What shall we do, all of us?
All of us passionate girls who fear crushing the boys we love with our mouths like caverns of teeth, our mushrooming brains, our watermelon hearts?
What's real is what's imagined in nine tales of transformation by Francesca Lia Block.
From School Library Journal
Grade 10 Up—Block is known for her fantastical, edgy, and highly feminized stories of young women, and this book fits neatly into that mold. Blood Roses consists of nine loosely connected short selections focusing on elemental and magical changes in each character. In "Skin Art," straitlaced Elodie Sweet finds tattoos mysteriously appearing on her body as romantic tension—and obsession—builds between herself and an older tattoo artist. With each new tattoo, her perception of herself grows and changes, but she ultimately finds that the tattoos are only superficial and disappear as she realizes that she is not in love with the man. In "Wounds and Wings," Audrey finds a fairy whose wings have been cruelly torn off. She takes him home to nurse him to health and learns to see the similarity between his injuries and insecurities and her own. The characters walk a fine line between the mundane and magical. It is impossible to decide if they are sane or not, or if it even matters. Blood Roses , like Block's other books, brims with sexual suggestion that is meant for more mature teens. This short book will appeal to reluctant readers, though Block's fans will find it on their own.— Stephanie L. Petruso, Anne Arundel County Public Library, Odenton, MD
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From Booklist
“What shall we do, all of us? All of us passionate girls who fear crushing the boys we love with our mouths like caverns of teeth, our mushrooming brains, our watermelon hearts?” Block’s latest book, featuring eight new stories and one reprint, explores female sexuality with wild poetry and a sense of vulnerability that extends to the book’s cover, a discreetly posed nude photo of the author. The stories, which read with brief, flashing intensity, are more like dark, fantastical dreams than developed narratives. Block combines elements used in her previous books—predatory adults, threatened girls, a natural world that both harms and heals, and the terrifying, infinite power of the imagination—to create strange, evocative scenes filled with archetypal fantasy characters, L.A. teens, and sly social commentary. In “My Mother Is a Vampire,” a girl’s mother, struggling in a youth-obsessed culture, drinks her daughter’s blood to stay young. In two of the strongest stories, girls’ bodies are dramatically transformed by the strength of their sexual desires. As disjointed as nightmares, the stories will startle, provoke, and fascinate many older teens, who may find reassurance in one character’s raw, closing message: “You are not fucked up. . . . Your world is fucked up . . . and you are just responding normally to its psychotic vibe.” Grades 10-12. --Gillian Engberg