I’m looking forward to reading Twisted Clay. “She loved … and killed … both men and women. She was utterly beautiful and utterly mad. This is a tale of passionate horror … a breath-taking venture into abnormal psychology … a story which cannot be forgotten. ”
I have been spending a little time each day working on cleaning up the database of lesbian books that feeds the Big List of Lesbian Books. Not only am I fixing a *ahem* few flaws, I decided it was an excellent time to rate books. Not only can I include my own ratings, but I wanted to include ratings by reputable experts.
Ratings by Experts
Sorry, but Goodreads and Amazon ratings just aren’t going to cut it. I based the idea on Rotten Tomatoes, a movie website that culls reviews from various trusted and pre-authorized sources. They then rate the reviews, then rates the movies based on expert opinion.
I am going through various bibliographies and literary critiques. This includes Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Checklist, and the infamous The Lesbian in Literature by Barbara Grier. These, as well as locating reviews in journals, magazines and newspapers, would help inform the ratings.
Have you looked at these bibliographies? I mean, I went through some of it, but not the whole thing. For Checklist, I resorted to looking for Zimmer Bradley’s + rating. For The Lesbian in Literature, I decided only to look at the books marked A***.
It’s surprising what I was missing (not really all that surprising actually). It was truly surprising to see how long it took me to get the details of some of these books. In more than a few instances, the books are nowhere to be found except in library holdings and bibliographies. There are no covers, no reviews or summaries, nothing. In some cases, they can’t even be found on the author’s website! And these are the A*** books!
I guess that’s why I keep the Big List of Lesbian Books… to try my best at making sure books don’t just disappear.
Finding Twisted Clay
There were a number of books I had to add, so it means I am finding out about older books I’d never heard of. And Twisted Clay>/i> is one of these.
Written in 1933 by Frank Walford, it features a bisexual serial killer. The book was banned for 30 years in Walford’s native Australia. I suspect it’s not quite so provocative in 2020.
The 2014 trade paperback by Remains Books features the weirdest and most non-committal reviews on the back cover. Twisted Clay was called an “effective novel” by “Cleveland, O., PRESS”. Bruce Catton of NEA SERVICE said it was “competently told.” Dayton, O. DAILY NEWS said “…it merits numerous superlatives, such as most peculiar…”
Yeah Yeah, I’ll Get To It
If I didn’t like reading about serial killers so much, I would never have bought the book. I haven’t read it yet, as excited as I am about it. I’m still reading Conflict Is Not Abuse: Overstating Harm, Community Responsibility, and the Duty of Repair by Sarah Schulman. It’s a slow and thoughtful read, and takes time to think about what the author is offering.
I think a bisexual serial killer from 1933 might just be the antidote to such heaving thinking and introspection. Grier gives it A*. This symbol, A, following an entry indicates major Lesbian characters and/or action. * indicates some interest beyond the ordinary.
Zimmer Bradley’s Checklist says, “It must be marked for people with very complete collections only; it is depressing, inaccurate, etc. ‘The writing, etc, are excellent, but oh my, what a plot!'”
Here’s my oooh so exciting 60-second unboxing video of Twisted Clay, because unboxing a book is way too damn fun! I’ll update ya’ll when I’m done the book.
