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Camptown Ladies
"Damn if I didn't actually laugh out loud while reading it--several times, in fact. If you're looking for a funny, well-written novel . . . give this a try!"--AfterEllen.comJust when you thought it was safe to pitch your tent, the Santora family shows up. Lisa's taken over a rundown campground, baby sister Marie's been dumped (again!) by the actress, and the Santoras don't know the meaning of minding their own business. When the whole clan decides to fix things for their girls, it's a hilarious recipe for havoc. "Camptown Ladies" is the sequel to "Greetings From Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer."Mari SanGiovani lives the crazy Italian family lifestyle and writes about it like no one else.
264 pages, Kindle Edition
First published November 15, 2011
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
February 13, 2020
Rating: 4* of five
The Publisher Says: Just when you thought it was safe to pitch your tent, the Santora family shows up. Lisa's taken over a rundown campground, baby sister Marie's been dumped (again!) by the actress, and the Santoras don't know the meaning of minding their own business. When the whole clan decides to fix things for their girls, it's a hilarious recipe for havoc. Camptown Ladies is the sequel to Greetings From Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer.
Mari SanGiovani lives the crazy Italian family lifestyle and writes about it like no one else.
My Review: Okay, see, it started like this. A few years ago, I was having a discussion with an old, old, old dyke of my acquaintance (I mean, born in the first Truman administration! And not dead yet!) about how gay men don't support lesbian writers and publishers of lesbian-themed books, and fewer straight men do this than straight women support gay smexy-time publishers. (I suspect ZERO straight men read gay smexy-time books, they're too skittish about the whole thing, poor lambs.) (BTW, when exactly did you dirty, dirty ladies start using men together as bubble-machine starter? I am shocked, shocked!)
Back to my story. So after a somewhat spirited exchange, containing the words "do not!" and "you big stupid!" rather more often than is seemly for two people whose combined age reaches well, well into triple digits, a challenge was issued: Each of us would buy from InsightOut (GLBTQ book club) a novel wholly and entirely about the other's preferred romantic partnerings. I bought Greetings from Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer.
Oh blessèd day. I snorted, howled, giggled, and generally made unseemly noises the entire time I was reading...make that devouring...the book. My then-love interest, the lamented Mr. Man, got so curious he read it too. He laughed, or the relationship would've ended sooner.
I sent the book to another friend, and she howled her way through it. She sherpa'd the sequel, recommending it to me, and keeping me abreast (!) of developments in Mari SanGiovanni's personal life. The fact that I'm finally reviewing the book is due to the fact that I need to get it in the mail to yet another friend who read the first one after several of us pummeled him into reading the first one (he's a straight boy, poor thing, so it took a wee tiny bit of coaxing). Having done so, he's fallen for Marie, Lisa, and Lorn just like the rest of us, and is looking forward to reading more about them.
Little does he know. (Close your eyes, Mark! Spoilers from here on out!)
Mari has made Marie's life easier in this book: She's broken up with Lorn, whose career as a movie star means more to her than her love for Marie, she's got money, and her lunatic out-there Italian family (a lot like several Italian families I know, all up in each other's business and as full of questions and demands as any police interrogator) go to work together. Marie gets to leave Lorn's orbit and lick her wounds, Lisa the older sister who's also a dyke gets to hit on the girls around and about, and so does Vince the youngest child, a straight boy (such a pity, that).
Vince does bring Erica, his girlfriend, into the picture.
Oh well, so much for family harmony. Erica falls in love with Marie, Marie goes back to Lorn, Erica leaves for Italy, and there's a romantic ending that made me mist over. Not before, however, I'd snorted and guffawed a lot. There's the clamdigging scene, with Lisa at her inappropriate best/worst. Think I hurt myself laughing, retching, laughing, and shuddering.
So anyway, off this book goes to its new daddy. I hope he hides it from his wife, there is a goodly amount of lesbian sex of the detailed sort in it. I skimmed. Fast. Now if I can just read this address...I find it improbable that he lives in "Olympus Mons, JI" since we haven't colonized Mars yet. I must've written the address down while still laughing about the clamdigging scene.
The Publisher Says: Just when you thought it was safe to pitch your tent, the Santora family shows up. Lisa's taken over a rundown campground, baby sister Marie's been dumped (again!) by the actress, and the Santoras don't know the meaning of minding their own business. When the whole clan decides to fix things for their girls, it's a hilarious recipe for havoc. Camptown Ladies is the sequel to Greetings From Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer.
Mari SanGiovani lives the crazy Italian family lifestyle and writes about it like no one else.
My Review: Okay, see, it started like this. A few years ago, I was having a discussion with an old, old, old dyke of my acquaintance (I mean, born in the first Truman administration! And not dead yet!) about how gay men don't support lesbian writers and publishers of lesbian-themed books, and fewer straight men do this than straight women support gay smexy-time publishers. (I suspect ZERO straight men read gay smexy-time books, they're too skittish about the whole thing, poor lambs.) (BTW, when exactly did you dirty, dirty ladies start using men together as bubble-machine starter? I am shocked, shocked!)
Back to my story. So after a somewhat spirited exchange, containing the words "do not!" and "you big stupid!" rather more often than is seemly for two people whose combined age reaches well, well into triple digits, a challenge was issued: Each of us would buy from InsightOut (GLBTQ book club) a novel wholly and entirely about the other's preferred romantic partnerings. I bought Greetings from Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer.
Oh blessèd day. I snorted, howled, giggled, and generally made unseemly noises the entire time I was reading...make that devouring...the book. My then-love interest, the lamented Mr. Man, got so curious he read it too. He laughed, or the relationship would've ended sooner.
I sent the book to another friend, and she howled her way through it. She sherpa'd the sequel, recommending it to me, and keeping me abreast (!) of developments in Mari SanGiovanni's personal life. The fact that I'm finally reviewing the book is due to the fact that I need to get it in the mail to yet another friend who read the first one after several of us pummeled him into reading the first one (he's a straight boy, poor thing, so it took a wee tiny bit of coaxing). Having done so, he's fallen for Marie, Lisa, and Lorn just like the rest of us, and is looking forward to reading more about them.
Little does he know. (Close your eyes, Mark! Spoilers from here on out!)
Mari has made Marie's life easier in this book: She's broken up with Lorn, whose career as a movie star means more to her than her love for Marie, she's got money, and her lunatic out-there Italian family (a lot like several Italian families I know, all up in each other's business and as full of questions and demands as any police interrogator) go to work together. Marie gets to leave Lorn's orbit and lick her wounds, Lisa the older sister who's also a dyke gets to hit on the girls around and about, and so does Vince the youngest child, a straight boy (such a pity, that).
Vince does bring Erica, his girlfriend, into the picture.
Oh well, so much for family harmony. Erica falls in love with Marie, Marie goes back to Lorn, Erica leaves for Italy, and there's a romantic ending that made me mist over. Not before, however, I'd snorted and guffawed a lot. There's the clamdigging scene, with Lisa at her inappropriate best/worst. Think I hurt myself laughing, retching, laughing, and shuddering.
So anyway, off this book goes to its new daddy. I hope he hides it from his wife, there is a goodly amount of lesbian sex of the detailed sort in it. I skimmed. Fast. Now if I can just read this address...I find it improbable that he lives in "Olympus Mons, JI" since we haven't colonized Mars yet. I must've written the address down while still laughing about the clamdigging scene.
March 19, 2012
Mari SanGiovanni's novel Camptown Ladies is her second novel about the Santora clan, a typical Italian-American family that includes two lesbian sisters, a straight brother and the craziest parents and relatives that one can imagine. Like Ms SanGiovanni's first novel, Welcome to Jamaica, Wish You Were Queer, Camptown Ladies begins with nonstop laughter. Although there are some scenes that tug at the heart and caused a few tears, like her first novel, Ms SanGiovanni takes the readers on a thrilling roller coaster ride that is a combination of humor, drama, angst and romance. Although you don’t have to read Welcome to Jamaica… in order to follow the antics of this crazy family, why wouldn’t you? No, seriously, why wouldn’t you have read Ms SanGiovanni’s first novel? If you’ve never read Ms SanGiovanni’s novels, I urge you to purchase both and devour them, as I did. You will not be disappointed.
August 19, 2012
I really enjoyed reading this book. It's fast-paced and funny, and you just want to keep on reading. The storyline was very predictable and the cluelessness of the main character annoyed me a bit, but besides that it was a pretty good sequel.
August 9, 2012
This is such a feel-good book! I loved reading it and it made me laugh out loud several times!
August 7, 2022
Although it wasn’t as good as Greetings From Jamaica, I did love it and can’t wait to read 80% done with straight girls.
April 4, 2012
Roof-ripping love and laughter!
Mari SanGiovanni has hit the mark at the top of the gay humor meter with her second book, Camptown Ladies. The Santori family goes camping, not as paying guests, but as part of the work crew that got wrangled into helping the new campground owner whip the overgrown plot in Rhode Island back into camper-habitable shape. The ball-busting owner and head hauncho of the restoration project is a dyke named Lisa, who plans to restore more than the run-down bathhouses; she plans to install marble countertops in the boys bathhouses and have a five-star Italian restaurant on site! She also hopes to get her siblings’ minds off their love-torn hearts—both Marie and Vince have just ended relationships with significant others.
Things seem a little out of order when Lisa hires a decorator to assist with the interior design of the dilapidated buildings. Eddie is putting his heart and boa into it when—almost as an afterthought—Lisa hires a contractor who decides to rip the roofs off the buildings and install authentic Italian clay tiles. This is no ordinary contractor though; this is Erica—the beloved character we met in Mari’s first book, Greetings from Jamaica. Erica has just broken up with Vince. Will they get back together? And what about Marie? She has just lost her actress lover. Will she find love again?
The gay-lesbian humor in this book is not for everyone. If you are prejudiced or can’t laugh at gay boys and drag queens parading around in silk bras, or the potty-mouthed dykes flirting with one another at the dinner table, this book probably isn’t for you. I give the book five stars because the well-developed story is very touching (in more ways than one), and because I love the way this author reminded me that love knows no limitations and how she kept me laughing out loud from beginning to end.
Mari SanGiovanni has hit the mark at the top of the gay humor meter with her second book, Camptown Ladies. The Santori family goes camping, not as paying guests, but as part of the work crew that got wrangled into helping the new campground owner whip the overgrown plot in Rhode Island back into camper-habitable shape. The ball-busting owner and head hauncho of the restoration project is a dyke named Lisa, who plans to restore more than the run-down bathhouses; she plans to install marble countertops in the boys bathhouses and have a five-star Italian restaurant on site! She also hopes to get her siblings’ minds off their love-torn hearts—both Marie and Vince have just ended relationships with significant others.
Things seem a little out of order when Lisa hires a decorator to assist with the interior design of the dilapidated buildings. Eddie is putting his heart and boa into it when—almost as an afterthought—Lisa hires a contractor who decides to rip the roofs off the buildings and install authentic Italian clay tiles. This is no ordinary contractor though; this is Erica—the beloved character we met in Mari’s first book, Greetings from Jamaica. Erica has just broken up with Vince. Will they get back together? And what about Marie? She has just lost her actress lover. Will she find love again?
The gay-lesbian humor in this book is not for everyone. If you are prejudiced or can’t laugh at gay boys and drag queens parading around in silk bras, or the potty-mouthed dykes flirting with one another at the dinner table, this book probably isn’t for you. I give the book five stars because the well-developed story is very touching (in more ways than one), and because I love the way this author reminded me that love knows no limitations and how she kept me laughing out loud from beginning to end.
July 28, 2020
I love this book and it is one that I go to when I need to laugh out loud. A little bit vulgar, a lot slapstick , this book is full of love and affection.
If you want a book full of heart and great comedy then this is a great read.
If you want a book full of heart and great comedy then this is a great read.
June 30, 2013
Oh my god. This book was hilarious! Great summer read!
November 24, 2012
I laughed all the way through it...well done Mari.
March 22, 2013
Couldnt put book down and im not an avid reader. But I can picture everything that was happening in this book. Waiting for the next book!!
May 26, 2013
great sense of humor.
May 25, 2014
Like the first book, we continue to read about Marie and her wonderful Italian family! Very funny like its predecessor!
December 11, 2023
Fun, laugh-out-loud book about three Italian loud, boundary-less siblings. The two sisters are gay and the brother is not. The clever gay puns and humor make this a joyful read.
August 14, 2014
Hmmm....I had high hopes for Mari's second book. Sadly, the same character development (or lack thereof) problems persist. Sure, same zany family from her first novel but in a new setting, and the storyline feels again a bit contrived. I would have given this two stars but grammar and lack of editing are worthy of a one-star subtraction. Perhaps all of this explains the state of the two remaining unpublished (?) books listed under her name? Peace, out!
March 29, 2013
More Santora family insanity. Fun, funny but like all family vacations--shorter is sweeter. Not sure this family saga has it in it to book another trip. Hope Mari can dream up a new plot line for future books. Whatever happened to Liddy Jean?
January 16, 2014
This was fun to read, easy, though I liked her other book better. Perhaps because second time around the jokes get predictable (same family, same general topics) so it's not novel and that makes it less funny.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews