, uncomplicated creatures, and if you split them in two with a handy axe there would be all one substance inside, hard candy. But it isn’t hard candy so much as a hopeless seething lava of all kinds of things, a turmoil, a mess. And once the child starts thinking about this mess he begins to disintegrate as a child and turns into something else–an adult, an animal.”
― Joyce Carol Oates
Joyce Carol Oates is one of my favorite authors. I’ve read a lot of what she’s written and understand most of it.
Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been?
What I like the best about her is that she is not afraid to go for the jugular. I have a need to explore the thin membrane – the border – between what we all consider our day-to-day lives and the world of evil chaos that is right there on the other side. She understands that and will cross that membrane and will bring you along with her.
In today’s bit if flash fiction she does that, in only 500 words.
Bill Chance 