Cheap Alma Mater (Book) (RITA MAE BROWN) Price

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Customer Reviews of Alma Mater

From a Declared Heterosexual Female . . . ;-)
With apologies to Rita Mae Brown, who is an accomplished writer, from a reader who most certainly is not: I liked some aspects of this book better than others.
Nobody I read "does" the southern family as well as she does, especially the loving, though usually tempestuous relationships between sisters. Her sense of humor is delightful -- she can be hilarious when making a serious point, which makes her message so much sweeter than preaching.
Brown is a woman's writer whose empathy is with her gender. However, in contrast to the rest of this amusing and well-told story, the Lesbian theme is handled somewhat ponderously and didactically. Gay men women, even today, may have a hard time being themselves, but I think that Lesbianism as a social issue has stopped being newsworthy or in need of defense. The book -- a very lighthearted one -- would not be the appropriate vehicle for socal comment, anyway. Brown does a grand job describing women relating to each other. Still, the sexual adventures of the Lesbian characters in this book are no more interesting (or amusing) than those of the heterosexual ones, and the book appears a bit lopsided in seeming to pretend to that.

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Disappointment
I love the Mrs. Murphy series, but Rita Mae Brown seems to flounder without the helping hand of Sneaky Pie. This book was just plain boring. There was a lot of supposedly "witty repartee" by Vic's family and friends that had nothing to do with the story and appeared to be in there just to show how cute they all were - I found myself starting to skim every conversation in the book. The "quirky" characters came across as demented and strange, and I got tired of all the emphasis on how beautiful Vic and Chris and various others were - I think this was supposed to be some political statement that not all lesbians are masculine and ugly, but she kept making this point over and over, and it got tiresome. Vic made more long, tedious speeches than a politician, and at times the book felt more like a lecture than a story, with some sex scenes thrown in that were also surprisingly dull, given how steamy they were - in fact, very little seemed to happen.
If this is your first Rita Mae Brown book, don't judge them all by this - the Mrs. Murphy series is a million times better.

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WOW!!!!!!!!!
This is truly the best book I have ever read! I could read it over and over again. It is like reading my life story in a book. Thank you Rita Mae Brown for the opportunity to read this wonderful novel.