Reviews and Comments

A private investigator and former academic gets an unusual mystery from an anonymous client: Find the secret horn of Alice B. Toklas, hidden from the world under her thick fringe and low brimmed hats.

Needing the money to support her kid and still looking for direction amidst the grief left by the death of her partner, she scours archives and interviews contacts from Paris to San Francisco hoping for a lead.

This book is perfect if you've ever been tempted to spice up your English Lit dissertation with high stakes tension, noir-esque monologues on the nature of grief and copious amounts of gay sex*. Indeed it seems every supporting character with a name is rapidly identified as queer and fucked (yet in a very unsatisfying, grief ridden private detective way); and I am here for that energy.

It strikes a wonderful balance of sincerity and absurdity that kept me laughing yet deeply invested. It's also a great way to pick up some queer and literary history!

*=Disclaimer: I don't care how subby you are, if your ACAB doesn't include fit lesbian policewomen who want to dominate you, it's not ACAB. Get some standards, girl.

This is a fascinating book exploring the interrelationships between women and the cities we inhabit. From gentrification, harassment, transit, pop culture, accessibility and design assumptions that focus on the white cis male, Kern shows how women survive and are failed by the policies that build the modern city.

While many points may feel obvious to anyone who has experienced them, the book does an excellent job tying together the experience and forces at play while reflecting on the intersectionality at play in these issues. However there would likely be more depth on that last point if it drew in more from other non-white authors instead of dwelling on Kern considering her privilege.

It is also a little frustrating in not offering much in the way of alternative models. It does give excellent action points throughout but it is better at raising questions than answering them. This of course may be unfair of me as such systemic problems do not come packaged with easy solutions, the lack of which does not make it any less pertinent to raise the issue so comprehensively.

It leaves a lot to consider and work on as we challenge our own assumptions and rebuild our cities to support those they fail.

Rosa delivers a strong critique of how the heterosexual, monogamous nuclear family unit was built to serve the needs of capitalist economics and woefully fails the individual and society at large in the midst of rising poverty and systemic discrimination.

Instead we're invited to look alternative perspectives on intimacy and community as well as challenging the primacy of monogamous romantic bonds drawing on queer, feminist and anti-colonial perspectives, especially those from the aro/ace & QPR community. Rosa covers aspects the hollowness of the wellness industry, state-sanctioned (and erased) relationships in housing, taxes and death, and the demotion of friendship bonds relative to marriage.

"For queers, trans people and other marginalised groups such as sex workers and rough sleepers, mutual, collective mothering in a broader support network has always been the norm. Amongst these communities, kinship networks are chosen and porous – or, as the writer Armistead Maupin has put it, ‘logical’ family. While this type of kinship may include communal living, it may also be diffuse, between people who share spaces and moments dedicated to care, connection and community. This could take infinite shapes: shared creative pursuits, childcare cooperatives, support groups, sex parties, festivals, co-authoring, political organising. As the comedian and historian Jules Joanne Gleeson argues: ‘for queers, the prospect of putting an end to the domination of private households can come to seem less extreme and more hopeful’ because it would mean ‘an end to the farce of most queers being raised by heterosexuals’."

The book sparked a lot of thoughts for me as it progressed through a broad array of alternative perspectives on bonds to others. This especially hit close to home with my own experiences with QPR, polyamory and intensity in how I naturally relate to everyone in my circle. It's well worth a read if you feel nuclear bonds as isolating and the capitalist dominion over social spheres disempowering.

Amélie was excited to move to Japan to take an entry level position at a large corporation. However despite starting at the bottom, Amélie's repeated well intentioned and often hilarious blunders send her spiralling ever further down the ladder. Between cultural missteps in the Japanese corporate culture and small but impactful blunders in the even more mundane work assigned to her, she earns the rigorous fury of her manager, one of only three women in the entire company, who sees Amélie's honest mistakes as a deliberate attempt to undermine her.

On the face of it, this book might be about Amélie or a broader contrast to Japanese culture. But at it's centre is the manager, Fubuki, and how her life as an isolated career woman in Japan has shaped her and her world view. The tragedy is how much Amélie worships Fubuki. Despite how much Fubuki starts to hate Amélie, torturing her with tasks and verbally humiliating her, Amélie is enchanted with Fubuki. Amélie even relishes the fury at times, and is envious of the men Fubuki tries to earn the attentions of.

Basically, she has a definite "step on me, mommy" vibe which I hope Amélie eventually talked to someone about for her own safety! I'm not sure how much was read into it by others, but I definitely read their relationship through a queer lens. Amélie would hardly be the first sapphic girl to process her feelings by crushing on her older, elegant and authoritative boss without truly acknowledging where those feelings and adoration may be coming from.

I do have reservations, which I think partly relate to that period of late-90s early-00s it was written. Amélie's definitely puts Japanese culture through an exotic lens and leans on cliches. Granted, it is a short book focused exclusively inside the walls of a single office, so it doesn't set out to be broadly representative. However that's not enough to give it a pass; especially when Amélie's adoring descriptions of Fubuki veer too close to the line and one particular long section which was a very blunt and dated view of Japan.

It also engages in the trademark 90s/00s fatphobia and seems disjointed on the topic of sexism. While the ableism largely portrayed as part of the abusive dynamic, the of slurs there may be needlessly triggering to some. I'd hope if written today it would carry all that with more nuance, but taking that into account I did still enjoy the core of the story.

This version is based on the manuscript, rediscovered in 2017, from before the magazine editors started chopping out all the scandalous bits. The censored short version that was used against Wilde at his trial was then censored more when it was expanded into a full novel.

So now we get to see Wilde's original baby! Despite the censored version still causing a scandal and being used to convict Wilde, this is of course still tame by modern day standards (alas, where is my purity!) but far more explicit when it comes to things like Basil's romantic affection for Dorian. It's certainly fascinating to see what was triggering the poor little editor (being far more concerned about illicit hetero affairs than the gay stuff!) and also the stylistic changes. But either way, like much of Wilde's writing, it can't go a page or two without a little monologue of his witticisms - something I always look forward to!

This is some fascinating research on the experiences of trans men (stealth and open) in the workplace, covering aspects of discrimination, transphobia and masculine societal norms. While a lot of it is well known to anyone experiencing it, the broad academic work here is very useful and can certainly open your eyes to things that you may take for granted or haven't had firsthand.

Much of the work is broadly intersectional, taking into account the varying experiences, such as the impact on race on workforce dynamics. It also contrasted some very different experiences of trans women and how those can reflect on societal attitudes around gender.

I was noting a lot of sections of this book, but I do have to just include below a few of my favourite lines concerning the leveraging of masculinity and homophobia against other men in order to deflect potential transphobia;

Robert has grown comfortable using a urinary device at urinals in public restrooms: "Men are not going to look down at my crotch because this society is homophobic." [...] Homophobia is a powerful social control mechanism, particularly in intimate, all-male spaces such as the bathroom or locker room.

Johnny goes further, saying he would call someone "gay" if they questioned him or looked at him too long in the bathroom. "It would shut him up pretty quickly because no guy wants to be questioned about their sexuality, especially in the males' restroom."

When men asked Peter about his chest scars, he said they were intentional scarification—a subcultural form of body marking. He notes, "They thought it was cool and hard-core." These responses fit with idealized masculinity: stoically dismissing pain.