Really, that was my reaction after reading Jill Nelson's novel Sexual Healing. The Sista has written one tough story. And, as a Brotha, I swear I will never go near another 40-something Sista as long as I live. I mean, Sista Jill's protagonists, Acey Allen and Lydia Beaucoup, scared me to death. These are two bad Sistas. They make me feel inadequate in every way, from head to toe. If you get my meaning.
Although Sexual Healing is satire, it does little to airbrush its intended targets - sundry middle-class African-Americans who have a warped view of sexuality and romance. For those who got their undies and skivvies all bunched up over Sista's Jill's bestselling Volunteer Slavery: My Authentic Negro Experience, they had better take a powder before reading Sexual Healing.
Sista Jill, a former Washington Post journalist, has written a fun book, an ill-mannered comedy of errors, a ribald tour through the psyche of 40-something African-American Sistas who want it all, all the time.
Here is a synopsis of Sexual Healing, Sista Jill's first novel: On a Sunday afternoon in Oakland, childhood friends Acey and Lydia luxuriate over a bottle of Taittinger. Sistaspeak, mid-career angst and expressions of man and romance deprivation flow like their champagne. You get the feeling they do this often.
Acey's current flame, Matthew, is rich and nice. But the Brotha is overweight and, to Acey's utter distress, is terrified of heavy lovemaking because of his recent triple-bypass surgery. The poor Sista has to console herself with memories of her deceased hubby, Earl. Lydia is in the middle of a nasty divorce from the good-looking Lorenzo, a low-down scoundrel who is demanding alimony. But get this: The Brotha is a rotten lover, and the sucka cannot keep a steady job. Lydia is a successful copy editor for a major ad agency, and Acey owns and operates a lucrative spa.
Not only are these Sistas at the top of their professions, they are "still fly." The problem is that their lives are empty. They are like two Beckett cut-outs searching for meaning.
Well, Lydia had an epiphany: They would create a business that satisfies the emotional and sexual needs and desires of Sistas like themselves. Just like that, A Sister's Spa is born. Located outside of Reno, Nev., it will be a "full-service" establishment where handsome, well-endowed black men fulfill every need and want of their clientele. For lack of a better description, A Sister's Spa is an old idea turned on its head: It is an upscale whorehouse for Sistas.
According to Lydia, the narrator, no profound notion undergirds the creation of A Sister's Spa, even though the conceit of a brothel for women is rich in symbolism: "Contrary to those who think that what happened was part of a conspiracy of sexually insatiable black women bent on further dogging the brothers, it wasn't. It also had nothing to do with confronting the system, celebrating decadence, or making a political statement. Really, all we wanted was to find a way to give women more pleasure, without the pain it often takes to get to it, and the way it all started was simple."
Do not believe her. Although humorous, Sexual Healing is biting social commentary about middle- and upper-class black America. It depicts the enmity between black men and black women, the competition, the mistrust, the recrimination, the incompatibility.
As Acey and Lydia start their business and get it running, they encounter a cast of Dostoevskian antagonists and sycophants. One of my favorite villains is the Rev. T. Terry Tiger, who moonlights as a civil rights leader. A good likeness of the Rev. Al Sharpton, Tiger heads the Baptist Brotherhood and Boule. My favorite brown-noser is LaSha Wanda, who is the spa's financial genius and administrative assistant.
Indeed, the plot is a patchwork quilt with logical design. The characters represent a menagerie of stereotypes: jive-time mates, phony friends, likable and sex-crazed Brothas, egotistical, trash-talking Sistas whose unflattering views of black men have been honed over centuries.
Sista Jill's book is a good read. But keep it away from faint-hearted Brothas who do not understand satire.
Now, for a real treat: Jill Nelson, a gifted speaker, will present Sexual Healing Sunday during the 11th Annual Times Festival of Reading at Eckerd College. She will speak in Fox Hall from 1:15 to 2:15.
