 Several reviewers compared Tipping the Velvet to Jeanette Winterson 's Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit for a similar story of a woman 's sexual awakening . Waters credits Winterson as an influence in lesbian writing , but states that the books are quite different and her writing is not like Winterson 's at all . Waters suggests that reviewers have bracketed them together because Winterson was the only other lesbian author they could recall . 
