Rita Mae Brown is as subversive as apple pie. Her favorite author, according to the flyleaf of Six of One, is Mark Twain. It doesn't surprise me a bit. Imagine, if you will, Tom Sawyer, only smarter; Huckleberry Finn, only foulmouthed, female, and lesbian, and you have an idea of Molly Bolt, heroine of Rubyfruit Jungle. This largely autobiographical first novel … [features] an exuberantly raunchy style and the toughest heroine this side of Mae West. The book was funny, explosive, shocking—a clear hit, and one that landed Brown … a reputation as a radical feminist.

[Rubyfruit Jungle is] a classic American success story, really; by a winning combination of pluck, wit, and good looks the hero rises out of poverty and ignorance and into a fine liberal arts college, embarks bravely on a career, and returns home at tale's end to measure the distance traveled. Brown's perspective, though...