Fireworks

I've moved on from the calculated restraint of Ishiguro to the pyrotechnics of Jeanette Winterson's Sexing The Cherry. It's been a good while since I've picked up anything by the lady. I read the first novel, Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit, some fifteen or sixteen years ago based, surprisingly, on the recommendation of a Principal I was working under and immediately followed up with this one for reasons I can no longer remember. What I do remember is being a bit irritated by the wilful obscurity of the texts and a tiny bit suspicious that the packaging was hiding a very fragile gift. Viewing subsequent appearances by Ms Winterson on various television programme didn't instill much confidence She struck me as more than a little tiresome and more than a little in love with her own ideas.

So when I found her singled out for a particularly unkind skewering in John Carey's What Good Are The Arts? I wasn't entirely surprised. He may have been unkind but he was deadly accurate regarding her ideas about art.

So I found myself rather pleased to be thoroughly enjoying Sexing The Cherry rather than standing in miserable critical judgement over it. It's got energy and as long as you don't bother too much about where it's going it turns out to be a pleasantly funny journey, well so far at least. Oh, and I like the paperback edition I've got it in. From the Grove Press, New York. Rather handsome