Edmonton Lesbian+ Book Club

Some items for future consideration... Torchlight to Valhalla, a 1938 novel by American author Gale Wilhelm - considered a classic of lesbian fiction, and published only 10 years later than The Well of Loneliness, but (quite rare for lesbian fiction in this time) the ending is actually satisfactory for the lesbian characters. It was also reissued in 1953 by Lion Publishers, but titled The Strange Path . It was re-issued once more in 1985 by Naiad Press under its original title. The Group is a classic from American author Mary McCarthy. Sounds like this 1962 novel is the reason for all those rumours about Vassar! This one is exciting - lesbian fiction from a young Muslim woman from Indonesia. Herlina Tien Suhesti's novel Garis Tepi Seorang Lesbian (The Margin of a Lesbian) was a massive (and unexpected) bestseller in Indonesia. Does anyone know if it's available in English? Y o-Yo Boing! by Giannina Braschi looks fascinating, although apparently it is written in Englis...

Updated reading list! September we're reading Persistence: All Ways Butch and Femme . This anthology is edited by Ivan Coyote and Zena Sharman. They have a blog for the book and all its fans, check it out! Kind of a butch/femme appreciation zone. October is If You Follow Me by Malena Watrous . The book is about a character who moves to Japan to teach English. November we're reading Sing You Home from Jodi Picoult. This blockbuster author is a bit of a departure for us. We're looking forward to trying something new. Since it's being made into a movie, there is lots of hoopla and info on her site . Check it out! And December we're reading a classic, Beyond the Pale , by Elana Dykewomon. It's a Lambda Lit award winner.

Hi everybody, remember, we are meeting on the last Wednesday of the month, that means August 31st! Hope to see you there to talk about Dorothy Allison's Bastard Out of Carolina . A few discussion questions for you to consider between now and then... 1. Bone is nicknamed when, at birth, her "Uncle Earle announced that I was ‘no bigger than a knucklebone.’" In what way does this name come to define her character? Does it reflect on her life in any way other than her size? 2. When Bone is born, Anney is fifteen, dirt poor, and unmarried. With so many obstacles, why is she so focused on Bone’s birth certificate, which no one but her will see? How does she pass this preoccupation on to Bone? 3. Bone’s identity as a female shifts tremendously throughout the book. She worships her uncles and takes pride in being a tomboy. Yet, on page 91 she says, "I liked being one of the women with my aunts, liked being a part of something nasty and strong and separate ...

Big changes everybody! New meeting dates - permanent change! Adjustments to reading list! Most importantly, we now meet the LAST Wednesday of the month. Yes, we just had our August gathering a couple of days ago, but we'll meet again this month on the last Wednesday of the month, and continue with that from here on in. Be there or be square, okay? Secondly, the local bookstore hasn't got copies of Persistence yet so we bumped Dorothy Allison's Bastard Out of Carolina . I read it already and it is powerful stuff, so please don't skip this one! This week our discussion of On Dangerous Ground was great - it was a light read, written by an acquaintance of one of our members. The author asked our friend "should she write a sequel?" and well, the reply from book club is "I'd read it!" Thanks for the slightly pulpy butch cop fantasies provided by this little nugget of a novel, DL Line. Oh and one more title added to the reading list breaking from our ...

Last night, thanks gals, for the great discussion of Nancy Garden 's Annie on My Mind . We were really glad to meet a new member, and see old ... just kidding, some members we haven't seen in awhile! Annie was a great book, with great fodder for discussion: the era it was written in, the controversy it saw in its time, and just general good literature talk! Thanks, Nancy Garden, for a sweet love story that had a happy ending (we frequently notice that a lot of lesbian fiction has terribly UNhappy endings). Reading list excitement! Next month is from the wonderful Toronto writer, Farzana Doctor : Six Metres of Pavement . Farzana has kindly offered to chat with us via teleconference during our meeting - so please prep some questions for her!!! Farzana chatted with us when we read her first, Stealing Nasreen , and it was really wonderful. July's title will be The Book of Salt from Monique Truong , a Vietnamese American writer. The Book of Salt tells the story of Binh, a Vie...

LAST MINUTE CHANGES!! May's title is the classic Annie on my Mind by Nancy Garden. Audrey's bookstore says they might be able to get a few in by mid-month so check it out. It should be readily available in lots of places, it's a pretty mainstream title. This is a young adult title, considered a classic. According to wikipedia , Annie was a step forward for LGBT young adult literature because being gay is treated as something permanent and to be explored, not something that needs to be fixed. The School Library Journal included the book in its list of the 100 most influential books of the 20th century. June's title is Six Metres of Pavement by Farzana Doctor. Farzana has offered to join us via the phone for that meeting! July we'll go with Monique Truong's The Book of Salt . Thanks to everyone for the discussion of Seven Moves at our last get-together. It was great... Very thought-provoking discussion. Some more reading list ideas - Malinda Lo's Ash ...

Thanks Kay! for the discussion questions from the publisher... What are some of the ways in which Chris and we question—as a result of her misperception of her and Taylor’s relationship—her competence as a therapist and lover? What different views of female sexuality emerge from the relationships and actions of Chris, Renny, Taylor, Leigh, and Stéphane Michaud? Does Chris’s challenge ultimately become one of recreating her very identity, beyond merely reconstructing her life without Taylor? What is the relationship between identity and love, desire, and self-deception? To what extent do we create our own identities or have them imposed upon us by society? How central to Chris’s life is her need for control? Does she come to realize that loss of control is a defining element in her disintegration? How is the need for control related to a person’s self-esteem? In what ways do Chris’s neglect and manipulation by her parents, in her early years, contribute to the vulnerability that surface...

Last meeting everyone agreed we need to meet one week early this go around. It's all my fault because I'm going to be out of town the first Tuesday of the month. I suggested you guys go ahead without me but for some reason you guys want me to come! Aw, thanks! So. Meeting to chat about Seven Moves is next Tuesday March 29th (instead of April 5th)!!! Mark your calendars!

Hi all. Thanks for a wonderful discussion of the classic The Well of Loneliness . I enjoyed your thoughts immensely. Especially interesting was the discussion of Jenn's question in my last post - whether the book is still "the lesbian bible" and whether the challenges faced by the characters are still relevant today. Amazingly, almost 100 years later, most of it rings true to us; many of us could identify with the struggles of that era. What does this mean? No progress? But we live in Canada, where same sex marriage is legal! Where LGBT rights are more entrenched than most other parts of the world! I'd love to hear your thoughts as well! Some changes to the reading list had to be made. It seems that The Au Pair is not as readily available as we'd hope so we're moving it back by a couple of months to see if we can get hold of it. So this month, we're reading Carol Anshaw's Seven Moves . Grab a copy right away! We will have some discussion questions asa...

Here are some discussion questions for you all to ponder before next discussion, courtesy of Jenn! Thanks Jenn! 1. What's in a name? Is it possible that Stephen's name influenced her personality? Or perhaps the fact that her father treated her as the boy he'd always wanted? Which side (if either) of the nature/nurture debate does Radclyffe Hall seem to be taking? 2. The Well of Loneliness has been called the "lesbian bible." Do you think that this title is still applicable today, nearly 100 years since its original publication? Are the challenges the characters face throughout the novel still relevant for the queer community today? 3. The introduction to the story suggests that the book should be read for its historical value, rather than its literary value. Do you agree/disagree with this statement? 4. Religion seems to have played a large part in Stephen's understanding of her identity. She often identifies with biblical figures who had suffered. Do you thi...

We just finished discussion of The Creamsickle, a delightful novel from Rhiannon Argo. Everyone seemed to enjoy the characters a great deal though the plot seemed a little meandering. All in all we loved it and we intrigued by it and identified with it... love that. This month we're reading the lesbian classic with the most uplifting title, The Well of Loneliness . Originally published in 1928, it was subject of a storm of controversy. It became the target of a campaign to have it banned for obscenity. Although its only sexual reference consists of the words "and that night, they were not divided," a British court judged it obscene because it defended "unnatural practices between women." According to Wikipedia , in 1926, Radclyffe Hall was at the height of her career. Her novel Adam's Breed , had become a bestseller and award-winner. She had long thought of writing a novel about "sexual inversion" and believed, her literary reputation would allo...

February's title is The Creamsickle ! And according to our recent survey (have you taken our survey??), we love discussion questions. So here they are for you to ponder before next Tuesday. 1. This review ( here ) says: "Bois, boards, baby butches and bed hopping - Argo's angsty fiction debut, centred on the shenanigans of a crew of gender-fluid young women, should perhaps come with an age-appropriate label. Old folks - anyone over 40, more or less - ought to be adolescent at heart, or at least nostalgic for their own adventurous youth, to fully engage with its feisty plot..." Do you agree that The Creamsickle is mostly suited to one age group? Why? Why not? 2. How realistic was the characterization? Would you want to meet any of the characters? Did you like them? Hate them? 3 What about the plot? Did it pull you in; or did you feel you had to force yourself to read the book? 4. Some of the characters made choices that might be seen as having moral implications - su...

Okay, well, obviously Sappho wasn't the first lesbian. But she seems to be the first one in recorded history... And it's her home, the island of Lesbos, in Greece, that brought the word lesbian into usage. In January, we read and discussed Sappho's poems in a collection called "If Not, Winter" by Anne Carson. It was interesting to see how the historians and translators worked to bring such a body of poetry to life. The poems are found on old papyrus scraps. Shards. Like in the photo I'm attaching here. So in some cases the poems are nearly intact. In others, there is much left to the imagination. In some cases, it's hard to understand why the editor bothered to include one word on a page, although sometimes that one word did seem be evocative. Some members felt that using the broken fragments of poetry would be wonderful in an English class. Ask students to fill in the blanks. What a wonderful idea! February's title is The Creamsickle by Rhiannon Argo...