Why, what a nice surprise!

bluepiano: Amazed to have been so absorbed in & entertained by this--I'd have thought a fat 17th-century novel something to be avoided like the plague.

bluepiano: Bought it because of ridiculously low price in 2nd-hand shop and, because authors were journalists not scholars, expected to like it mainly for the illustrations. Most of the text though was well-researched and thoroughly absorbing.

bluepiano: Expected good. Got wonderful

bluepiano: There was a chance this would be dry or repetitive or would deal at too much length with the incongruence of a lesbian sociologist attending Ann Summers parties. What it was, was a vivid account of these parties and the people attending them by an academic who wears her scholarship lightly.

bluepiano: Expected to be at some point bored by the book but not only was I interested in it, I learned quite a lot from it.

bluepiano: For several reasons hadn't great hopes for it. I was wrong.

bluepiano: Because it was a gift, i.e. someone chose it for me, I feared it wouldn't be to my taste. But it was.

bluepiano: I thought it fairly likely this would be simply pulpy he-man rubbish but it was only faintly so. Interesting, & will probably read it again.

bluepiano: Oh lord chicklit, thought I.--Not a bit of it: female characters act like intelligent and individualistic adults with better things to do than to excitedly squeal about Blahnik and potential husbands over wine at a giggly girls' night in.