Tangled Sheets: Stories and Poems of Lesbian Lust

Britta Santowski is a freelance writer in Victoria, B.C.

This anthology of 17 short stories and 26 poems presents an array of
sexual (and sensual) lesbian encounters. Catherine Creede’s “Double
Vision” explores one lesbian’s fantasy in which she watches her
lover taking a man. Deb Ellis’s “Down on the Docks” and Kiss and
Tell’s “Edmonton” both depict the danger and the thrill of the
illicit public encounter. Judith P. Stelboum matches an inhibited
heterosexual woman with an uninhibited lesbian mentor in “Simple
Lessons for Beginners.” The poems, too, are delightful, vulgar, and
challenging works that employ language in a most erotic and sensuous
manner in their celebration of lesbian sex and the arousal of the
senses.

The collection is diverse, and includes everything from tops and
bottoms, butches and femmes to body-piercing, rubberwear, silk,
cat-o’-nine-tails, and strap-on dildos. In the last short story, Lucy
Jane Bledsoe brings us back to earth with her delightful tale of doing
it “The Old-Fashioned Way.” While most of the stories follow the
traditional progression from tension to climax, Sandra Haar’s and
Ellen Flander’s “All for You” plays on points of view relating to
desire in a passionate sexual encounter. As a whole, this collection
effectively channels all kinds of lesbian lust into a public forum and
explores its diverse and intimate dimensions.