Bell, Book and Dyke: New Exploits of Magical Lesbians - Softcover

Karin Kallmaker; Julia Watts; Therese Szymanski; Barbara Johnson

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1594930236 ISBN 13: 9781594930232

Publisher: Bella Books, 2005

Synopsis

Lesbian Magic. The best-selling quartet that brought you Once Upon A Dyke unveils four deliciously different takes on magic in lesbian lives. Reluctant witches, tempting books, and beautiful bells―and belles―delve into the mysteries of love, lust and power.

Sex Magic. Be Skyclad with Julia Watts. Do it By the Book with Therese Szymanski. Find enchantment with Barbara Johnson's Lily and lose your reason with Karin Kallmaker's Unbeliever.

Woman Magic. Black cats, haunted houses, strange brews and dancing bonfires heat up the pages of this diverting quartet of erotic, imaginative tales. Curl up with a bell, a book and a dyke and let the magic be real.

About this title

About the Authors

Karin Kallmaker has always written about lesbians and love and isn’t likely to change. Her thirty+ novels include Painted Moon, Captain of Industry, and Maybe Next Time. She’s also written more than five dozen short stories and novellas. She has won three Lambda Literary Awards and is a Golden Crown Literary Society Trailblazer.

When she’s not writing books she’s thinking about books, enjoying life in the San Francisco Bay Area, or embarking on new adventures by plane, train, or automobile. Learn more at kallmaker.com or search social media or favorite book sites for “Kallmaker”―there’s only one.

Therese Szymanski is an award-winning playwright. She’s also been short-listed for a couple of Lammys, Goldies and a Spectrum, as well as having made the Publishing Triangle’s list of Notable Lesbian Books with the first anthology she edited. She’s edited five anthologies for Bella After Dark (BAD), written seven books in the Lammy-finalist Brett Higgins Motor City Thrillers series, one book in her new Shawn Donnelly mystery series, and had a few dozen short works published in a wide variety of books from numerous publishers.

A native of southeastern Kentucky, Julia Watts is the author of the Lambda Literary Award-winning Finding H.F. and many other works including lesbian romance, lesbian erotica and young teen paranormal. Watts is a two-time recipient of grants from the Kentucky Foundation for Women and recently completed an M.F.A. in Writing from Spalding University. She lives, writes and teaches in Knoxville, Tennessee.

From the Inside Flap

Clouds moved in to cover the night sky, making the darkness total and complete. It was still and hot. Even the ocean winds seemed to be stifled, for no breeze fluttered the bedroom curtains. The padding of kitty feet broke the quiet, a mere whisper of noise. In the gloom, cat eyes glowed.

Lily felt the hands on her body. They were warm and soft. She stretched into their caress, arching her back and willing them to touch every inch of her. Sea Witch, Barbara Johnson

Nothing was adding up to anything that meant anything at all and dear sweet Hecate I could only hope that it hadn t all fallen into the dark, evil realm of calculus, with all its imaginary numbers and equations that proved two-plus-two did not equal four. By the Book, Therese Szymanski

My world was pulsing to the movement of her hand. The light went and there was a hammering in my ears that let in only her gasps and my sharp cries. I was a wound coil, ever tightened by her body on mine. I tried for short, easy words like coming and more, but they were caught behind my bared teeth. Unbeliever, Karin Kallmaker

Chameleon changed into her pink poodle pajama bottoms and her Glinda of Oz T-shirt that read, "Are you a good witch or a bad witch?" Taking the question on her T-shirt personally, she thought of the choice she had made to go into the woods with Iris: "Tonight I was a bad witch. But I ll try to do better." Skyclad, Julia Watts

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

FOREWARD If we were in the mood to do so, we could expound at length on the long history of women, healers, midwives and workers of goddess magic. We could document the equally long history of oppression, violence and outright murder of so many of the women who dared to live outside their expected, constrained lives.

But that s not the mood we re in.

Regardless of history, being a lesbian in the twenty-first century already means living outside expected, constrained lives. Finding love, pleasure, community such simple things is for so many of us an every day wonder. Snatching happiness in the often violent world around us can render something as simple as holding hands an act of spiritual magic. That is what we mean by lesbian magic and it s what we ve tried to capture in this New Exploits volume.

Along the way we ve added a few black cats, some spell making, magic books, spooky twist and turns and a fair amount of just plain creepiness.

We re willing to admit, too, that when we contemplate a power that can leave us feeling as if a goddess has briefly visited our bodies, we re thinking about sex. Sex is the very magic that makes us lesbians. We have sex with other women, we enjoy it and we intend to share that joy through our stories.

That s the mood we re in.

---- Julia Watts & Karin Kallmaker

Edition details

• Publisher: Bella Books
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1594930236
• ISBN 13: 9781594930232
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 357