Brown claims Aristophanes, Euripides, and Mark Twain as her major literary influences. In Venus Envy it is perhaps Twain who has wielded the most influence on the biting social satire Brown uses to describe the rich, mindless "starved to perfection" women of the Virginia country-club set, and the hypocrisy of the closeted gay characters who try to fit into the very social conventions which have made them outcasts. Conversely, the "romp with the gods" scene near the conclusion of this novel shows not only Brown's great imagination and quirky sense of humor, but also points to a thorough knowledge of ancient mythology, as well as of art history and its more classical sources. Stylistically, the novel owes something to the French tradition of the letter-novel, popularized effectively by Choderlos de Laclos (1741-1803) in his infamous book Dangerous LJaisons, where the content of personal letters never meant...