Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Found at my local library

I use both the county's and the city's library system. There are a few others I don't have cards for, some smaller, local ones, but for the most part, I'm pretty lucky in that I can usually find the books I want no matter how obscure. I've noticed that the city one is better for academic books and general nonfiction, while the county is better at scoring a copy of a popular novel without having to be on a waiting list for months. Here are a few things I've picked up recently that I haven't found elsewhere:

Amber Hollibaugh - My Dangerous Desires: A Queer Girl Dreaming Her Way Home
Amber Hollibaugh is a working-class woman, proudly femme, and sex-positive before it was feminist shorthand. The essays here are pretty old, but still read fresh, and it's rare to see working-class women's experiences centered.

Pat Califia - Sex Changes: The Politics of Transgenderism and The Advocate Adviser , which is really dated, but if you're interested in Pat's old Advocate advise column, it's a pretty good history lesson. My library also has a copy of Public Sex , and I really, really wish my library had a self check-out, too. I sometimes forget I live in the conservative American heartland.

The Outlaw Bible of Literature 
Like most anthologies, this one is a mixed bag, but it's a pretty good collection of unheralded writers: Dennis Cooper, Kathy Acker, and John Rechy are among the most celebrated. Weirdly enough, one of the essays from Public Sex is in here.

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