Here's what I borrowed from the library yesterday:

Patrick Swayze: One Last Dance.
Leigh, Wendy (2009)

Lives Like Loaded Guns: Emily Dickenson and Her Family's Feuds.
Gordon, Lyndall (2010)

Her Blue Body Everything We Know (Earthling Poems 1965-1990).
Walker, Alice (2003).

"There Are Things I Want You To Know" About Stieg Larsson and Me.
Gabrielsson, Eva (2011).

How Stella Got Her Groove Back.
McMillan, Terry (1996).

And I checked out a 4-disc dvd collection, a British drama series from Masterpiece Theatre (PBS): Upstairs, Downstairs (Anniversary Edition).


eta: I'm half way through the book about Patrick Swayze which is not only about him, but also about Lisa (his wife), his mother (Patsy) and his father (Big Buddy) and their family of friends, but also incredibly insightful about the man himself, his accomplishments as a dancer and actor and how he owned his life - no matter the circumstance, no matter the outcome. I am enjoying this book immensely.

i just started the Lesbian Adventure Club series by Rosalyn Wraight
They are fun and a quick read

Read a great little piece of lesbian fiction titled "Lexington Connection" (by M.E. Logan, http://www.bellabooks.com/9781594933233-prod.html) about a week ago. Really enjoyed the characters and was happily surprised at the depth of the story considering the size of the book and the fact that the sexy times begin on Page 5. I recommend it.

Lesbian Romance Novels
 

I recently read a ton of these because I wanted to understand the formula so I could write one. Most of the ones I read are not badly written, very focused on the romance (not very literary), and pretty vanilla. Most are not butch-femme but a few hint at it. All in all, they are worth a read if you need some escape. I put a list together for a friend. Here it is:

The ones with a * are the ones I like the best!

1. Heart Block* - Melissa Brayden: Rich, white, blonde CEO who never gets into relationships (but sleeps around a lot), Emory. Her mother dies and she hires Sara (Latina, single mom, not identified as a lesbian) to clean out the mansion of a house and give everything away. Good characters and writing.

2. Wild Things* - Karen Kallmaker: Rich, white attorney/politician in AA after alcohol addiction avoids relationships in order to keep a squeaky clean image so she can run for State Senate, Sydney. Her brother is dating Faith, a U Chicago history professor who is very Catholic and still living with her very Catholic parents at age 34. Faith has a lesbian past she is trying to forget.

3. Waiting in the Wings - Melissa Brayden: Jenna is a blonde dancer/singer/actor who majored in musical theater and gets her first big break in the touring company of a hit show which stars Adrienne, a former teenage actress. Romance ensues until Jenna gets a big offer to work in LA and they break up. Four years later, they are cast in a movie together.

4. Come and Get Me - Julie Cannon: Lauren is an in-house attorney for a Fortune 500 company, not sure of her sexuality. Elliott is a rich head of her family's venture capital fund. Elliott sleeps around. They meet and at the point when things get steamy, Lauren tells Elliott this would be her first time with a woman. Elliott freaks, thinking she's being played. The rest of the book is their coming back together.

5. The Princess Affair* - Nell Stark: Princess Alexandra (Sasha) is second in line to the British throne and has a reputation as a party girl. She's a closeted lesbian who sleeps around a lot. Kerry is an Irish Catholic Rhodes Scholar who comes to Oxford to study architecture and meets Sasha. Can they reconcile their different worlds?

6. Too Close to Touch* - Georgia Beers: Gretchen is a sales executive starting a new job. Kylie is the girl next door and is Gretchen's assistant. But you can't fall in love with your boss or your assistant. Can you?

7. Love Waits - Gerri Hills: Classic reunion story. Gina, a former high school jock, and Ashleigh, a blonde cheerleader, fall in love in high school and break up their first year of college after a terrible miscommunication. Neither has found real love over the next 20 years. They attend their 20th high school reunion dreading seeing one another.

8. Starting From Scratch - Georgia Beers: Avery pines after the local bank branch manager, Elena, who she believes is out of her league. After being asked by her friend to coach a T ball team while her friend recuperates from surgery, Avery meets a little boy named Max. One day Max shows up at Avery's backyard and begins playing with her dog. Her mom comes by looking for him and she is none other than Elena.

9. Learning Curve* - Rachel Spangler: Ash, a butch about town who never sleeps with the same woman twice, is convinced by her best friend to sit in on a support group for LGBT youth where she meets Carrie, a women's studies professor who volunteers with the youth. The book is about their growing attraction, romance and how they reconcile their two different worlds. It also features the story of a young lesbian struggling to get away from her homophobic mother.

Barnheart: The Incurable Longing for a Farm of One's Own
Woginrich, Jenna

On it's way....can't wait to start reading.

"The Price of Salt" by Patricia Highsmith (lesbian romance)


Patricia Highsmith was an American novelist and short-story writer most widely known for her psychological thrillers, which led to more than two dozen film adaptations. Her first novel, Strangers on a Train, has been adapted for stage and screen numerous times, notably by Alfred Hitchcock in 1951. In addition to her acclaimed series about murderer Tom Ripley, she wrote many short stories, often macabre, satirical or tinged with black humor. Although she wrote specifically in the genre of crime fiction, her books have been lauded by various writers and critics as being artistic and thoughtful enough to rival mainstream literature. Michael Dirda observed, "Europeans honored her as a psychological novelist, part of an existentialist tradition represented by her own favorite writers, in particular Dostoevsky, Conrad, Kafka, Gide, and Camus


So far my favorite quote from this book;

"You’re about as weak as this match.” Carol held it burning for a moment after she lighted her cigarette. “But given the right conditions, you could burn a house down, couldn’t you?”

Katniss~~

Thanks sweetie. i just bought it and it looks great thanks for sharing.

I'm reading Queer South Rising: Voices of a Contested Place, edited by Reta Ugena Whitlock.

From the back cover:

Queer South Rising is a collection of essays about the South by people who identify as both Southern and queer. Essays explore the complexities of the Southern place while questioning notions of a universal, homogenous LGBT, queer, identity. Essays explore topics ranging from religion, politics, sexuality, race and education, inviting readers interested in the South and queer themes to engage with the narratives it holds. Whitlock has sought, in collecting these essays, to shatter perceptions about a nostalgic, romanticized Southern culture in general.

"This is simply wonderful! Reading these pieces is invigorating- like getting a call from my mama- as if she had never died and had just been hiding out in the moutains somewhere. Suddenly I feel like I am not alone, that I have family close by. These essays are resonant powerful tales and wonderfully complicated examinations of what most of the world does not even acknowledge, my people and our messy lives." - Dorothy Allison

I have an essay in the book, so yeah, I'd recommend it. :)

What am I reading
 

Break Down by Sara Paretsky - a V.I. Warshawski book.

Just started but I liked this:"He only wants to marry a strong woman so he can wrestle her to the ground and grind the life put of her."

I've been hearing a lot about "Gone Girl" by Gillian Flynn and started listening to it today while I'm puttering around the house.

I am pleasantly surprised and have stayed with it all day! It's really engaging and I will probably stay up late tonight to finish it in print!

The World's Strongest Librarian- memoir of a weight-lifting librarian with Tourette's Syndrome

Every Day-great premise about a teenage being who wakes up in a different body every day, poorly excecuted, IMO.

Read this off and on over the last several months. It's been tough to get through, but an amazing journey.


The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey

by Candice Millard

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_Rites_(novel) by Jim Butcher. Harry Dresden number 6. Nice brain candy.

A Short History of India and Pakistan by T. Walter Wallbank. This is the 1958 edition, which has been revised slightly from the original. I've just started it, but at this point, it seems a bit Pro British with a bit of Colonial Apologism on the side, but not as much as I was expecting. It's remarkably objective for the time when the book was written. It's also interesting to see what the British attitude was towards the Middle East (Jordan/Israel/Palestine/Syria area) and the Far East (India/Pakistan) at the roughly the same time. It's also a bit uncomfortable to see how little has changed in Western attitudes towards the area.

and....

The Handbook of Needlework by Miss Lambert. Found on Google Books, as it's from 1901 ish and in public domain. Very good, super interesting!

Intercultural Empathy:Myth, competency, or possibility for alliance building?
Sara Deturk Oct 23 2001 Peace Corps Online

HOME by Toni Morrison.

I'm only about one quarter of the way through it. Morrison's ability to build character is blistering. However, at a quarter way through, I am still unsure of the real meat of the story line. How can I be worried about it as, after all, it's Toni Morrison. I could probably read her grocery and to-do list and be glued.

Ok, so I finished this at 3am. In other words, I gulped this book down like free ice cream!

A couple of spoiler-y things so read no further if you plan to read this:

First, I've never read anything by this author and was prepared to be disappointed because I don't like a lot of popular fiction. This, however, was so different than what I expected that I will be reading all of her other stuff.

And second: The PACE is fantastic. The writing style is both jarring and stark...and really beautiful. The characters are fucked up beyond all belief and the sheer mental illness in that one is beyond most of what I've read about supposed "-paths".

I told a girlfriend of mine that I felt like I had been punched in the butthole after reading this. It's such a fucked up, wonderful read.