A Red Wonder

A Review of Red #40 by Beth Gutierrez

For decades … the feminist movement has asked the question … ' why men consider the woman's body to be a store house of delight ' … referring no doubt to the bane of women everywhere … as inexhaustible care-giver to the male … in their life. This question comes under … a sexually explicit inquiry … in the novella Red#40 … by one of our own … first time author … Beth Gutierrez … profile name Muse … here at writer's cafe.

The flamboyant Ayn Rand … in her book ' The Fountainhead ' … pens a profound praise … for the groundbreaking achievements of the male … thinly veiled about the personality Frank Lloyd Wright … in the continued role of care-giver. Ms. Gutierrez does it differently in her novella. What she did … was to point at the female body and mind … and express an understanding of the way … her life … has brought her … to an understanding of her duties … as the ultimate care-giver … and to remind women … to also give to themselves.

Written with the attitude of the times … she begins her novel of self discovery … with a flirt … with what may have been an older man in the neighborhood … and introduces to the reader the oft perceived attitude of women … in association with the male company. In that bodily sensual encounter … she reveals her nervousness by spilling wine. Thereafter … she leads the reader on … with that attitude … and builds a world … that many experience in the coy demeanor of femininity.

The reader soon realizes … that she is sharing her boudoir … her panties … and the lush landscape of her body … as an instrument of understanding … in the life lived. She dismisses any apology … or even an attempt to explain her attitude. Instead … she teases her reader … by the audacious suggestion … that she is enraptured by her own beauty … and would like nothing more than … to f**k herself.

The reader quickly finds that this is no troubled woman … at the therapy couch of psychology. It is in fact … the matador … who plays with the charging bull … and is both bull and matador … but realizes that one … must albeit die … in their intimacy of relations. Its a novel about the heart and mind in love … with itself … and by extension … represents its qualities … in relation to others in society. It refers to the mystic union of the soul … with the higher self … and suggests a reflection of that in the DNA.

In the projected … relation between fantasy and reality … mind and heart … the soul and the creator … Ms. Gutierrez … walks hand in hand with anxiety … and finds in anxiety … the dynamism of life's impulses … gone wary … of living life to the full. She trashes them into wakefulness … and bares her body … mind and soul to it … in a match between champions … who are prepared to play the game to the end.

Having fallen in love with herself … she seeks the response of her lover … to her right to guide the wheel of life … to where she believes it ought to go. By doing so … she proves the point that … its not about knowing what you do … but rising to the challenge that life brings to us. She takes command of her own enthos impulses … and like any man … peers into the eyes of creation … to discern its purpose.

This she does … not by mucking around in gay clubs … but in the home … that she lives in … as a normal member of society. Neither does her novel … play games of intrigue with her lover … like the Pillow Book of the Oriental. Instead she introduces her intent clearly … divides the Narcissus … into two halves … to express her belief in the way love should be … between two persons. She makes the call to share … and to relate as equals. When faced with a wide view of the possibilities … she suddenly feels a sense of relation to the presence of divinity … that she describes as … ' It would be our final reminder that not even death can keep us apart.'

The legendary Nike of Samothrace … first brought the instrument of the winged wonder to the world … in the 2^nd century bc … and in the inspiration that followed … the people of Greece … defeated the Persian navy … and brought the experience of independent self determination to western civilization. Ms. Gutierrez does the same winged wonder … to the cause of women for self understanding … and asks the reader to decide … what is real.

Her write … and prose style … borrows heavily on her personal fantasies and notions … and goes into a voyeur's delight of the unreachable … bringing the reader to examine details of their body … from the lips of the vagina … the c**t … breasts … and the glorious feel of sexual adequacy … that is expressed physically … in bed with herself. The story comes full circle … to the beginning … but this time … its her lover who spills the wine.

Unlike the usual pornographic novel … it relies on the graphic nature of porn … to break the doors to the mind … that is set up by the body's fear of shame … and goes boldly … to not only say that sex is great … but its even greater when you understand it. The book doesn't have a fairy tale ending … but creates the intimation … that one woman may be just beginning to perceive … a new life of equality … and understanding. And she doesn't ask to be treated equal … but plasters her message on the billboards … of the Tallulah Bankhead Boulevard … to say they know. Red # 40 … a 25-page novella is free to read at Smashwords .. https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/Muse78. Don't miss it!