About this title: A story about two women, contrastingly different but powerfully drawn to one another. As their relationship develops, they reveal what lies beneath the surface of their suburban childhoods - violence, pain, intimacy, isolation, denial, fulfilment and the betrayal of love and innocence.
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Binding: Trade paperback
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Date Published: 1998
ISBN-13:9780684843124ISBN:0684843129
Description: Good. No dust jacket as issued. Clean pages, no marks or tears, reading wear with corners turned up, edges slightly worn, many pages folded, dirt soiling to cover & page edges, tight binding, solid. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 320 p. Audience: General/trade. read more
Edition: Fifth Printing
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Bantam Books, New York, New York, U.S. A
Date Published: 1992
ISBN-13:9780553550047ISBN:0553550047
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Bantam, Westminster, Maryland, U.S.A.
Date Published: 1992
ISBN-13:9780553550047ISBN:0553550047
Description: Very Good. 0553550047 Mass market paperback, previously read used book in very good condition, may have slight worn corners and varying degre..._ read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Bantam Books
Date Published: 1992
ISBN-13:9780553550047ISBN:0553550047
Description: Grade: B. Catalog: Fiction General Synopsis: 388 pages. A handwritten ad in a New York Laundromat has brought them together. Both are thirtyish, adrift, and fragile. Dorothy Never-overweight, e... read more
Description: Very good. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Very good. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
"i turned to this in order to escape from Blood Meridian (which i hate a lot and think i might not finish at all), and at first it was refreshing to encounter female characters with interiority and subjective emotions, etc. for some reason, father-daughter sexual abuse is more palatable to me than diseased horses with swollen heads and drunk white dudes who kill random mexicans for no reason.
i read this quickly and remained fully engaged even on crowded subway rides. but in retrospect, i am not sure this novel is entirely successful. the structural device (switching between 1st and 3rd person narrators) never made sense to me and i kept waiting for it to do so. it wouldn't be so bothersome if it were merely an aesthetic flourish, but the entire project of this book seems to be to draw connections between these two different characters, which begs too many questions regarding justine's lack of narrative voice. moreover, the execution seems flawed, since the narrative VOICE remains absolutely the same even when the narrator AND the point-of-view change. how does that make sense? is the omniscient narrator actually dorothy? is justine invented by dorothy? is dorothy's subjective voice being written by justine? none of those options would feel satisfying, but what's worse is there is no answer to the conundrum.
at times, the writing is eh. adverby. but the nuances of complex emotion are made palpable by gaitskill's observations and depicted with killer accuracy. at least, they ring true for me and what i know about female psychology regarding self-worth, sexuality, identity, intimacy, and survival instinct. justine's adolescent cruelty. dorothy's ability to insulate herself from external reality. these are profound constructs.
i just don't know how soon i'll be ready to read another gaitskill. highly recommended for lovers of melodrama, since this is definitely a step-up from v.c. andrews."
"Gaitskill is delightfully twisted. You find yourself looking into the lives of and absorbing the complexities of each character. Works within my desire to read books that make me feel less of a freak!"
"I enjoyed this book and found Gaitskill's insight about certain human conditions, namely loneliness, psychological trauma, and isolation from society, to be a haunting reminder of the cruelty that lies within human nature. Admittedly, there were moments where my skin crawled with disgust, and my mind could not comprehend the idea that one's father could have an incestuous relationship with his daughter for any extended period of time. Or, in Justine's situation, that a father could find out his daughter was molested and not do anything about it, even though it was something he always suspected. I admire Gaitskill for her ability to transcend the superfluous and to place her charcters firmly in reality."
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