‘Waiting Up for the End of the World: Conspiracies’ by Elizabeth J. Colen
Posted on April 9, 2013 by Sarah Sarai in Poetry, Reviews
Elizabeth Colen’s ambitious Waiting Up for the End of the World: Conspiracies (Jaded Ibis Press) offers a cohesion of themes: cataclysm, catastrophe, and possibly worse, and the legal definition of conspiracy, a decision by two or more people to commit a crime. (more…)
‘Queer Cinema: Schoolgirls, Vampires and Gay Cowboys’ by Barbara Mennel
Posted on January 16, 2013 by Sarah Sarai in Nonfiction
Oh, “murderous gays” and “self-hating lesbians”! You distraught and twisted queers were once our sole image in film. Then things changed, changed again, and now, well. . .. Definitely there’s a history here. Barbara Mennel’s Queer Cinema: Schoolgirls, Vampires and Gay Cowboys (Wallflower Press) provides that history of us onscreen, beginning in the early 1900s. Part of Wallflower Press’ Short Cuts: Introduction to Film Studies series, Queer Cinema situates the LGBT presence in movies and some TV within its social and historical milieu. Unsurprising and necessary are the many parallels author Barbara Mennel, an associate professor of film studies and German studies at the University of Florida, draws between the culture’s comfort level with queers and how we’re portrayed. The writing is workmanlike, clear, and detailed. I am not a film scholar, surprise surprise, and though I probably shouldn’t admit it, I am an IMDB.com fanatic. And, proudly, an L.A. girl at heart. I’m interested. So. (more…)
‘Allen Ginsberg’ by Steve Finbow
Posted on January 2, 2013 by Sarah Sarai in Bio/Memoir, Reviews
I have heard rumors, lately, of a poet once of the City of New York named Ahron Grinsberg, no wait, that’s my building manager, let’s see, yes, here: Allen Ginsberg. He seemed to have had a faint few followers when he resided in the formerly seedy East Village.
‘Buddha in My Belly’ by Brittany K. Fonte
Posted on October 29, 2012 by Sarah Sarai in Poetry, Reviews
If Roseanne Barr wrote prose poems, they wouldn’t be so very different from those in Buddha in My Belly, Brittany K. Fonte’s debut collection (Hopewell Publications, 2012). Like Barr’s routines, these pieces are sardonic, honest—and about women. Sometimes it’s hard to be one. Okay, that was Tammy. Anyway.
‘Lady Business: A Celebration of Lesbian Poetry’ edited by Bryan Borland
Posted on August 22, 2012 by Sarah Sarai in Poetry, Reviews
A dozen long-stemmed red roses? Ho hum. How 50s heterosexual can you get? It’s not that I’m disenchanted with roses, their heady fragrance and dizzying blend of fragility and toughness. It’s just, well, I love me some variety. (more…)
‘My Sister Chaos’ by Lara Fergus
Posted on June 17, 2012 by Sarah Sarai in Fiction, Reviews
The world of My Sister Chaos (Triangle Publishing’s Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction winner and a finalist for this year’s Lambda Literary Award in Lesbian Debut Fiction) is disconcerting. Always near the surface of this quiet and speculative methodical tale is the fact that we are in a time of crisis. (more…)
