Reviews for The Femme Mystique

The average rating for The Femme Mystique based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2016-05-13 00:00:00 Jeff Hans I know this book was written by our femme ancestors and has value for telling their truths in the context of their place in history but I hated this book. I identify as femme but I did not find myself in the pages of this book. The vast majority of stories told the same narrative again and again. Each woman was ashamed of her femininity and then was rescued by a butch. Again and again the women insisted they need only define themselves for themselves then turned around and insisted their identity existed only in the context of being a foil to a butch. "Being single is the worst isolation for a femme..." p 167. Even worse these women spoke of their struggle to be recognized as queer women then insisted on calling women they slept with (sometimes for years) straight women despite these partners telling them otherwise. I think the worst was the lack of recognition for internal misogyny. Some of the women even went so far as to avoid the term "femminity" instead saying"femme-inity" in order to distance themselves from what they clearly deemed lesser. This also undermines the ability of non-queer women to examine and participate in certain gender expressions in the same powerful way as queer women. Very depressing read.

Review # 2 was written on 2012-11-10 00:00:00 Andy Kurniawan I found myself among the pages of The Femme Mystique. For the first time ever, I heard of another gay woman who felt as I did; a love of purses, heels, dresses, lingerie...Femme. Thank goodness for Leslea Newman. I was finally able to put away the wallet, jeans, and Doc Martins that I thought I was resigned to wear within my identitiy as lesbian. I now embrace the Femme in me and love a woman who also embraces me as Femme.