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Don't Go There

Don't Go There - Kate Genet This story is about a high school girl, Scarcity/Fliss slowly pushing herself on 'the only other lesbian in town', Theresa. A new landowner in a dust speck village. Theresa in turn cannot control her impulses and bids the girl to leave with at times only half-hearted pushing. What does the younger girl see in the artist who lives in the woods painting portraits of dogs wearing tiaras? By the way. I have given a full point to this review as I have painted family dogs before, watercolor, and wasn't happy unless the owner of the dog cried with the unveiling of the portrait.

Maybe it was Fliss's youthful optimism and devotion that got to me and had me adding stars to my review. These traits are nice and uplifting to witness. I did not initially see the attraction to Theresa, however. As a character, she is unsympathetic but I applaud the author for using a flawed person. She eventually did learn the consequences, again I might add, of her living out amoral compulsions.

Does Theresa fall in love or like with Fliss or does she just like her nubile sex appeal? With Teresa having difficulty in ever saying "no" to physical pleasure from anyone she fancies I could not call this story a romance. With the younger girl, 17, Fliss, maybe talking about final exams twice in the book, and hardly any mention or interaction with her peers I would not call this YA. Have we learned anything from reading this? What would our reaction be to a young girl repeatedly, obsessively visiting a man for example?

This book is difficult to rate. One the one hand the age difference between the romantic leads bothers me and on the other.... wait..... it still bothers me. I, myself, changed dramatically (for the better!) between 17 and 25. The author could've had Fliss be 19, working in a burger joint and living with her psychotic cop brother and still had a story.

I enjoyed the English used in the writing of this, the dialect and new Zealand expressions.