Date of Review:

Published Work:

Reviewer:

Source:

Review Excerpt:

At first I thought that Lucy Jane Bledsoe's new book, Biting the Apple, was released at the wrong time of the year.  Dipping into the first pages, I imagined I was reading a summer beach novel. The high school love relationship between Joan and Marianne that begins the book is a perfect and delightful catharsis for all who remember their high school crush and their first rejected overture of love.  In Bledsoe's hands, however, this story is not an easily recollected fantasy; it is not a beach read for women (or men) wanting to recapture youthful love.  Rather, Biting the Apple evolves into a much more psychologically riveting and significant story and, by its conclusion, is a haunting and profoundly satisfying novel.

Biting the Apple represents the contemporary generation of writing by lesbian novelists in which the central quest of the novel is no longer coming out, and not even romance or the working through of significant intimate relationships.  Rather the plot and the subplots of Bledsoe and her cohorts reach beyond lesbian identity.  In Biting the Apple, Bledsoe tells a tale of self-actualization in a world where lesbian identity is strong, and homophobia, while still present, is not a soul-crushing phenomenon.  Bledsoe delivers four strong women -- lesbian and heterosexual -- who form the dramatic core of the book:  Eve Glass (nee Marianne Wade), her high school crush, Joan, her personal manager, Alissa, and her contemporary love object, Audrey.  Together these women provide different faces and narratives to illuminate the central struggles of the book -- women seeking lives of fulfillment, love, and integrity.

Bledsoe raises many more questions than answers.  How are you named?  What does your name mean?  How do relationships from early childhood and adolescence shape our lives?  How do we transform our lives?  How do we seek greater integrity and honesty?  All of Bledsoe's women are concerned with working through these questions in difficult and occasionally contradictory ways.

Biting the Apple begins with near whimsy and nostalgia, but by the conclusion it is a gripping psychological drama.  Bledsoe deftly plots the book while unpeeling the layers and layers of her characters.  The determination of apple or onion for Eve, Alissa, Joan, and Audrey will tantalize each reader:  sweet or fragrant?  You choose.

Perhaps because of Bledsoe's great compassion and affection for each of her characters, she structures the book so that it moves between the perspective of Eve, the protagonist, and her antagonist, Joan. The glimpses into Joan's psyche, however, are slim and not as well-developed.  This structure initially was a barrier to entering the story and the lives of the people within it.  Thus, this advice:  keep reading.

Biting the Apple is a good read -- too dark for the beach, but well-suited for the coming wintry days.  Begin it one morning and read into the darkness of the world, real and imagined. 

Link to Full Review: