RaveLos Angeles Review of BooksSharp-tongued and darkly hilarious, it is also one of the more relentlessly honest, big-hearted reckonings with abuse to come out of the #MeToo era ... When you strip away Schickel’s cheeky, effervescent prose and charismatic self-deprecation, there is little to laugh at: compulsive shoplifting; self-absorbed, sort-of-famous parents in the midst of a \'spectacularly ugly zeitgeist divorce\'; and a series of bleak, often exploitative sexual relationships with older boys and men ... It’s a sad story, and sadly common. But what makes The Big Hurt so singularly rich and harrowing...is that it percolated while Schickel was ensconced in a tumultuous, marriage-ending affair.
