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In Review

21 November 2008 22:45 BST

The Dirty Bits for Girls edited by India Knight

Published by Virago, out now, hardback, 266 pages, £10.

In a nutshell…

Compendium. Jolly. Romp. Bizarre. Enjoyable.

What's it all about?

It’s a light romp through all the dog-eared reads which girls supposedly read in secret and whispered about in boarding school forms and suchforth. India Knight puts short introductions on each clip which are enjoyable by virtue of their distinctiveness. Some chapters are the high-brow snippets you will have heard about before like DH Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover or James Joyce's Ulysses while others are accessible and fun, more along the lines of the very 80s Octavia by Jilly Cooper.

There are a few mysterious choices like Chaucer, Keats and Shakespeare which are tenuous additions given that these are books which girls apparently read and re-read with glee.

The more exotic Story of O by Pauline Reage and Delta of Venus by Anais Nin provide the ethereal and composed sexiness you probably wouldn't want to battle through yourself, but are quite happy to read the best bits of.

And Valley of the Dolls is a hoot.

Who's it by?

India Knight writes a column for The Sunday Times about parenting for children with special needs, a sometime blogger and also a bestselling author of Don't You Want Me and My Life On a Plate.

As an example…

"The taxi eases off, very slowly; nor has the man next to her said a word to the driver, But on the right, on the left, he draws down the little window shades, and the ones behind him too; thinking that he is about to kiss her or so as to caress him, she has slipped off her gloves. Instead he says.." – Story of 0, Pauline Reage

Likelihood of becoming a Hollywood blockbuster

Much though this would make a hilarious film, you'd have to be mad to turn some 21 books into a salient plot – so no.

However Anthony and Cleopatra, Lady Chatterley's Lover and Valley of the Dolls have all been turned into films.

What the others say

"When finding out about sex was a lot more fun" – The Sunday Times

"Inattentive book-buyers should beware. This is not an anthology of erotic writing for women" – Jane Shilling, The Scotsman

So is it any good?

Not as good a read as I thought it would be.

The sheer variety of inclusions from Keats where you have to put your thinking cap on, to My Secret Life by "Walter" where it all gets a bit too blunt, makes this hard to get into to and irksomely disjointed at best.

Though great fun for a 20-minute tube journey, it's hard not to worry what the banker behind you is thinking as you plod through The Passion Flower Hotel. Perhaps it would make a good starting point to a life of erotic books but I think your best bet is to get the Judith Krantz one and enjoy a longer, easier read with lots of over-the-top lingo.

It is also questionable to suppose that many of these excerpts are the sort of thing girls would read and reread with mirth. Keats? Ulysses? Judy Blume's Forever is a much-welcomed and sweet addition but it’s the only one I recognised.

Perhaps India's choices belong to a more booky older person than the title suggests, which disappoints.

6/10

Kate Lalor