Doc and Fluff: The Dystopian Tale of a Girl and Her Biker

by Patrick Califia

Set in the bleak and not-too-distant future of a culture in its death throes, Doc and Fluff careens through the lives of a pair of outlaw women struggling to survive on the road. Packed with true love, rough sex, and over-the-top adventure, this popular novel is now available with a new introduction to the wild world of Pat Califia's imagination.

Genres: Fiction, Erotica, Queer, LGBT, Lesbian Fiction, BDSM, Sexuality

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1990

About the author

Patrick Califia, who formerly wrote under the names Pat Califia and Patrick Califia-Rice, is a writer of nonfiction (on men, gender, transgender identity, and sexuality) and fiction (erotica, poetry, and short stories).

Reviews

[Bryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Whoa.

[M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

My copy of this book had a foreword from the author that basically called a bunch of critics out on the violence in the book and told them to get real. Doc and Fluff is on some harsh sexually violent biker land shit, and there's especially one scene in the book that I'll say I never plan on reading ever again. So, it's a rough time. And It's a time capsule. There's a network of dyke-run farm communes, where "ex-hets and passing women" (passing for men, they mean) aren't really given the same rights within the farms as the native-borns. There's a sex worker femme who has a butch dyke partner who doesn't respect her enough and doesn't know how. And the point of those things existing in the book is to bring light to how they're messed up. So . . . it's raw. It's from the 90s.

[Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wouldn't recommend this as a first intro to Califia -- even if novels are your preference. Public Sex, Speaking Sex to Power, any of the short story collections and of course the unbelievably important Macho Sluts are more accessible. This has some important stuff in it, but as a novel it didn't blow me away the way Macho Sluts did as a collection -- and Califia's essays are just drop-dead brilliant, all of them. This one is interesting and critical for completists, definitely, but I found it spoke less to my interests than most of Patrick's other books.

[Nairne Holtz · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Doc and Fluff, Califia-Rice blends dystopia, BDSM, and lesbian romance to tell an original tale of violence and retribution among bikers, back-to-the-land feminists, and queer outlaws. This novel, first published in 1990, was banned from some feminist bookstores and seized at the Canadian border due to its violent content – and it is grossly, gorily violent in places. A defense of literary merit is not entirely merited: the plot meanders, the secondary characters are thin, and the writing clunky. Yet Doc and Fluff has many satisfactions. As Califia-Rice noted in the introduction, “This book…is a love story about women who are traditionally viewed as utterly unlovable.” Doc is a drug using, drug dealing masochistic butch with a terrible attitude. Fluff is a badass femme sex worker with a taste for domination. But their connection is potent and touching, leading them into the best and worst of decisions. These well-drawn protagonists taken in conjunction with Califia-Rice’s dryly humourous analysis of class and feminist politics adds up to a starred rating.

[Sheryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't know if I still own this book....it kinda freaked me out with some very graphic violence toward women and I may have gotten rid of it.
Pat/rick does not shy away from uncomfortable realism in hir work, and this book is the only one so far that has gone farther than I could take.
Proceed with caution.

[Leila · Rating 4 out of 5]

Awesome. Except for that sappy ending.

[Paula Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another of my favorites of Pat Califia!

[Patrick St-Amand · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not for me though I'm not the target audience. I don't mind brutal reading but it needs to have a good story attached to it. It felt like it was too much for shock value's sake.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this years ago and was blown away. Pretty tough read but I loved it too. What of Califia should I read next?

[Yvette Verwer · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book, a dystopian romance that feels intense in a fascinating world with two main characters to love.

[Alessia Mari · Rating 1 out of 5]

Non so se è colpa della traduzione fatta coi piedi, ma c’ho capito davvero poo. Nemmeno finito, però ci sta, son gusti

[Gabrielle · Rating 5 out of 5]

First off, a warning on this book - if graphic violence or descriptions of S/M sex bother or trigger you, you're probably better off giving this book a pass.

Califia does a really good job writing a novel that has plenty of hot sex, good plot, and compelling characters who grow and change. Which is not an easy balance by any means. The dystopian setting is compelling and far too possible and most of the characters inhabit various shades of gray (and the only exception is the villain of the book). The ways they grow and change is actually compelling and makes sense, and if the ending is sappy, it's the sort of sappy ending that sometimes (rarely) actually happens in life, and makes perfect sense if you want to give these larger-than-life outcasts a ray of happiness.

The sex is kinky and really S/M focused, and while other leatherdykes are probably going to find it really hot, I'm sure a lot of vanilla folk could find it really squicking. I was mainly just overjoyed that there is a lot of Femme top/butch bottom sex going on, but that could just be me.

The violence is really graphic - though as Califia points out in the introduction, people are fine with recounting women being victims in gory detail, but not with them taking vengeance. Plus, we're dealing with outlaw bikers, organized crime, and militant lesbian separatists in a post-apocalyptic world here - it's going to be violent.

I devoured this book in one lazy day when I had no work, and while I'm a fast reader, it's definitely a good book for a single day read. It moves quickly, and Califia has the same sense of urgency with this novel as he does with his pornographic short stories, despite the change in medium and bringing a lot more elements into focus. It's incredibly rare that I find a book (regardless of quality) that I can't put down.

[Hank · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wiki doesn't even have a page on this one, but you could probably find a plot description out there somewhere if you feel the need.

This has got to be the only scifi, dystopian stroke book I've ever read. Queer bikers! Pulp novel dialogue! Lots of fisting! Pimps and hos! Separatist feminism! Some sort of vaguely religious Goddessy retribution! Seriously, I love this shit. Honestly, though, there could have been more sex, don't you think?

final thoughts: Jennifer Tilly, circa 1990, would have been perfect to play Fluff in the film version. Except I'm pretty sure the book didn't come out until '96. update: I've just been informed that the book was first published in '90. So there you go.

[Sassafras Patterdale · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was going to give this book 4 stars, the 3 it deserved and a 4th because I recognize the cultural importance of this book for leather dykes... But after the ending I just couldn't bring myself to give it another star.

This might win the award for the most femmephobic book I've ever read. It's a despicable unexamined representation of butch masculinity and horrific in its portrayal of femmes as tits, ass and a sometimes a useful plot device.

I also could have done without most of the non consensual violence.

That said as a leather novelist I know that Patrick Califia is a trailblazer in the genre and without his books no one would be reading mine. I cut my baby leather queer teeth on so many of his stories and I really wanted to love this one as much as I have his other work

[Cher · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was way not surprised when Pat Califia became Patrick. This whole book is about longing to just be a freewheeling biker dude & having an honorary acceptance on account of being butcher than a pitbull and treating women just as horribly as any biker might. However, the eroticization of the bad treatment was entertaining. It's fiction, so get your kink on. Only issue for me is that I don't think biker guys are hot at all, so I found the protagonist to be a jerk. It's meant to be a sort of one handed novel, though, so it's all good.

[ncn nothing · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pretty good until the last page. What the fuck, Patrick? Fluff taking back Doc = NOT COOL. And, it's a double-standard: Prez is tortured for eternity for being abusive and Doc gets off the hook with one apology?

Also, an odd structure for a novel: rising action, climax... 150 pages to go. I recommend reading the first half and then stopping.

[Joey Diamond · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. How did I wait so long to read this?
It's like the most perfect summary of 1990 lezness ever. And it has a daddy bottom, a rapist getting sacrificed by a witch priestess and womyn's land of course. Everything is so perfect. Though warning: there is a disturbing mix of hot and not hot sexual violence.

[Freyja Vanadis · Rating 1 out of 5]

I bought and read this book when Pat Califia was still female, before she changed her name to Patrick Califia-Rice and still identified as a lesbian. I've now given away, or am trying to give away on another book swap site, most of my Pat Califia books.

Not impressed, either with the book or with the author. She tries to be such a bad ass with her characters, but it mostly makes me laugh.

[Heidi Nemo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Post-apocalyptic queer biker smut. Hot, toothy, really fucking challenging, mean and problematic as hell. But his vision of outcast life in an even more screwed up and balkanized america is worth the bad dreams.

[Hazel · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first half is so amazingly dirty and hot and also really funny. Good jabs at back to the land womyn born womyn culture. Very violent. So much so I have told some not to read it. But if you can deal/like it, it is totally amazing. The second half lags.

[HeavyReader · Rating 3 out of 5]

My friend Jessica Goodman gave me a copy of this sex-centered novel by Pat Callifa. I'm just not much into hardcore SM for days.

Warning: This book contains possibly triggering material.

[Hunter · Rating 3 out of 5]

this book is real hot but totally enforces binary gender roles in queer relationships

[Jeanette · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first fiction book i read by Pat califia. It freaked my sister out at the time, but she read the whole thing. Iloved it.l Extremely hot!!!!!

[Kate · Rating 2 out of 5]

um. yeah. there are definitely some images from this book permanently burned into my brain. this book made me real, real scared of bikers.

[Aradia V · Rating 4 out of 5]

yummy biker sex

[Glenn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good action and hot S&M sex wrapped inside an allegory in this near-future sci-fi erotica

[Anna Pulley · Rating 3 out of 5]

At times hot, at times sickeningly violent. The Native American appropriation I wasn't too keen on. Last half tended to drag as well. And ridiculous, hypocritical ending.

[Amanda · Rating 2 out of 5]

A challenging read. Not sure it was worth it.