Rubyfruit Jungle
The first great lesbian coming-of-age novel to reach mainstream audiences. Molly Bolt's unashamed pursuit of love and selfhood blazed a trail through American culture at a moment when that trail genuinely needed to be blazed. Funny, defiant, and alive with erotic energy.
The novel's harshest critics focus on what it treats lightly. Several readers describe a forced kiss early in the book as flatly “the rape that isn't called rape,” and object that the text never names it as an assault. A critic goes further, citing “sexual consent thrown out the window, glorification of incest” in how the book handles an incestuous relationship between minor characters. Some reviewers also flag Molly's dismissive attitude toward butch lesbians as its own blind spot, and the sex scenes draw complaints too, with one reader calling stretches of the book “kind of like soft core porn.” Structurally, the novel reads as a string of disconnected episodes rather than a single arc, and Molly herself barely changes across it: a critic notes she “doesn't tend to care about anyone but herself.” Race is another sore point, since Molly's whiteness buys her mobility a Black character in the book is denied.
The case for it and the rest of the canon open with Pro.
