"Blood Roses" by Francesca Lia Block (Joanna Cotler Books, ISBN
9780060763848, $15.99)
Francesca Lia Block may well be my favorite author: I certainly own more of
her books (15 and counting) than anyone else's. She's more magical, winged,
and punk-rock than Alice Hoffman, with a similar belief in the
all-consuming, all-transforming power of romantic longing, and a penchant
for lush, detailed descriptions of vintage outfits and ethnic foods and the
streets and canyons of L.A. But she's spent her career in the young adult
ghetto, because her main concern, I think, is reaching out to the awkward,
fledgling souls of teenage girls, taking them by the hand, and leading them
out of the twisted expectations of our culture into a joyful and
color-saturated space where who they are is enough. That's what she did for
me when, at 14, I picked up her debut novel Weetzie Bat. I suppose there are
some well-adjusted adolescents that don't need her books: but for the sake
of all the weird, smart girls at the back of the room, I'm glad she's still
writing.
"Blood Roses" is a series of tiny, perfect short stories. A girl kissed by a
David-Bowie-listening painter grows gigantic in her joy; Elodie, in love
with a tattoo artist, finds her skin spontaneously generating art; an
equestrienne meets the perfect boy in the shape of a West L.A. gang-member
centaur. I read this at a gallop--half an hour for a hundred pages. These
tales are like sips of ambrosia.
Review by Anna
Perleberg, May 22, 2008
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