 Among Waters ' Victorian @-@ set novels , depictions of sexual encounters are also , according to Palmer , the most vivid in Tipping the Velvet . A review in The Advocate calls the book " riotously sexy " , and The Seattle Times suggests the scene where Nan shows Kitty how to open and eat an oyster is evocative of Tom Jones . This follows a marked difference in recently written fiction by and for lesbians . Frank depictions of lesbian sexuality specifically penned by women have been quieted by censorship that equated lesbian sex with aberrant mental behaviour , or employed it as an erotic element controlled by , and for the benefit of , men . Lesbian literary scholar Bonnie Zimmerman writes , " Lesbians have been reticent and uncomfortable about sexual writing in part because we wish to reject the patriarchal stereotype of the lesbian as a voracious sexual vampire who spends all her time in bed . It is safer to be a lesbian if sex is kept in the closet or under the covers . We don ’ t wish to give the world another stick with which to beat us . " 
