Nymph Book

Nymph is a collection of intertwined short stories. It starts with a quote from Ovid's Metamorphosis, "My intention is to tell of bodies changed to different forms." That quote is not only the underlying theme, but also hints at the mythical feeling infusing all of Francesca Lia Block's writings. The erotic and fantastic, the far-fetched, and the everyday with a twist are all combined. At the heart of the stories is a woman named Plum. She has the love gift, which benefits everyone but her. Shortly after having sex with her, each person finds the man or woman of his or her dreams.

In Milagro, she has sex with her closest male friend, Santiago, and discovers a secret about him that she really knew all along. In Nymph, Plum has sex with her closest female friend, Sylvie, to ease her pain and loneliness. An aging surfer dude loses his edge in Mer, but regains it with a mythical lover. In Spirit, the spirits of lovers long dead enliven the nearly dead sex life of a married couple. A sexy nurse and a dying young man fuck like there's no tomorrow in Milk. A woman tries to escape from being the object of men's fantasies in Goddess. Change is about the opposite; a woman wishes that she could be all of the beautiful women in the world while having sex with her boyfriend. In Fox, a sex therapist has to deal with urgently pressing ethical issues. In the story bearing her own name, Plum meets the man who may be the one to end her gift.

The stories are typical of Block. They're oozing with ultra swanky hipness and girlish dreaminess, yet are surprisingly and graphically sexual in content. The sinister atmosphere of Goddess, the pornographic sappiness of Milk, the surreal nostalgia of Mer, and the overlapping lives of the characters are all brought together with a smooth precision. I read Nymph all the way through, but the stories are also strongly independent of each other. Hopefully, Block will write more for adults in the future.