Tipping the velvet

Tipping the velvet

by Sarah Waters

Genre: Lesbian fiction
Reviewed: September 11, 2003

I had this book recommended over and over from a friend. I thought "take it easy!" it cannot possibly be that good. But it is! The story is really a rather simple love story about a girl that leaves home to go to London to be with her cross dressing beloved. It is set in late 19th century England and the author really has that period well described - it's almost as if one can feel the streets of London.
The main character performs as a singer dressed as a man and the whole cross dressing thing is very present throughout the book.

Anyway. The fantastic thing about this book is the sexual tension! It is so laden with what one might even call porn, but in a very stylish, intelligent and intriguing way. Apart from the fact that story is good, it is very hard to let go of the book because of the nice sex love scenes, Hehe.

Fingersmith

Fingersmith

by Sarah Waters

Genre: Lesbian fiction
Reviewed: September 11, 2003

When I had read Tipping the velvet I was hungering for more of that rush I got from reading it. I read this book that does not have half the captivating sexual tension, but I think I like the story in this book better. Also set in late 19th century London this book is about thieves and scoundrels tricking each other to a degree where they cannot even figure out who tricked who. I really enjoyed trying to keep up with the pace the set for tricking each other.

The mammoth book of (seriously) comic fantasy

The mammoth book of (seriously) comic fantasy

by Mike Ashley (editor)

Genre: Comic fantasy
Reviewed: September 11, 2003

A collection of short stories some funnier than others, but almost all had what I like best about fantasy: A hint to something rotten in our own world. The genre is perfect for wondering about how man tamed fire or what would happen if someone hated Cadillacs so much he could make them disappear. One story, by Peter Anspach, is absolutely brilliant. It's the "Top 50 of things I'd do if I ever became an evil overlord". It is just hilarious. For example:

No. 19 My pet monster will be kept in a secure cage from which it cannot escape and into which I could not accidentally stumble.
No. 28: If the beautiful princess that I capture says, "I'll never marry you! Never, do you hear me, NEVER!" I will say, "Oh, well" and kill her.

Read the book and laugh. It is not a real page turner, but because it's short stories, one can read the book over some time. It might just be to comic to read it all at once.

Data Management 3rd. Ed.

Data Management 3rd. Ed.

by Richard T. Watson

Genre: Non-fiction
Reviewed: June 8, 2003

I don't normally review non-fiction, but since this book got stolen from me today I will remember it by this obituary. It's not like I loved the book, it's about databases, probably one of the most unsexy areas in computing. If I ever end up in a job where I work with databases would someone please shoot me? What I managed to read in it was not much. Today is 5 days from the database-exam so I should probably have read more of it, but now it's gone. I hope the person who stole my bag gets bored to death from it.

Chimney Rock Blues

Chimney Rock Blues

by Janet McClellan

Genre: Lesbian fiction
Reviewed: June 4, 2003

Man is this a bad book! Lesbian fiction is sometimes even worse than the short stories one finds in family magazines. The detective Tru North(!) is the troubled woman working on a murder case while trying to figure out which woman she loves the most. End of story.

A Widow for One Year

A Widow for One Year

by John Irving

Genre: Fiction
Reviewed: March 18, 2003

I have a weak spot for the novels by John Irving. This one is so funny and at the same time very serious. A 16 year old boy is seduced by a woman 20 years older than him and he keeps wanting older women the rest of his life because he can never forget that summer of lovemaking 60 times. The daughter (Ruth) of the older woman grows up without her mother, but with her notorious womanizer of a father. Ruth becomes a writer and accidentally witnesses a murder that will mean a lot for the rest of her life.

The book is a lot about sex, but also about death, mourning, and letting life go on. A wise book that does not take itself too seriously.

Shampoo Planet®

Shampoo Planet®

by Douglas Coupland

Genre: Fiction
Reviewed: February 3, 2003

It's about a guy called Tyler who lives with his hippie-mom and his brother and sister in an uninteresting nuclear plant town called Lancaster. He has been to Europe and in Paris he met a girl who suddenly comes to visit him in Lancaster. She turns his world upside down a least for a while. Tyler is a modern ambitious consumer who talks and thinks in a very American way, at least too American for me to understand. I had a feeling the entire time while reading the book, that I was missing the point. Still, I liked the book. There are two passages in particular I like; one where after beating somebody to a pulp he says: "I was nice to him for so long and it never paid of". In the other passage Tyler starts writing bon mots like "you are never far from the sound of an engine" or "imagine yourself befriending a monster" on one dollar bills. That is brilliant, what a medium! Everybody uses money, an even better medium than billboards.

Other Women

Other Women

by Lisa Alther

Genre: Fiction
Reviewed: January 27, 2003

More than one of my friends would mention this book as the best lesbian book they have ever read. It is surely a very lesbian book but I like almost all the other books written by Lisa Alther better. When I say very lesbian I mean: two women, a house by a lake with three children, a cat, both sleep around, both are nurses, one goes into therapy, both always wear Levi's, one weaves, the other knits and so on.

Don't get me wrong. I like books that have this air of lesbianism, but the whole therapy part just went right over my head. I must be either a strong candidate for therapy or very much at ease with how I feel, because I kept thinking that the therapy sessions where boring.

Original Sins

Original Sins

by Lisa Alther

Genre: Fiction
Reviewed: January 27, 2003

The book follows five people from their childhood in Tennessee together into adulthood. The two girls, Sally and Emily, are very different although they are sisters. Sally is the nice girl that only aims for a good husband, a neat home and being popular. Emily on the other hand, likes sports, is intelligent and does well in school. She goes to New York to study and there she has a bad marriage and some girlfriends. Raymond and Jed are brothers and as little a like as Sally and Emily. Jed is the big sports jock that goes out with the nice girl (Sally) while Raymond also goes to New York only to discover that the Yankees are a bunch of capitalist arseholes. He eventually moves back to the south where he prepares for the imminent breakdown of the Yankee system by learning how to survive in a farm in the middle of nowhere. Last, but not least, Donny is the grandson of the black maid working for Sally and Emily's parents. He is thought to "be a good nigger" by his grandmother, because his mother had to leave town when he was young. She hit a white man in the head with a brick because he tried to rape her. Fair enough I think, but apparently not in '59. Being a good nigger means that even though your whole family is starving, the answer to "how are you?" is "I'm fine thank you". Luckily he slowly realizes that being a good nigger will not really get him anywhere.

Lisa Alther tells the story of these people in a way that makes them come very much alive. I simply ate this book, I could not let it go because the story is so sweet, bitter, political and yet moderate, and funny. By far my favourite book written by her.

The Fourth Hand

The Fourth Hand

by John Irving

Genre: Just fiction
Reviewed: January 6, 2003

John Irving just has a way of getting away with really absurd stuff casually. And I mean that in the good way!
This book is about a journalist called Wallingford that gets his hand eaten because he accidentally held the microphone too close to a cage full of hungry lions. He has a problem with women, not that he has trouble meeting them -they virtually throw themselves at him, but he never seems to be able to hold on to those that he likes. There is this one woman who, when she sees the hand being eaten on TV (there was a cameraman right next to Wallingford when the lions ate his hand), decides that when her husband dies, Wallingford can have his hand. At that time the husband is not dead, actually he is a live and well, but after an ahem.. accident, he does die and the hand is transplanted to Wallingford.
Now the fun starts: The widow has some rather strange ideas about her rights to that hand and the doctor that performs the transplantation is a very funny person who plays lacrosse with dog shits when he goes running along the river. Wallingford gets more and more confused -poor guy, he is really a decent guy, just not always very lucky.
The Fourth Hand is not very long compared to The Cider House Rules or other Irving books, and I must admit that I like the long ones better. It's a good book but I found myself missing the weird little anecdotes about everything. There is just not room for a story with Irvinian commenting in 380 pages.

Divided Allegiance

Divided Allegiance

by Elizabeth Moon

Genre: Fantasy
Reviewed: November 22, 2002

This is the second book in "The Deed of Paksenarrion" series. As Paks is getting older and wiser she decides to leave the mercenary army she was trained in to try her luck on her own. She hooks up with an elf and they go (almost) dungeon crawling together and Paks gets to use all her swords skills. She is accepted as a paladin candidate with the fellowship of Gird where she learns a lot of new things.
I like this book even better than book one and I can't wait to read number three. The story is exciting and still told in a very calm and pleasant way. Although it is a fantasy world, nothing too amazing happens and that keeps the credibility of the story high.

Sheepfarmer's Daughter - The Deed of Paksenarrion

Sheepfarmer's Daughter - The Deed of Paksenarrion

by Elizabeth Moon

Genre: Fantasy
Reviewed: November 5, 2002

It took me 8 years to read Tolkien's "The Hobbit". No really, I thought it was annoying and they kept singing songs in olden-hobbitian or something. I did have some idea that I might like the three books in the Lord of The Rings series, so I struggled hard to eat my way through The Hobbit. And I did like the Lord of The Rings although they kept singing too, I think only operas and musicals should have this option, not books!.
Anyway, The Sheepfarmer's Daughter is the first in the "The Deed of Paksenarrion" series. It's set in a very Tolkien-like world but there is no singing. Elizabeth Moon is very good at building the characters in her book and as Paksenarrion, a young woman that leaves home to become a soldier in a mercenary army, learns more about the world so does the reader. It's nice not to have every detail about this fantasy world explained, it's simply viewed by the eyes of Paksenarrion.
This book is a lot better than the usual Dungeons & Dragons books, they tend to be violently dull and unimaginative. If you were fascinated by the story in Tolkien's books, but found yourself annoyed by the singing and long descriptions of everything, you will like this book.
Thank you Tommy for recommending this book!

1984

1984

by George Orwell

Genre: Sci-fi, Classic
Reviewed: October 19 2002

This book fathered the expression "Big Brother" (the one who is watching you). It's about a society where the need for controlling the citizens has gone mad. Everywhere and always people are being watched to register any political enemies. Written in 1949 he certainly foresaw the society we live in today. I'm thinking of Echelon, satellite monitering, and so on. I very much recommend this book.

Heart of Darkness and other Tales

Heart of Darkness and other Tales

by Joseph Conrad

Genre: Classic
Reviewed: October 18 2002

Being a student of American Indian culture I am concerned with European and cultural imperialism. Joseph Conrad has got the cultural problems in colonies very right. The heart of Darkness is about a journey up the Congo River, but it could just as easily have been about a journey up the Amazonas River. Conrad's view of human nature is amusing as well as sad.

The Unadulterated Cat

The Unadulterated Cat

by Terry Pratchett and Gary Jolliffe

Genre: Humour
Reviewed: October 18 2002

To Terry Pratchett a real cat is a cat that doesn't eat from a bowl, but it can hear the fridge door being opened 200 meters away. It certainly never appears on Christmas and birthday cards and its name would typically be something like "Yaargeroffoutofityarbarstard".
This book covers everything from how to get a real cat, how to understand your real cats needs like food, sex, and entertainment. Mr. Pratchett must be a real cat lover, because he certainly captured the essence of how cats behave. The writing style of this book is funny and not as annoying as the Discworld-series. Gary Jolliffe's cartoon drawings are also very funny.

The Femme's Guide to the Universe

The Femme's Guide to the Universe

by Shar Rednour

Genre: Humour, Handbook
Reviewed: October 18 2002

Shar is a real queen and she humorously guides her readers trough such useful subjects as how to make your girlfriend think you really did the ready mix pancakes from scratch, how to make your apartment look like a castle, and how to fuck in high heels. This book contains very important knowledge for all femmes -and the rest of us who aren't really in to the whole butch femme thing. Its good fun reading it.

Expecting Someone Taller

Expecting Someone Taller

by Tom Holt

Genre: Fantasy Crazy
Reviewed: October 16 2002

I laughed for an entire day when I read this book. It's a lot like the books Terry Pratchet writes, only this is good. The book is a sort of sequel to the composer Wagner's work "Ring des Niebelungen" and then again it's almost too crazy. The main character Malcolm runs over a badger in his car. The battered badger turns out to be Ingolf, the last of the Giants and he talks. Just before the badger dies, he gives Malcolm the power to rule the entire world. He finds himself in a cast of Niebelunger characters giving exactly as much trouble as the ruler of the earth is expected to have. Very British humour and a great laugh!

The Passion

The Passion

by Jeanette Winterson

Genre: Lesbian novel
Reviewed: October 16 2002

Jeanette Winterson has been one of my favourites since I saw "Oranges are not the only fruit" on TV when I was little. I've read a lot of her books but this one is the one I like best. Set in Venice in the time of Napoleon the mysterious heroine who has webbed feet passionately falls in love with a rich Venetian woman. Henri, Napoleons personal cook marches to the Russian front and almost dies of cold and passion. This book is the incarnation of passion, the title says exactly what this book is.

Rendezvous with Rama

Rendezvous with Rama

by Arthur C. Clarke

Genre: Sci-fi
Reviewed: October 15 2002

I always thought that Arthur C. Clarke was just the boring guy on the Discovery channel who talked about inexplicable things. I was very wrong. This book is so interesting and brilliant that I read it in one day. The year is 2130 and humans discover what they think is a giant meteor approaching earth. They name the meteor Rama, but the soon discover that it is too big and too regular in shape to be meteor. A spaceship lands on it to explore the alien space vessel. The cylinder is hollow and inside, this is the brilliant part, is a landscape with gravity because the vessel is spinning. There is a "Cylindrical Sea" and weird buildings resembling skyscrapers but no living things in sight except for some "biots" -robots maintaining the landscape. The concept of "a world inside out" is fascinating as is Clarke's down-to-earth (ha ha) way of writing. Although the man clearly is genius there is nothing too difficult to understand or technical ramblings in his book. Even if you don't like science fiction I would recommend this book anytime! This book is the first in a series of four. It can be read without reading the rest, but chances are you will be craving for the next three.