[In "Trying Hard to Hear You"], Scoppettone has taken an inherently condescending form and pumped it full of "nature" content; the result is a little like reading "Double Date" in post-hippie costume and language (words like "masturbate" and "vomit" are bravely in place), with the obligatory moral punchline adjusted to 70's liberal pieties: not "save your virginity for marriage," but "as long as you don't hurt anyone else, you have a right to be whatever you want to be."…
The story tells what Camilla and her crowd go through when they discover that Camilla's best friend Jeff and her crush, Phil, love each other and are lovers. They react, predictably, with bewilderment, fear, disgust and, in some cases, violence; the confrontation between the gentle sincerity of the lovers and the tittering shock of the "straights" is, while a bit of a set piece, the most emotionally genuine and moving thing in the book….
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