★★★★★ She was sent to pose as a maid, but their relationship becomes more than that, a lot more. It feels like many books in one; Victorian London, girls, crime, and love - girls in crime and in love.
🔽 log 🔽 Fingersmith Sarah Waters, 2002 582 pages Read in 2020.10 check on amazon.com
🔽 Book review and notes 🔽
I actually watched the Korean film The Handmaiden first. I watched it when I was heavily pregnant so it's a bit blurry, but I was astonished to a point that I had to look for the original book.
A family of thieves sends their girl to a rich family, for her to be a maid of the naïve gentlewoman aiming for her eventual inheritance, but slowly their relationship becomes more than that - a lot more. In the film her uncle collects paintings, ukiyoe, which suits the film as it's set in Korea, but in the book in Victorian London he collects words.
So naturally I kept comparing it to the film, which is always an error because films tend to be more dramatic or exaggerated, but the madness is definitely there in the book. It feels like you're reading many books, because there are quite a few twists and everything builds up so well; the girls, the crime, and the love.
Also the historical background is intriguing, it depicts different lives in the backstreet in London, that's one reason it feels like you are different many books in one.
At first you think one is tricking another, but oh no you are wrong, but wait it's changing again, now what, oh what is going on NOW. I don't want to spoil it but you'll see what I mean by this - she's not just a pearl, she's what she's made herself to be but now with pride.
Bisexuality in the Ancient World
Eva Cantarella, 1988
Secondo natura
286 pages
Read in 2025.06
check price on amazon.com
✔ Ancient Rome and Greece
✔ Their separate history and culture around bisexuality
✔ Arrival of Christianity and its moral
🔽 Review summary 🔽
★★★★★ A man marries woman as a social obligation, a man has a relationship with a younger man for education in Greece, and for his manliness in Rome - and the societies get tired. Fascinating to see we've always suffered from the same things, patriarchy and machismo.
🔽 Book review and notes 🔽
I've had this for long, but didn't really realise it was so academic, written by a university professor in Milan.
Bisexuality here is not the same definition as today, as in, loving men and women at the same level.
It means that men are socially obliged to marry women, but also to love men, for different reasons in Greece and Rome.
In Greece it was about education and sophistication, and only men could educate boys via semen.
Rome was about machismo, men conquer at wars and in life they conquer women and other men.
In the end both cultures were extremely misogynistic.
It's all about how men should be higher than women.
In Rome, then came the religion (made by men of course, then it spread to Greece) misogynistic as ever, but this time to protect men's superiority they told people to focus on reproduction, just marry and have sex with women who will give more births.
She argues that, however it was not Christianity that changed this attitude of loving men, men were already a bit tired of being forced to be macho constantly, times change, people change, so it was more that Christianity came at the right time.
The book expects you to know the basics of the ancient world which I don't so I now need further readings, especially Sappho.
But even after 1000s of years, we're still suffering from the same problems - patriarchy and machismo.
✔ 2 women in love and in crime ✔ Gripping suspense ✔ Life in London after the war
🔽 Review summary 🔽
★★★★★ As expected, it's gripping, exciting, and a great storytelling. A woman lives quietly with her mother falls in love with a beautiful young wife of the tenant, they're in love in crime, all in secret.
🔽 Book review and notes 🔽 As expected, it's gripping, exciting, and a great storytelling. The story is more straightforward than Fingersmith, but definitely not less curious. It has all the good female characters.
After the war a woman now lives modestly with her mother, they decide to rent out a room but she falls for the young beautiful wife. And yes we'll have a crime scene and it all goes wrong. They're in love but who manipulates who? But is it manipulation or true love? They find a tiny corner in the hostile society where they love blindly.
✔ Biography of TV personality and comedian
✔ Part travel journals
✔ LGBTQ community
🔽 Review summary 🔽
★★★★☆ My favourite TV person in UK, definitely the best in BBC. The book is full of love that she is full of love, though she would not say it.
🔽 Book review and notes 🔽
I even went to an event about this book at South Bank and queued to get it signed, and only reading it now.
Maybe one of the few of my favourite people on British TV, one of the few gems of BBC. She's funny, clever but silly, honest, uncomfortable, a bit reckless but mostly humane. A lovely human being.
Who didn't love her on GBBO, the Bake off?
And you get all that in the book, it's full of love that she is full of love, though she would not say it.
And what surprised me is she's older than I thought, but was still doing all that crazy stuff.
🔽 log 🔽 Carol Patricia Highsmith, 1952 The Price of Salt 307 pages Read in 2024.4 check price on amazon.com
✔ Written originally under pseudonym ✔ Lesbian love story and coming of age ✔ Bittersweet
🔽 Review summary 🔽
★★★★☆ An unusual love story; a girl and a woman fall in love, they run away, but there's the tension you wouldn't expect from people in love. And it's bittersweet, as ever.
🔽 Book review and notes 🔽
The movie was with Cate Blanchette, I haven't watched it yet so didn't know the story much but i can see it's a perfect casting.
It must have been a shock when it came out but not as much as it would have been if people knew it was written by her and not was pseudonymous.
I only recently read The Paying Guest by Sarah Waters so I cannot help myself comparing them but it's not so obviously a suspense or mystery. An unusual love story; they fall in love, they run away, but there's the tension you wouldn't expect from people in love. Is it a dare? Is it more about a girl growing up to become a woman. Like there are many stories for boy becoming a man, this is one of those. And it's bittersweet, as ever.
This Monk Wears Heels: Be Who You Are Kodo Nishimura, 2022 224 pages Read in 2022.09 check price on amazon.com
✔ LGBTQ essay and self help ✔ Gay Buddhist monk who is a make up artist ✔ Encouraging and uplifting
🔽 Review summary 🔽
★★★★☆ Make-up is to enhance the beauty, not to hide behind it, and Buddhism is to find truth, by being true. So his purposes are not as contradictory. Such a unique person, a person with a mission.
🔽 Book review and notes 🔽
Such a unique person, a person with a mission. Saw him on Netflix and love the fact that he is a monk and a make-up artist, at the same time, with the same purposes – though they seem completely the opposite, they are not.
This book would be a perfect self-help book for a young person who is struggling to find true self, (whether they are gay or not, I’m not gay and this is inspiring) and his message is clear; be proud.
Make-up is there to enhance the beauty, not to hide behind it, and Buddhism is there to find truth, by being true. So his purposes are not as contradictory as it might seem.
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