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Richard Labonte, BookMarks
Apr. 26th, 2004 08:37 amYay! Here's Richard Labonte's review, released in his syndicated column, Book Marks today:
Venus of Chalk, by Susan Stinson. Firebrand Books, 207 pages, $14.95 paper.
The magic of this elegant novel is that it embraces both the surreal and the so real with sublime charm. The offbeat plot: Carline, an unapologetic fat lesbian, quits her job precipitously to climb aboard a junked city transit bus, bound cross-continent for rural Texas, with two strange men - leaving behind a bewildered lover, an unhappy cat, and a sensible life. The journey taxes Carline's emotional endurance, challenges her physical stamina, and - so very eloquently - confronts whispers of her shame around body self-image and personal self-worth. Stinson's prose is spare and poetic; her characters are wrought with exquisite precision. The unlikely relationship between Carline, who lives to cook and clean and sew, and her partner, a poetry slam champion, resonates with passion and honesty; the unsettling secrets, aching loneliness, and wise self-reliance of Carline's elderly aunt in Texas are salt-of-the-earth plausible. Road-trip novels are, generically, adventures of discovery. Venus of Chalk is an almost sacramental voyage into a brave, fat, proud dyke's spirit.
Venus of Chalk, by Susan Stinson. Firebrand Books, 207 pages, $14.95 paper.
The magic of this elegant novel is that it embraces both the surreal and the so real with sublime charm. The offbeat plot: Carline, an unapologetic fat lesbian, quits her job precipitously to climb aboard a junked city transit bus, bound cross-continent for rural Texas, with two strange men - leaving behind a bewildered lover, an unhappy cat, and a sensible life. The journey taxes Carline's emotional endurance, challenges her physical stamina, and - so very eloquently - confronts whispers of her shame around body self-image and personal self-worth. Stinson's prose is spare and poetic; her characters are wrought with exquisite precision. The unlikely relationship between Carline, who lives to cook and clean and sew, and her partner, a poetry slam champion, resonates with passion and honesty; the unsettling secrets, aching loneliness, and wise self-reliance of Carline's elderly aunt in Texas are salt-of-the-earth plausible. Road-trip novels are, generically, adventures of discovery. Venus of Chalk is an almost sacramental voyage into a brave, fat, proud dyke's spirit.