Butch Fatale is a Los Angeles-based private dick just barely scrapping by on whatever cases come her way. While having sex with an old friend, a new case walks in the door– another butch is looking for her missing ex-girlfriend, Angie. Butch suspects Angie is just another fallen ex-junkie, but decides to follow the leadsRead More
Mfred reviews Passion’s Bright Fury by Radclyffe
Trauma surgeon Saxon Sinclair does not want Jude Castle filming a documentary in her top-rated NYC trauma center. Jude Castle does not want Bossy McBossersons Sinclair telling her a damn thing, ever. Both have emotional baggage and dark secrets to hide. Radclyffe gets so many things right, I find her romance books a joy to read.Read More
Mfred Reviews Odd Girl Out by Ann Bannon
Laura goes off to college and meets Beth. Beth inspires in her a frenzied, frightening passion, which she can barely contain. Beth, in her loneliness, is drawn to Laura’s worship of her. They start an affair. Until Beth meets Charlie, and finally falls in love. This is basically the plot of Ann Bannon’s Odd Girl Out andRead More
MFred reviews Bittersweet by Nevada Barr
The back copy of Nevada Barr’s Bittersweet promised me a truthful, accurate portrayal of two women living together in the 1800s West. Imogene, a spinster teacher, is forced from her job in the East when her secret affair with a female student is revealed. She ends up in small Pennsylvania farming town, where she starts a friendshipRead More
Mfred reviews Valencia by Michelle Tea
What to say about this book? I can’t quite put my finger on Valencia, can’t pin it down or summarize my reaction to it. Perhaps my first mistake was to read the introduction. My copy is a reprint, with Tea adding commentary on her own ambivalent feelings regarding the semi-autobiographical story of being young, queer, drunkRead More
Mfred reviews Skin Beneath by Nairne Holtz
I cannot adequately explain the joy, the incredible sense of pleasure, I derived from reading this book. Even as the book’s plot unraveled a bit at the end, I enjoyed every moment of reading Nairne Holtz’s Skin Beneath. The first paragraph: Sam unlocks the mailbox in the lobby of her building, takes out a singleRead More
MFred reviews Call Me Softly by D. Jackson Leigh and Jukebox by Gina Noelle Daggett
Around the time I was ten years old, “horse girls” emerged and it was clear I definitely was not one of them. Sure, I tried. I read Black Beauty and watched National Velvet. But I was way more into the Babysitter’s Club and Nancy Drew; horses just did not appeal. Imagine my surprise, twenty-some years later (oh god),Read More
Mfred reviews Piece of My Heart by Julia Watts
Can a poor end to an otherwise okay book truly ruin the entire reading experience? This is the question I have been pondering since reading Julia Watt’s Piece of My Heart. Jess Hamlin starts grad school just out of the closet and broken hearted. Pining for her former (yet still straight) roommate, she begins aRead More