{"id":837,"date":"2015-08-29T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-01-21T03:08:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/?p=837"},"modified":"2025-01-01T15:12:19","modified_gmt":"2025-01-01T02:12:19","slug":"lost-boi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/2015\/08\/29\/lost-boi\/","title":{"rendered":"Lost Boi"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Sassafras Lowery<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Arsenal Pulp Press\/Newsouth Books<\/em><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Otago Daily Times, August 29th 2015<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I have to admit to feeling a few moments of doubt about the palatability of Lost Boi<\/em> for mainstream readership after looking at the author\u2019s profile (Sassafras Lowrey describes hirself as a straight-edge queer punk who has been honoured by, among others, the National Leather Foundation). But although the novel is set firmly within a sexual counterculture, it is in fact a brilliantly original and engaging reimagining of J.M. Barrie\u2019s classic tale. In it, Lowrey creates a real-world analogue of Neverland in an abandoned industrial site occupied by a cast of characters who are excluded from \u2018mainstream\u2019 society because of their sexual identity and\/or preferences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here, were fairy-dust really IS fairy dust, the Crocodile heroin, and people really do fly. Pan\u2019s bois (biological females who identify as male, and who have abandoned, or been abandoned by, their birth parents) live out an anarchic fantasy, partying with the femme prostitutes of Mermaid House, and battling each other or with the BDSM fetishist Pirates led by the honourable, old-school Leather man, Hook.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the only place they have ever felt accepted or cared for and the bois\u2019 loyalty to their Sir is unwavering; their days dictated by Pan\u2019s rules and centred around attempts to win their leader\u2019s approval and affection. Then Pan brings home two newcomers to join the family; a new boi, John Michael and Wendi, a grrrl who slips into her new role as Mommy with a wholehearted enthusiasm that soon wins her a place next to Pan in their hearts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Pan soon becomes uncomfortable with the idea of playing Daddy, particularly when it becomes apparent that Wendi has ambitions to grow her bois into upstanding and successful members of society, and slowly drifts away from his family and deeper into the love-hate relationship with arch-enemy Hook, an ongoing battle for domination that dates back to the their first meeting when Pan introduced Hook to the Crocodile that is now his constant companion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The story is told from the perspective of Tootles, Pan\u2019s second in command, and contains all the elements of the original story. Although the characters strongly identify with a sexual \u2018underground\u2019, this is a world where \u2018no\u2019 really DOES mean \u2018no\u2019, and any physical references are far less confronting than much that is already considered mainstream. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lowrey provides just enough detail to allow the non-initiated reader to infer its workings without explicit detail or description, and leaves unfamiliar gender identifiers to be deciphered from context (or, just as effectively, left ambiguous). At its heart, Lost Boi<\/em> is a moving and believable examination of love, identity and the urge to belong that I personally found it much less unsettling than the original children\u2019s story. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.odt.co.nz\/entertainment\/books\/reimagining-jm-barries-classic-tale-set-sexual-counterculture<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sassafras Lowery
\n
\nOtago Daily Times review August 29th 2015<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[221,370,18,242,407],"class_list":["post-837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-reviews","tag-221","tag-fiction","tag-odt","tag-sassafras-lowery","tag-speculative-sci-fi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=837"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/837\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1785,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/837\/revisions\/1785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cushla.spooky-possum.org\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}