Greasepaint

"""Greasepaint stages a butch past that feels like it should be a future; and a version of New York that should be a galaxy. What’s more, the novel lends itself to playing ‘pick your favourite character’ with your gay friends like it were a boy band; and yet, it sings better. Levene is a talent to reckon with."" —Isabel Waidner ""New York finally has its Nightwood – or more Nightchrome, a dazzling, finger-snapping hymn to bar butches in black jeans and leather jackets with anarchist newsletters tucked in their back pockets. Greasepaint will WOW you with its catchy attunement to the complex popping rhythms of performing our rainbowed genders in a world that sees in monochrome, singing the songs we make ours by how we say ‘baby,’ to our own selves keeping kosher even when we’ve had to leave. If you’ve ever longed to eat a pink, pink Reuben while critiquing Gershwin’s racial appropriations, with Greasepaint, baby, you’re home."" —So Mayer ""Reading Greasepaint is like entering an old school dyke bar: the dark swirl of conversation, jokes, sass, anarchists, communists, butches and more butches. Turns of phrase have a sexy glint and a little strut. “Harry made the girls melt like tears into a pillow.” And what about Vic? She’s so butch the steak is hard to swallow. This isn’t a sentimental book. The oppression is severe. One character reflects, maybe she’s dead and this is hell, though sometimes it feels like heaven. I’m left with a sexy glee and sheer vitality blasted from the past. It’s absolutely refreshing."" —Camille Roy"