Robert's review
Bastard Out of Carolina (Plume Essential Edition) by Dorothy Allison
Bastard Out of Carolina is one of those books about which all of the hooplah surrounding it really baffles me. Allison basically plagiarizes herself by, instead of expanding what was a quite good short story she wrote and published in High Risk: An Anthology of Forbidden Writings, simply cutting and pasting sections of it throughout the book (I actually went through it and identified the sections because I could scarcely believe a serious author would do something so incredibly lazy). The final product was somehow a finalist for the National Book Award, and I think that had much more to do with the content than with the artistic merit. The book was published during a time when “empowerment novels,” written in a style similar to confessional memoirs, dealing with the taboo subjects of gay identify and childhood sexual abuse were enjoying a minor vogue, and I am convinced that a book written at the same level of artistry, but about different topics would have garnered little respe...more
sometimes a short story needs to be strtched so that the whole story can be properly told. and if a passage ain't broke, don't fix it, is how i feel about you laziness comment.
