BRITAIN, SLOAN. The Needle. pbo Beacon Books, 1959. Overly contrived shocker about Gina, a young girl who falls simultaneously into narcotics, lesbianism, prostitution and the hands of a weird couple dabbling in incest. Evening waster, rather better than most but leaves a bitter taste.
+ First Person, Third Sex. pbo Newsstand.Library 1959. Very well-written novel of Paula Harman, young school-teacher coming to terms with her life as a lesbian through bitter experience. Don’t let the lurid paperback covers and blurb scare you off, this is a NOVEL—well worth hard covers and a steal at 35¢.
BROCK, LILYAN. Queer Patterns. Greenberg 1935, pbr Avon 1951, 1952. Purple-patched sloppily sentimental tale of Sheila, beautiful young actress with a perfect husband who nevertheless loses her heart to Nicoli, a stereotype lesbian complete with tuxedo. They part to avoid gossip and live unhappily ever after.
BROMFIELD, LOUIS. The Rains Came. N. Y. Collier 1937, pbr Bantam 1952. In a long novel of India there is a brief but important episode involving two old missionary ladies. The elder, an engaging old battleax, muses as she tucks the younger and sillier into bed that her friend had never understood why they had been driven out of the school where they had, as young girls, been teaching. Ironically, the nice old grim one is killed in a flood while the silly one remains to pester everybody.
Mister Smith, Harper, 1951; no pbr oh record, but your editor has owned one—perhaps an “Armed Forces” edition? (m). Four men, marooned on a desert island in WW2.
+ BROPHY, BRIGID. King of a Rainy Country. Knopf. 1957. Poignant novel of a young girl who lives with Neale, a young male homosexual, out of wedlock. They both become enamored with a portrait of Cynthia, a girl out of the childhood of the heroine....
BROWN, WENZELL. Prison Girl. pbo, Pyramid, 1958. One of many books documenting in painful detail the abuses prevalent in the women’s prison system, with special attention to the undeniable fact that the system breeds various sexual aberrations. A few of these books are excellent. This one isn’t.
BROWNRIGG, GAWEN. Star Against Star. N. Y., Macaulay, 1936. Story of a girl conditioned from childhood to lesbian affairs, first by an overly seductive mother, then by a school friend. The book has the doom-ridden atmosphere of its day, and is emotional and somewhat over-written.
BURNS, VINCENT G. Female Convict. Macaulay 1934, pbr Pyramid 1959. More women in prison and the unfortunate relationships developing among them.