Books like Wet Moon, Volume 2: Unseen Feet

this is a lovely little series, and it would be too easy to miss it. it's so understated it could come off as aimless, but it's not. it captures the awkwardness and angst of that period between childhood and adulthood, when you have to find the courage to explore everyone and everything you meet, change your look daily, agonize over all kinds of things, until you find out who you are and what you want. cleo's alternately naive and knowing journey through her everyday turns up all kind of fears and consequences, and she's agonizingly uncomfortable with herself. she hasn't noticed yet that she has friends and goals and destinations, much less that people care about her, but it's clear that's what she's got and she will trust that someday. all the many characters seem sketchy at first but are well differentiated and finely drawn, even the ones with no speaking parts, and because we look through cleo's eyes we care about them, even the prickly ones. and we know why cleo can be prickly too. the naive and casual style of this series does a wonderful job of evoking a whole world, in the period of leaving home to enter into college life.