From Publishers Weekly
The editors of The Penguin Book of Modern Fantasy by Women join forces again, this time turning their selective eyes to more earthy considerations. Here are 31 tales, spanning 103 years and encompassing six continents, arranged in chronological order. With a compilation that includes such diverse authors as Edith Wharton and Kathy Acker, it's a safe bet that each reader will find some of these tales titillating, others curious and still others repulsive. Among the more intriguing offerings is Danish author Siv Holm's "I, a Woman," in which a woman, choosing multiple fantasies over conventional marriage, posits that civilization and humanity are polar opposites. In Svetlana Boym's "Romances of the Era of Stagnation," an emigre returns to Russia, wading through bureaucracy while queuing for information on two former loves. The adulteress in Elizabeth Cook's "Billets Doux," finding the mark of a wife on her lover's person, competitively decides to leave her own. The curious entries tend to focus on fetishes: Czech-born Iva Pekarkova's "Truck Stop" ends with a virtual paean to sperm; Yuan Ch'iung Ch'iung's "A Lover's Ear" explores the erotic trust necessary for cleaning a beloved's ears. Some of the most imaginative pieces come from those writers with an SF and/or fantasy background (L.A. Hall, Joanna Russ). Head and shoulders above the rest is Carol Emshwiller's whimsical "Sex and/or Mr. Morrison," in which a female being (alien?) eats Fig Newtons while sitting on a man's shoes in his closet, eagerly awaiting a peek at his pecker. Caveat emptor: Erotica is definitely in the eye of the beholder.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
The poet Adrienne Rich's definition of the erotic, cited in the Introduction to this remarkably diverse anthology, sums up the thread that ties these works together. In female terms, Rich argues, the erotic is ``an energy not only diffuse but. . . omnipresent.'' The stories here, ranging from work by well-known writers (Katherine Mansfield, Colette) to those little known in this country (Siv Holm, Nicole Jouve), and dealing with such matters as obsessive love (Claire Rabe's ``Sicily Enough''), the intersection of fantasy and desire (Angela Carter's ``Flesh and the Mirror''), or the struggle for equality (Simone de Beauvoir's ``Marcelle''), all demonstrate the extent to which the erotic has as much to do with emotional honesty and the imagination as it does with physical intimacy. A nicely balanced collection of provocative versions of desire. --
Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
