Out with the Girls!

Tiffany, Kate, Cathy and Ariane met Franz Wisner and his brother Kurt at the Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe. They were talking about their new book "How the World Makes Love". It was fun hearing them speak since we felt we knew them from their book "Honeymoon with My Brother". Then we had drinks at Max's Bar. Great night, wonderful company, a memory to cherish.

Our next book is Wicked by Gregory McGuire. Think we talked about May 8th but I think Tiff can't make it.

The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber

Book #50 Hosted by Cathy

The story of a well-read London prostitute named Sugar, who spends her free hours composing a violent, pornographic screed against men, Michel Faber's dazzling second novel. We learn about the positions and orifices that Sugar and her clients favor, about her lingering skin condition, and about the suspect ingredients of her prophylactic douches. Still, Sugar believes she can make a better life for herself. When she is taken up by a wealthy man, the perfumer William Rackham, her wings are clipped, and she must balance financial security against the obvious servitude of her position. The physical risks and hardships of Sugar's life (and the even harder "honest" life she would have led as a factory worker) contrast--yet not entirely--with the medical mistreatment of her benefactor's wife, Agnes, and beautifully underscore Faber's emphasis on class and sexual politics. Amazon.com Review

Discussion Questions

1. Does Michel Faber keep the reader hooked and entertained throughout this lengthy novel?

2. Are Sugar and William ever in love?

3. The novel ends with a "what if." Speculate about the futures of Sophie and Sugar. Did you suspect William would act the way he did?

4. Why wasn't Sugar skin condition solved with the help of Williams products?

5. Do you believe that Ashwell and Bodley were merely included for comic relief?

Now Sleeps the Crimson Petal by

Alfred Lord Tennyson

Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the white;

Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk;

Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font;

The firefly wakens, waken thou with me.

Now droops the milk-white peacock like a ghost,

And like a ghost she glimmers on to me.

Now lies the Earth all Danae to the stars,

And all thy heart lies open unto me.

Now slides the silent meteor on, and leaves

A shining furrow, as thy thoughts, in me.

Now folds the lily all her sweetness up,

And slips into the bosom of the lake.

So fold thyself, my dearest, thou, and slip

Into my bosom and be lost in me.