The Vintage Book of International Lesbian Fiction

There are those among us--you know who you are--who tend to avoid lesbian fiction because the genre isn't known for literary excellence. The occasional lesbian mystery or vampire story may slip through as vacation reading, but for something serious you turn to the poets (Audre Lorde, Adrienne Rich, Jewelle Gomez), or to straight women novelists, or to writers such as Dorothy Allison, whose work transcends the boundaries of lesbian fiction. This anthology is for readers like you. The consistently fine quality of the stories is matched by their unusual ingenuity and playfulness with language (the specter of James Joyce hovers over many stories, and not only those by Irish writers). In fact, American writers--who might be thought to have pioneered the genre--may seem sluggish and puritan by comparison. As the editors point out, "the word lesbian is not global in its use and significance," and while most of the authors included would define themselves as lesbian, for others the term is almost without meaning. Selections by Marguerite Yourcenar, Anchee Min (from Red Azalea), and the Egyptian writer Alifa Rifaat are among the most striking. --Regina Marler