Tampa Review

This novel is not enjoyable to read.  I went through it as quickly as I could, treating it as a grim, grim task.  I'm left very torn over whether it's a book of any worth.  I'm uncertain over the author's motives for writing it.  What am I sure of?

It is a book about a female sexual predator. 

The most convincing arguments I've read that support Tampa praise the book for its examination of predatory female sexuality.  They argue that Nutting's writing is feminist, that treating women as the superior sex — less evil, more saintly than men — actually does women a disservice.  Better instead to acknowledge the full spectrum of female behavior. This is an argument that I understand, and can even get behind.  Because of this point of view, I have a reason to not throw Tampa in the trash.

Nutting uses explicit language.  

It cannot be argued that Tampa isn't sexually explicit.  The question is, does Nutting verge into the gratuitous?  In my opinion, yes.  Nutting has a reason for the lascivious prose — she wants to provoke the reader.  But she goes above and beyond.  I was so provoked by Nutting's language, that my nausea overtook my intellectual reactions.  To be fair, I consider Lolita.  Now universally celebrated, Nabokov's masterpiece elicited horror and disgust at the time of its publication.  It could very well be that, for me, Tampa's hyperbole is masking its worth.

The novel is interpretable.  

I found Tampa to be largely problematic, but the novel does elicit thought and elicit argument. That alone should warrant the book's worth, but does Tampa's repulsive gratuitousness strangle what points it strives to make?  My answer: yes.