Sarah Ditum reviews Grace Lavery’s book

[SpiderVersed]

She’s got a point, the pun in the title is very good. But otherwise Lavery is saying the quiet part out loud.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/d95d9e92-85e7-11ec-b939-57ea9f594ba1?shareToken=8d58838e7b97ce21a4181d7bff0f91df

‘heterosexuality with pretensions’!

Well.

No comment.

That was quite something!

Oh my!

Mumsnet gets a mention too.

That is going to be quite the read. It is surely so deliberately confrontational and offensive to get it talked about.

I wonder if that debate with Helen Joyce is going to go ahead. Roll on Lavery's promo tour.

I feel Sarah deserves a for her commitment to the team, reading all these books and reporting back so the rest of us can avoid.

@FannyCann

I feel Sarah deserves a for her commitment to the team, reading all these books and reporting back so the rest of us can avoid.

Absolutely!!! I feel like I need some mind bleach after reading the review. Not sure I could read the actual book.

Thanks for posting the share token @SpiderVersed. Came over here to find one! Very grateful to Sarah Ditum for reading this nonsense so I don't have to. GL went to my son's old school 😬 I've no idea what they now teach on gender stuff though - my son left before it became an issue. Though I've not seen the school celebrating GL in the way they do Lee Child, also a former pupil.

More sunlight into what is actually going on here. I haven't noticed many mentions of Torrey Peters in the UK media recently. When Torrey's book came out there was a massive hoopla and it was shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction. And then people actually read it.

Thanks Sarah for reading this so nobody else has to.

Lavery is married to Daniel, a trans man — a union that they consider “extremely gay” but from the outside looks more like heterosexuality with pretensions.

Loved this.

The bit about the semi-erect penis and the miscarried foetus...

How insulting to women who've lost pregnancies. Biological women. Actual women, I mean.

The bit about the semi-erect penis and the miscarried foetus...

Yup, vile.

Yes, but it seems a trans person using it as a literary device expects to get away with it... because... intended offensive to lift book sales.

(they will come out with, OF COURSE I didn't mean it. Gosh, how hateful of you to hold me to a high level of showing any sensitivity at all)

I think people need to read and understand this.

This is the world young transitioners are being drawn into, whether they understand it or not. Grace is just articulate and says the quiet bits out loud.

'sexy wees' (not envy)

What this bit: her penis...feels “as though I were laying my own miscarried foetus across my hand”.

Having once held my own miscarried foetus, whilst doubled over in pain, I am so looking forward to the lib fem cheer leaders to tell me how vile I was, in all my cis het privilege, to have done such a thing, and how brave and stunning Miss Lavery is for her celebratory penis book.

I hope Sarah Ditum doesn't get PTSD having to read this type of utter filth.

@LilithOfEden

I felt sick reading that too. Monstrous thing to say.

Lavery is vile.

'her penis...feels “as though I were laying my own miscarried foetus across my hand”.'

Absolutely fucking vile. Could not be more offensive or more contemptuous of women

And the sexy bathroom stuff ... Weeing, pooing, wiping your bum, changing bloody pads and tampons. Yes, thrilling stuff 🙄

@LilithOfEden

I am so sorry for your pain. I have had miscarriages as well but never held my angel babies. I cannot imagine the pain of that.

This person can write this and is celebrated. And JK Rowling has trigger warnings on her books for saying that biological sex exists.

I am at loss for words.

There's this weird "I am trying to be obnoxious, therefore if you think I'm obnoxious, I won" thing that a lot of Twitter denizens of the Wokoid cluster do. You know, the "pee pee poo poo" lot.

I think Lavery is considerably older than most of those, but it strikes me as the same mentality.

I couldn't deal with that weird, faux valley girl 'like, really?' writing style. I never can quite believe Grace is an academic.

As Sarah Ditum points out, this is a book that exists to provoke^^ so is probably best ignored. But I find it is always, always possible to dislike this person a little bit more every time they show up.

I don't know how to clean my brain from thinking about that book. Do I use Listerine? Soap? Or just gargle with bleach?

Of all people to provoke, why choose women who have experienced miscarriage?

Lavery apparently doing a launch event at the university of Exeter, of all places.

Tickets are free from Eventbrite.

'This person can write this and is celebrated. And JK Rowling has trigger warnings on her books for saying that biological sex exists.'

Well said. What an absolute mess we're in