Divine Victim

Rating:
Summary: Lesbian gothic thriller
Review: Mary Wings is the author of the witty and entertaining Emma Victor series. With Divine Victim, Wings achieves higher and succeds. It is a dark, haunting story that links, surprisingly, lesbianism and the Roman Catholic faith. Other components of the story include art, art history and cloistered life.
The narrator's girlfriend Maryam inherits a house and a considerable fortune from her aunt Rebecca, on the condition that she has to live in the house one year. In Rebecca's house the narrator comes accross strange objects such as a nun's habit and a box full of red human hair. She become's interested in Rebecca's life and the secret that her house seams to hide. Meanwhile, someone is after the narrator, and it is not only the traumatic memories from her past, of her former lover Ilona and of their nightmarish trip to Italy.

Rating:
Summary: Another Treat
Review: Too bad Wings has some books out of print, because she is a delight to read. If you read her books chronologically, you can see her phenomenal growth as a writer. Her characters live and breathe on the page, and as she writes more her elements become more rounded and subtly shaded. In Divine Victim she does not disappoint. This more serious effort deals with more difficult issues. Who else could bring together Montana, Lesbian issues, and Catholicism in such a readable book? No one but Mary Wings. I always count on her to show me what I cannot always experience for myself. For my sake I hope she delves lesser known entities as well, such as a Lesbian Southern Baptist, or Baha'i, for example.