Books Acquired Recently: Erika Lopez Edition

I recently read Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes’s Queer Ricans: Cultures and Sexualities in the Diaspora, which discusses the work of Erika Lopez, a writer whom I had never heard of before. His description of Lopez’s work intrigued me because it involves a character who is a half Puerto Rican, half German Quaker. This hybrid identity is quite close to my Puerto Rican Mennonite one, as my mother’s ancestors came to Pennsylvania from Krefeld, Germany in 1710 and Mennonites are, along with Quakers, one of the historic peace churches. While I have read Mennonite texts depicting characters similar to me because of their queerness (most notably Stephen Beachy’s boneyard), I have never read a text that combines my queer and German identities with my Puerto Rican one, so I am quite excited to read Lopez’s work. I bought the three volumes of her Trilogy of Tomatoes from amazon.com’s network of independent booksellers as an introduction to her oeuvre.

Lopez, Erika. Flaming Iguanas: An Illustrated All-Girl Road Novel Thing. New York: Simon & Schuster Editions, 1997.

—. Hoochie Mama: The Other White Meat. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2001.

—. They Call Me Mad Dog! A Story for Bitter, Lonely People. New York: Simon & Schuster Editions, 1998.

Books Acquired Recently

Andreas, Peter. Rebel Mother: My Childhood Chasing the Revolution. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2017.

I will be writing a review of this book for Mennonite Life, and received it from them. It is about a man raised by a Mennonite mother who was a political radical in the 1970s, an era that I am quite interested in, so I look forward to reading it.

Eichhorn, Kate. The Archival Turn in Feminism: Outrage in Order. 2013. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2014.

I came across a citation of this book in my recent reading on queer archiving and decided to buy it as a continuation of this reading.

Hurst, Michel, and Robert Swope. Casa Susanna. New York: powerHouse Books, 2005.

This is a book of found photographs from a 1960s resort where crossdressers would congregate. I am excited to view it as I continue to investigate queer history.

Martinac, Paula. Out of Time. 1990. Seattle: Seal Press, 1999.

After I ordered Casa Susanna, I was reading an article about lesbian fiction that recreates the queer past, and it mentioned Martinac’s novel, which is about a woman who finds an old photograph album that apparently once belonged to some lesbians. In other words, it is an earlier fictionalized narrative of how Casa Susanna came to be! I decided in light of this coincidence that I should buy it immediately.

Wiebe, Rudy. The Scorched-Wood People. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1977.

This is one of the few Wiebe books that I do not already own. I read a critical essay recently which mentioned it. I did not realize that it was about the Louis Riel rebellion, a historical event that I know little about, but have been wanting to investigate further. So I decided to buy the novel as the beginning of my investigation.

 

Books Acquired Recently

Del Rio, Vanessa, and Dian Hanson. Vanessa Del Rio: Fifty Years of Slightly Slutty Behavior. Cologne, Germany: Taschen, 2016.

I have come across a number of references to Vanessa Del Rio’s acting over the years. If I recall correctly, I first saw some of her work in an exhibit at the Museum of Sex in New York City. One of my favorite queer authors, Samuel R. Delany, writes fondly of her in Times Square Red, Times Square Blue.  Recently, I was reading Juana María Rodríguez’s Sexual Futures, Queer Gestures, and Other Latina Longings, and she cites Vanessa Del Rio, which is Del Rio’s autobiography, quite favorably, so I decided to buy it. I love Taschen’s high-quality books of photography, and have enjoyed several of Hanson’s books that they have published about sexuality, so I anticipate that Vanessa Del Rio will be an enjoyable, educational read.

Peterson, Zoey Leigh. Next Year for Sure. New York: Scribner, 2017.

I read a review of this novel about polyamory on Casey the Canadian Lesbrarian and it sounded quite fascinating, so I decided to buy it. I’m not sure that I’ve ever read a novel that investigates being poly as a central theme before, so it is exciting to come across this book!

Wiebe, Rudy. A Voice in the Land: Essays By and About Rudy Wiebe. Ed. W.J. Keith. Edmonton: NeWest Press, 1981.

Rudy Wiebe is the most prominent North American Mennonite writer. His influence on the field of Mennonite literature cannot be understated. In my research about his work I’ve often seen A Voice in the Land cited, but have never actually read it. I finally decided to do so.

All three books were purchased from amazon.com’s network of independent booksellers.

Books Acquired Recently

Connelly, Karen. The Change Room. Toronto: Random House Canada, 2017.

I recently read a review of this book on Casey the Canadian Lesbrarian and it sounded quite interesting, in part because of how it mirrors some of my own personal experiences. I bought this and Katz’s book from amazon.com’s network of independent sellers.

George, Nina. The Little Paris Bookshop. 2013. Trans. Simon Pare. New York: Broadway Books, 2015.

I recently received this book as a gift from my mother. I love bookshops and always enjoy writing that is about them, so I look forward to reading it.

Katz, Jonathan. Gay American History: Lesbians and Gay Men in the U.S.A. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1976.

I’ve been doing a lot of research involving queer archiving lately, and have come across several citations of this book, which is one of the earliest efforts to collect documents having to do with LGBT life. I was able to find an inexpensive used copy for my own library. It is a mammoth text, over 400 pages, the kind of scholarly effort without which the queer community today would be much poorer.

Books Acquired Recently

Tzu, Lao. Tao Te Ching. Trans. Charles Muller. New York: Barnes & Nobles Classics, 2005.

I have been wanting to learn more about Taoism for several years, and came across this inexpensive ($5.00) edition while browsing at my local Barnes & Noble last week, so I decided to buy it.

Laing, Mary, Katy Pilcher, and Nicola Smith, ed. Queer Sex Work. 2015. London: Routledge, 2016.

I was recently writing about sex work in literature and felt that I did not have enough of a theoretical base for doing so. I bought this book to remedy this lack. I acquired it online from Blackwell’s bookshop in Oxford.

Books Acquired Recently: Queer Theory Edition

As noted in a previous post, I am trying to read as much queer theory as possible this summer. I bought these books (all from amazon.com’s network of independent booksellers) to further this end. I am especially interested to read La Fountain-Stokes’s book about the queer Puerto Rican diaspora because it is a group that includes myself. I’ve also heard lots of good things about José Esteban Muñoz’s work, but have never actually read any of it yet, so I’m looking forward to doing so soon.

La Fountain-Stokes, Lawrence. Queer Ricans: Cultures and Sexualities in the Diaspora. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2009.

Muñoz, José Esteban. Cruising Utopia: The Then and There of Queer Futurity. New York: New York University Press, 2009.

Wilchins, Riki. Queer Theory, Gender Theory: An Instant Primer. 2004. Bronx: Magnus Books, 2014.

Books Acquired Recently

I am trying to read as much queer literature and theory as I can this summer. The three following books fall under this rubric.

Butler, Alec. Rough Paradise. Toronto: Quattro Books, 2014.

Child, Abigail. Mouth to Mouth. Brooklyn: Eoagh Books, 2016.

Rodríguez, Juana María. Sexual Futures, Queer Gestures, and Other Latina Longings. New York: New York University Press, 2014.

This past weekend I attended the Crossing the Line: Women of Anabaptist Traditions Encounter Borders and Boundaries conference at Eastern Mennonite University. There was a small bookfair and I bought two books which I had signed by the authors (I already own many of the books that were on sale).

Loewen, Mary Ann. Sons and Mothers: Stories from Mennonite Men. Regina, SK: University of Regina Press, 2015.

Yoder, Anita Hooley. Circles of Sisterhood: A History of Mission, Service, and Fellowship in Mennonite Women’s Organizations. Harrisonburg, VA: Herald Press, 2017.

Books Acquired Recently

Fitzpatrick, Cat, and Casey Plett, ed. Meanwhile, Elsewhere: Science Fiction and Fantasy from Transgender Writers. New York: Topside Press, 2017.

Plett recently sent me a review copy of this anthology, which comes out in September. It is massive, nearly 500 pages in length. I love the work that Topside publishes and am very much looking forward to reading it.

Fox, Rose, and Daniel José Older, ed. Long Hidden: Speculative Fiction from the Margins of History. Framingham, MA: Crossed Genres Publications, 2014.

Salih, Tayeb. Season of Migration to the North. 1969. Trans. Denys Johnson-Davies. New York: New York Review Books, 2009.

I bought these two books from amazon.com’s network of independent booksellers after reading about them in this interview with Sofia Samatar. I love Long Hidden‘s concept of gathering stories in an intersectional manner from various minority groups rather than just focusing on a specific group. This anthological practice is a rare one which I wish was more common.

Books Acquired Recently: Radical Women Edition

The most important intellectual experience of my life was when I first encountered feminist theory in a Feminist Theology course my second year of college. Feminism gave me a completely new way of viewing the world that has led me to become a much better person than I would have been otherwise. It has also led to my scholarly interests in minority literatures, most notably queer literature. The three books that I’ve acquired over the past few weeks in the U.S. (see the post I wrote yesterday to read more about the books I acquired on my recent trip to England) are evidence of my continued desire to encounter new feminist perspectives.

Breedlove, Lynn. Godspeed. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2002.

I had not heard of Breedlove, a member of the band Tribe 8, until recently when I came across several mentions of her in some queer theory I was reading (one mention was by Ann Cvetkovich and I think the other was by Jack Halberstam). Then I heard about this novel via Stryker’s book (see below) and it became a “Rule of Threes” thing: the universe was telling me to encounter some Breedlove. So I bought a copy of her book.

This and Stryker’s book were purchased from amazon.com’s network of independent booksellers.

Morris, Catherine, and Rujeko Hockley, ed. We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women 1965-85: A Sourcebook. Brooklyn: Brooklyn Museum, 2017.

I ordered an exam copy of this book from its distributor, Duke University Press, because I love radical literature from all traditions. While some of the documents it collects are well-known, most are not, so I anticipate that reading it will be an enjoyable journey of discovery. It looks like it would be an excellent resource for both African American Studies courses and Gender Studies courses.

Stryker, Susan. Transgender History. Berkeley, CA: Seal Press, 2008.

I love Stryker’s book on queer pulp fiction and have enjoyed other essays of hers as well, thus when I encountered a citation of this book while doing some writing on trans Mennonite literature I decided to buy it immediately. I have already read it and it is a strong, accessible introduction to the subject.