Young and innocent

Young and innocent

139 pages

18 cm

Damon, Gene. "Young and Innocent." Ladder, vol. 5, no. 1, January 1960, p. 12.

Despite the misleading information on the blurb, this is a first novel by a feminine author. Disregarding the usual formula, "Edwin West" has attempted to show the inner workings of a successful lesbian marriage disrupted by a combi¬nation of petty events and the simultaneous appearance of a desirable young girl. Lavinia Cartwright and Sandra Keel are both fully adult, intelligent women and the whys and wherefores of their lives are thoroughly examined as they live together, and separately, through the crisis of Lavinia's brief interest in another woman. At the publisher's insistence, some of this novel has pointless additives, but the practiced reader will have no difficulty in separating the good from the bad, commendable for its unusual aspect of the lesbian relationship, one hopes to see more from this author.

"Too arousing for youth- the heroine is a lesbian & glorified as such.
The details of sex between male & female & female & female are a bit too sordid."

"Trash from start to end.
Notice ads in back of book, they tell just where to get books if not found on stands.
Wish there could be something done to publishers of this type of trash."

They were twilight lovers in the world between the sexes.

Twilight Lovers
Anita - An innocent, unawakened girl caught up in New York's smart publishing set. . .
Lavinia - her older but seductive boss with a reputation for making out with young men, but secretly a lover of girls like Anita . . .
Barry - Who has sworn off females till he is forced to prove to Anita that she is a normal woman - and to Lavinia that she is not. . .
These three form the explosive triangle that gives thrust to this electrifying novel about the private, off-beat lives of Manhattan's glamourous career girls.

The heads of two women are centred over a brushstroke stripe of lime green over a solid, light tan background. A blonde in the foreground, a brunette partly behind her. The blonde has her eyes closed, and her mouth is slightly open. Her hair is long and curly, and she is wearing earrings. The brunette, whose hair is short and curly, looks at her from behind her on the right of the image with her eyes slightly squinted and lips slightly parted. The scene is lit from the top right in hard light.