Part 10 (1/2)

_Whisper His Sin._ Gold Medal pbo 1954, (m).

+ _The Evil Friends.h.i.+p._ pbo Crest 1958. Viciously condemnatory novel of two little girls of fourteen who, consequent to their lesbianish attachment, plot together and carry out ”a murder club”. Shuddersome, but, alas, well written. (Editorial query; why must so many of the detractors of lesbianism write such good books, while those who defend it are, all to often, of the Carol Hales ”quality”?)

_The Twisted Ones._ pbo, Gold Medal 1959, (m).

PARK, JORDAN. (pseud of Cyril Kornbluth). _Valerie._ pbo, Lion, 1953, 1957. Minor lesbian episodes in a novel of witch-hunting; the episodes occur at a Witches Sabbat. Evening waster.

PARKER, DOROTHY. ”Glory in the Daytime” in _After Such Pleasures_, N. Y., Viking 1934.

PATTON, MARION. _Dance on the Tortoise._ N. Y., Dial 1930.

Boarding-school novel; the heroine, repelled by the emotional friends.h.i.+ps around her, throws herself with relief into the arms of a man.

PAVESE, CESARE. _Among Women Only._ Noonday Press, qpb 1959 ($1.75). Recommended, highly tragic, novel by a writer considered, until his untimely death, one of Italy's best.

+ PETERS, FRITZ. _Finistere._ Farrar, Straus & Co 1951, pbr Signet 1953, (m).

+ PETRONIUS, _The Satyricon._ (the earliest known novel, written about the time of Christ; the last flush of the pagan world.) Trans. William Arrowsmith, University of Michigan Press, 1959.

This is also available in a highly expurgated Modern Library edition, n. d. Male, of course, and the Arrowsmith translation is hilarious and _very_ readable.

PEN, JOHN. _Temptation._ (trans. from the Hungarian by John Manheim,) Avon Red and Gold, 1959, (m). Fine picaresque.

PEYREFITTE, ROGER. _Special Friends.h.i.+ps._ NY, Vanguard 1950, (m).

+ PHELPS, ROBERT. _Heroes and Orators._ N. Y., McDowell & Oblensky 1958. Fine modern novel of family relations.h.i.+ps, containing a lesbian character described as the most real, human and sympathetic in recent years; Margot, in love with her ex-husband's sister Elizabeth. The two women live together, but any intimate relations.h.i.+p between them is disclaimed.

PHILLIPS, THOMAS HAL. _The Bitterweed Path._ Rinehart 1949, pbr Avon 1954, 1959, (m).

POWELL, DAWN. _A Cage for Lovers._ Boston, Houghton Mifflin 1957.

Mannish, wealthy hypochondriac keeps her nurse-companion in virtual slavery until the younger girl breaks away and marries.

Competent novel by a popular author.

PRIEST, J. C. _Private School._ Beacon pbo 1959 scv.

PRITCHARD, JANET. _Warped Women._ Beacon pbo 1951, 1956, 1959.

Despite the lurid blurb and cover, this is a nice evening waster about an innocent young girl who goes to work for a woman's health club which is, behind the scenes, an abortion mill run by gangsters. Fronting for the group, an attractive lesbian takes a fancy to the heroine, eventually protects her against the gangster boss at the risk of her own life. The heroine then marries a nice boy who's been telling her all along that the place is rotten.

Suspenseful, interesting.

PROUST, MARCEL. _Remembrance of Things Past_, the great work of the well-known French h.o.m.os.e.xual author, is available in many (virtually all except rural-provincial) libraries, numerous college editions, etc. Long sections are variant, male-h.o.m.os.e.xual or lesbian; bibliography would occupy entirely too much s.p.a.ce. Try a stray volume in qpb and see if Proust is your cup of tea-he isn't everyone's.

PURTSCHER, NORA. _Woman Astride._ Appleton-Century, 1934. Woman spends almost her entire life in male disguise. Offbeat, variant rather than explicitly lesbian.

PYKE, RICHARD. _The Lives and Deaths of Roland Greer._ NY, Boni 1929, (m). Horrifying.

RAVEN, SIMON. _The Feathers of Death._ London, A. Blond, 1959, Simon & Schuster 1960, (m).

RAYTER, JOE (pseud. of Mary McChesney). _Asking for Trouble._ Morrow 1955, pbr Pocket Books 1959. Murder mystery. A mannish, hard-boiled lesbian plays an important part.

REHDER, JESSIE. _Remembrance Way._ G P Putnam's Sons 1956.

Retrospective tale in which the heroine recalls a summer in girl's camp, when she was enslaved simultaneously to a domineering director (woman) and her daughter.