At long latst!
(And it doens't look nearly as good as her last one. Ah well.)
I'm going to buy it anyway.
If you've ever read Rita Mae Brown and said to yourself "Wow, the subject matter and themes of this book are really good. If only the writing weren't so freaking hokey..." then Lisa Alther is absolutely the author for you.
"Other Women" and "Bedrock" are her two best books.
Yay!
CC
2 comments:
I agree with CC that Lisa Alther is a wonderful writer, although more in the mature works that she mentions than in her younger books. I came across "Other Women" when I still lived in the LA area, and picked it up for a Christmas present for a Lesbian couple of family friends. I started reading it, and had to buy them a different Christmas present, since I was not going to let go of it. Alther often describes Lesbian characters, but undertakes more general themes in that context. In "Other Women," for instance, perhaps her most successful work, the deepest theme is the analysis of the clinical relationship between therapist and client (both are women). From a time in my life when I knew well a community of therapists, and from my own experience with therapy, it is an illuminating work, in ways that are probably very relevant to the interaction between minister and member, since the ministerial interaction can certainly verge into a clinical relationship (in either direction).
LinguistFriend
Last night, in the course of my Saturday evening run to Toledo to pick up bread etc. for our women's shelter, I found Alther's new book at Borders. Now that I have finished reading it, I can say that it is about half rather reticent autobiography, with interesting comments on her books, and about half a record of her
search for an unusual genetic component in her family's southern background. Her best books by far are still, as CC commented, "Other Women" (on which her comments support mine above), and "Bedrock", where I am not equally certain of my understanding, although it is impressive. Totally unexpected in "Kinfolks" were a couple of pleasant reminiscences of a favorite (now deceased) cousin by marriage of mine, with whom she overlapped in time at Wellesley College (Ophelia on pp.33 and 37).
LinguistFriend
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