Books
JUNE ARNOLD (1926-1982) is the author of Applesauce (1966 ), The Cook and the Carpenter (1973), and Sister Gin (1975). Her fourth novel, Baby Houston, was published posthumously in 1987.
Sister Gin
Afterword by Jane Marcus
Aging, alcoholism, and lesbian consciousness are among the themes of this extraordinary novel. Innovative in style, it also stands squarely in the southern literary tradition, depicting with memorable hilarity a group of elderly female vigilantes who take local rape deterrence into their own hands.
"Sister Gin is a tour de force about lesbianism and alcoholism, fat and feminism, rape and race, falling in love with your lover's mother's girlfriend, and it has the very best description of hot flashes in literature."
"Sister Gin may well be the most provocative and invigorating novel to emerge from the women's liberation and lesbian feminist movements. With a dazzling command of language and characterization, June Arnold undermines our comfortable assumptions about age, sexuality, relationships, and politics. The Feminist Press deserves our gratitude for reissuing this long-lost classic and Jane Marcus our admiration for her insightful afterword."
"Sister Gin is a wildly imaginative and luminously tender novel about the risks involved in being honest women. June Arnold's angry, brassy, funny, and vulnerable lesbian love story is a gift to intelligent readers everywhere."
NEA Grant will help fund the digitization of 15 Feminist Press classics, and the publication of three extraordinary literary works: Savage Coast by Muriel Rukeyser, Kissing the Sword: A Prison Memoir by Shahrnush Parsipur, and The Silent Woman by Monika Zgustova.
