Minimax by Anna Livia

Minimax

Anna Livia

Despite flashes of humor, Livia’s ( Incidents Involving Mirth ) latest novel has abundant eccentricities that at times approach incomprehensibility. Unattached, unemployed and discouraged by the sense that her years of lesbian political correctness may all have been for naught, Minnie (whose alter ego Milly serves as the ‘voice of Lesbian Nation’ to keep her in line) jets off from her London home to see her mother and sisters in Australia, with additional excursions to the U.S. to visit friends and accept an invitation to meet Natalie Barney, a famous lesbian author whose book introduced Minnie to the joys of opera. When Minnie returns to the bosom of her friendly if unorthodox family, she notes that its members have been touched by her mother’s wealthy and eccentric employer R. Vivien. Eagerly anticipating her meeting with Natalie, Minnie begins to worry that the mysterious Vivien may somehow already have staked a claim on the author. Soon she also realizes why her mother makes the ideal Vivien employee: Beryl is ‘constitutionally incapable of hearing the word ‘vampire.’ ‘

Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Australian-born but London-based Minnie is soaking in the bath to wash away the blues from losing both her lover, Genevieve, and her job. Assessing her condition, she discovers that both her clothes and her politics are out of date. So she rinses off and flies to Australia, seeking comfort from her mother and sisters in Perth and discovering romance and adventure in San Francisco and New York along the way. The cares and problems of her family entertain both Minnie and the reader. And in what is probably a first for a contemporary novel, she finds romance with a female vampire. The writing is bright and funny, and the characters that swirl around anchorless Minnie are quirky but friendly. The story sometimes lifts off and sails through surreal seas but always returns to earth with a bounce . For larger fiction collections.

– Regan Robinson, Editor, ‘Librarians Collection Letter,’ Keller, Wash.

Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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