Wilson’s amusing tales explore the fine line between desire and disgust.
A set of stories about embarrassing moments, including disappointing sexual experiences.
“Everybody who’s had sex more than a time or two has had lousy sex,” debut author Wilson writes. This short, humorous collection of anecdotes effectively aims to normalize such moments and help readers find humor in their own lives by laughing at others’. Wilson says that she collected the sex-related stories, which make up most of the book, from both friends and strangers, and she renders them here as first-person narratives. (However, she fictionalizes people’s names, identifying information, and sometimes chronologies of events.) For instance, in “The Fairy Queen,” set in 1999, a 25-year-old woman named Roseanne recounts fooling around with Scott, who dressed her as a fairy for a photo shoot, complete with body makeup and hair woven into the headboard. After she confused flower tendrils for a spider, she lashed out and inadvertently knocked him over. Pinned to the bed, she could do little to help when he hit his head—and then his mother walked in. Many other pieces here are similarly outlandish, hilarious, and excruciating in equal measure. Intestinal distress and a malfunctioning sunroof spoil a tryst in a cemetery in “Stayin’ Alive,” for example, and flatulence ensures that a date can’t get too serious in “The Battle Below the Clouds.” In several tales, Wilson presents women who can’t reconcile themselves to their partners’ fantasies; in one, a woman’s boyfriend begs her to try anal sex with him, but she can’t overcome her aversion to the idea. The best story in the collection, however, is “The Adjunct,” in which the writings of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Emily Dickinson convince a literature professor to dump a former student who’s merely using her for sex. A brief second section contains David Sedaris–like accounts of other, nonsexual awkward moments; of these, the scatological “The Funeral Weekend” is a highlight.
Wilson’s amusing tales explore the fine line between desire and disgust.Pub Date: March 31, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-9976355-6-0
Page Count: 182
Publisher: Wandering in the Words Press
Review Posted Online: April 14, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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