Reviews for Swimming sweet arrow

The average rating for Swimming sweet arrow based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2014-02-19 00:00:00 Hoa Tran God, I loved this book when I first read it. Still do, as a matter of fact. Yeah, yeah to the pearl-clutchers who call it "vile" and "pornographic" (you must be SO much fun to hang out with!) just because the main character is a girl who actually enjoys sex! GASP HORROR SHOCK. The tale of Vangie growing up and eventually, growing apart from those she once held dear, really hit my heart. It's one of the more realistic depictions of sex - in all its messiness - that I've ever read, and the dirty fun of the characters, and their intimate, raw lives, just never gets boring. It strikes close to the bone with so much of the story - the friends who realize they really don't know each other anymore, the many many variations of sex, the rape, the pain, the awful squalid chicken farm, and the reality that becoming an adult sometimes means letting go of childish things. Highly recommended - mainly, for its perfect characterization of Vangie, and for an author who isn't afraid to make her main character sexual. Love.

Review # 2 was written on 2011-02-02 00:00:00 Frank Shepard Maureen Gibbon’s novel, Swimming Sweet Arrow, is something of a surprise. The first surprise might be the very graphic sex. But the second surprise will most definitely be how affecting the novel’s narrator, 18 year old Vangie, is. “When I was eighteen, I went parking with my boyfriend Del, my best friend June, and her boyfriend Del. What I mean is that June fucked Ray and I fucked Del in the same car, at the same time.” Gibbon establishes Vangie’s voice- at once innocent and experienced- from the novel’s opening lines and from that moment on it’s hard to stop turning the pages as a year in Vangie’s life unfolds. Vangie graduates from high school, moves in with Del, parties incessantly and slowly begins climbing out of her youth and into her adulthood. The success of the book is the way in which Gibbon writes Vangie, a character who never shies away from who she is or what she wants. And even when she makes horrible mistakes in judgment, Vangie never passes the buck. Despite the subject matter, which might be too-graphic for some, Vangie’s search for meaning, for love, and for a place to belong is a thing of beauty.