romp

In 1984, at age 33, I fell in love with a woman for the first time. Her name was Cathy. Her previous girlfriend’s name was also Cathy. “Wasn’t that confusing, sharing a name with your girlfriend?” I asked. She shrugged. “Everything about being a lesbian is confusing at first,” she said. “You get used to it.”

In “Sweetener,” Marissa Higgins’ sexy, poignant second sapphic novel, the reader is served plenty of confusion, lesbian-related and otherwise. For starters, two of the book’s three protagonists, who are breaking up as we meet them, are both named Rebecca. With 18,993 girls’ names in active use in contemporary America, why would Higgins build this disconcerting element into “Sweetener’s” structure? It proves to be a decision well-made. As the reader turns the pages, learning to individuate the two Rebeccas (whose central struggle is learning to individuate from each other) gives us bonus information about, and empathy for, both of them.

“My wife and I have the same first name, though our friends never used mine; I’ve always been Rebecca’s wife,” Rebecca No. 1 says of Rebecca No. 2 — No. 2 being the more powerful one, since she’s the one initiating the breakup. “Our last names, too, are still the same, as I took hers at our court wedding,” No. 1 tells us. “With the same name, it’s easy to become one person instead of two.”

Applying for a part-time cashier job near her dismal D.C. apartment, Rebecca No. 1 mulls, “Inside the market, I remind myself I am a person. I have an age, a birthday, an address.” When the store manager asks about Rebecca’s hobbies, she thinks, “Making rent? Getting myself off? Finding a woman with more money than either of us to take me to the dentist?”

The engaging, original plot of “Sweetener” is complex, too. Unbeknownst to Rebecca No. 1, she and No. 2 (PhD student, less depressed, more conniving, heavy drinker) are both dating Charlotte. Obsessed with having a baby, Charlotte wears a fake pregnancy belly, a fact known only to Rebecca No. 2, because Charlotte keeps her shirt on while having sex with Rebecca No. 1. (Having Charlotte thinking, “Please don’t notice please don’t notice please don’t notice” to cover Rebecca No. 1’s failure to notice that her sexual partner is wearing a huge baby-shaped silicone belt seems a bit of an, um, stretch.) Both Rebeccas have great sex with Charlotte. Neither Rebecca wants to stop.

Rebecca No. 2 also wants a baby and doesn’t want to stop drinking, which means not bearing but instead fostering a child, which means enlisting Rebecca No. 1 in the effort, since the two are still legally married, and fostering as a single divorcee requires a minimum one-year legal separation. Neither Rebecca is certain whether pretending to be married will result in their actual reconciliation. Only Rebecca No. 1 is certain that she wants that.

“I know it’s not fair of me to ask anything of you,” Rebecca No. 2 admits in a phone call to her soon-to-be ex-wife, “but I’m serious about wanting to have a family.”

“Sweetener” is the second novel by Marissa Higgins.

(Catapult)

Desperate as she is for a reconciliation, Rebecca No. 1 mulls, “When she says she wants me to think about how important a family is to her, and what this could mean for her, I understand she is not using the word we… I tell her I miss her and she says she misses me, too. Then she says, ‘So you’ll come by when the social worker is here?’”

In 1984, when I dated Cathy No. 2, like the Rebeccas, most of the lesbians I knew were young, poverty-stricken and uncomfortably enmeshed with their lovers, and they considered “lesbian” to be their primary identity. Unlike the Rebeccas, we were also terrified by the consequences of being out during what were extremely dangerous times. During the 1980s and 1990s, Cathy and I were chased down city streets by men shouting slurs at us. We were refused rooms in hotels. Cathy would have been fired from her childcare job if she’d come out at work. My custody of my children was threatened. I was banished from my father’s home.

“My wife and I go to our first class on child development together,” Rebecca No. 1 tells us. “Next to my wife, I feel cool.” A few pages later, she observes: “The social worker tells me I’m lucky to have a partner who values non-threatening communication.” During their home visit with a second D.C. social worker, the Rebeccas lie about a lot of things — chiefly, their marital and financial instability. But they don’t lie about what Cathy and I would have had to hide if we’d tried to adopt a child in the 1980s. Living in a big, liberal city, the Rebeccas don’t feel the need (still required for safety in “red” locales) to call each other roommates or friends. They call each other wives, because in 2025 same-sex marriage and parenting are givens, not distant fantasies.

Ten years after it became “cool” (and legal, and publicly acknowledged) for a woman to have a wife; 40 years after I and many, many others paid a terrible price for coming out in our families, workplaces and neighborhoods, lesbians like Marissa Higgins are creating lesbian characters who live in a sweeter, changed-for-the-better world. The sugar that made life safer for us is the queer activism that begins with telling true tales of queer lives and persists today with renewed need and renewed vigor. “Sweetener,” the novel, is a fun romp through one version of lesbo-land circa 2025. Higgins’ “Sweetener” celebrates and accelerates the long, rough ride to lasting queer equality.

Maran, author of “The New Old Me” and other books, lives in a Silver Lake bungalow that’s even older than she is.

St Helens: Sailor; Feldt, Robertson, Percival, Dagnall; Lomax, Mbye; Walmsley, Clark, Lees, Sironen, Whitley, Knowles.

Interchanges: Paasi, Wingfield, Delaney, Burns.

Castleford: Rooney; Simm, Cini, Senior, Djeukessi; Asi, Atkin; Singleton, Lawler, Amone, Stimson, Mellor, Westermann.

Interchanges: Wood, Griffin, Robb, Hall.

Referee: Aaron Moore.

Each year, mature women flock to The Gambia in search of a holiday romance with a local toyboy, leaving authorities to despair over the country’s nickname, ‘The Gran-bia’

As Brits up and down the country jet off in the hope of finding holiday romance, a number of grans have just one destination in mind.

The Gambia, officially known as the Republic of The Gambia, has long had a reputation for attracting lusty OAPs, who flock to the West African country in search of toyboys.

Affordable package holiday deals at the main resorts are certainly part of the draw, but for these mature women, it’s the prospect of meeting young men on the sun-kissed beaches that has them packing their bikinis in droves.

To the frustration of authorities, who are working to crack down on geriatric sex tourism, The Gambia has earned an unwelcome nickname over the years – ‘The Gran-bia’.

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For those like Barbara, from Dartford, Kent, a trip to The Gambia is about having “a bit of fun”. Speaking previously with The Sun, the 65-year-old said: “I don’t know what all the fuss is about. I’m not doing anything illegal. If you go to somewhere like Thailand you see loads of old men with young girls, but no one talks about that.

“The minute a woman gets together with a younger man, there’s an uproar, and we’re called cougars and sex tourists and all that. I came here for a bit of fun, and I’m not harming anyone. If I want to take a good-looking bloke to my hotel room, it’s no one’s business but my own.”

There are, however, other Western women who are after something more serious, and say they’ve genuinely fallen in love with their Gambian toyboy. This includes Heidi Hepworth, 51, who even converted to Islam to tie the knot with fiancé Mamadou Salieu Jallow, back in 2018, even ending her 23-year marriage in the process.

During an appearance on ITV’s Loose Women at the time, Heidi shared: “No one imagined this would last, but we love each other and are making plans to marry. I’ve never been happier. It was daunting at first. I got on the plane and thought ‘Oh my God, what have I done?’ But then I got there, and he met us off the plane with his brother and friend, and it was alright. It was magical.”

Back in 2020, Channel 4 viewers were shocked by a documentary titled Sex On The Beach, which showed bars filled with elderly white women searching for younger Gambian men, in scenes some social media users found “disturbing”. One pensioner told reporter Seyi Rhodes that the country was “paradise” as they could have a different man every single night.

Among those interviewed was P, who claimed she’d travelled out to The Gambia four times in one year alone.

When asked whether she felt immoral about her choices, the 60-year-old responded: “I don’t feel morally nothing. It’s my noo-noo. I do what I want with my noo-noo. You’ve got to kiss how many frogs before you find your prince.

“I’ve done it so many times I have a bingey drink, one night stand then say take your socks and everything and go, bye.”

Reflecting on the scenes he was confronted with, broadcaster Seyi remarked: “What I do find troubling when I see these unequal relationships on the beach is that racial imbalance and the history of this country, the centre of slavery. You can’t ignore that. When you speak to people they say over and ever again, ‘This is only because we’re poor’.”

The Gambia is a stunning country with breathtaking beaches and parks teeming with wildlife. From delicious cuisine to a rich history and culture, there is plenty here for visitors to enjoy.

However, it’s feared that the country’s reputation as a real-life ‘Tinder’ for pensioners could be holding it back from becoming a family-friendly destination.

Unfortunately, the widespread poverty across The Gambia creates a power gap between the elderly sex tourists and the younger men whose company they seek. Although sex work is illegal in The Gambia, men who entertain these so-called cougars could well receive potentially “life-changing” financial gifts that could help support their struggling families.

Ali Cham has seen first-hand the older women looking for their paramours on the Senegambia Strip, where he plays at music venues, and says the impoverished men want to accept the opportunity presented to them.

The dad-of-five explained: “People are dying at sea in the search of a better life – and it’s both men and women trying to escape. Many of those left behind have little choice but to go out and look for Westerners that can support them.

“The men are not working as prostitutes, it’s more that the women have a financial advantage that is appealing. The £1,000 they change into local currency is a lot of money here, and that makes these guys want to be with them.”

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While the secret island doesn’t show up on maps, hundred of adventurous Brits escape there every summer where connections are anything but conventional

“You’re on an island where anything goes, but it feels incredibly safe nothing happens without consent. It’s like Disneyland for swingers” – so says one of the holidaymakers to the so-called ‘Spicy Island’, where Brits indulge in their wildest fantasies.

Amanda Leigh, a 38-year-old dancer, found unexpected freedom in a hidden swingers‘ haven off Croatia’s coast. She anticipated a “hot girl summer” but ended up meeting her now-partner Alex, during a skinny-dipping adventure amid strangers.

Her journey into the swinging lifestyle began over a decade ago at an adult-only resort in Mexico. Now, she’s a seasoned participant, with Spicy Island being her destination of choice.

“Last year I met Alex and this year we’re ready to open our relationship up,” Amanda shares. “I want to fulfil the ‘hot wife’ fantasy and I’m looking forward to exploring this further.”

The exclusive two-week getaway, now in its third edition, is run by Spicy Match, who take over the entire island for as many as 600 guests. The secret location is revealed only once attendees board on the boat from the mainland.

The ticket prices range from £1,000 for a simple bell tent to £2,500 for a luxurious two-bedroom sun lodge, complete with meals, fire-eaters and educational sex seminars.

“You only find out where it is when you get on the boat,” reveals Amanda. It was on this mysterious hour-long boat ride that she encountered Alex, a spa technician.

“I couldn’t get over how hot Alex was,” she confesses. “We started flirting right then and there, and by the third night we were together while skinny-dipping in the pool.”

The pair didn’t end up swinging with anyone else, instead spending the trip getting to know one another. Amanda says the sex was “incredible” and finds the freedom of being intimate on the beach or in front of others “very liberating”.

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Upon arrival, guests are greeted with a welcome bag containing condoms and wristbands to tell them apart from staff. Video recording guests is banned, but stripping down is encouraged.

The resort designates “play area” zones for various interests – couples, singles, and those into BDSM.

Amanda wants to set the record straight on swinging, noting: “People think swingers are gross or glorified cheaters. But it’s about consent and communication. You’re free from unwanted advances – it’s nothing like a standard nightclub.”

The island attracts people of all ages, including James and Katherine Gordon, 55-year-old sweethearts from Kent who have been swinging since their teens.

Katherine shares with confidence: “We’ve been to swingers events all over the world; the island ranks at the top. We’ll literally say, we’re into full swapping and single men.”

Before arriving, they’d already connected with others online and planned to meet for dinner in the port town. “Last year, 40 of us had dinner together the night before we left,” Katherine recounts. “It’s easy to build connections before you’ve even arrived.”

She admits her preference for younger men often takes the lead when it comes to flirting. James humorously remarks that he is content to “outsource” these days, admitting he can’t keep up.

“The meals on the island are communal, so we sit next to people we think we’ll vibe with,” she continues. “You flirt like you would in any bar or club.”

Katherine reveals that while she may be reserved in day-to-day life, this lifestyle unveils a more audacious side of her. They reserve a two-bed lodge, dedicating one room for rest and the other for enjoyment.

“It just suits us better,” she confides. “And after 30 years, we’ve made a lot of friends here.”

She describes the atmosphere as inviting: “You might see people having sex on verandas or making out on shared beds or you might find someone quietly reading a book.”

Meanwhile, Katie Jones, 38, and husband Simon, 49, from Hertfordshire, gear up for their second jaunt to the island, having stumbled upon it during a trip to the French naturist resort Cap d’Agde.

Embracing the liberty to be nude, unwind or participate, Katie shares, “You can find a quiet spot or join the pool parties – there’s an amazing energy.”

Despite the anything-goes atmosphere, she notes that the retreat doesn’t rely on booze to get the party started. “People don’t get too drunk because it’s about sex and alcohol doesn’t help with that.”

She describes the event as liberating and relaxed. “If you’re curious, you can come and see what you find. You don’t have to swing but it’s all there if you want it.”

Festival edit

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Ann Summers

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Ann Summer’s festival collection includes eye-catching bodysuits and faux leather shorts – some of which are on sale.