"Playful in tone but intellectually rigorous, Side Dishes adopts culinary metaphors to expand the 'menu' typically offered in studies of Latin American women's cultural production. In her analysis of film, stand-up comedy, science fiction, cartoons and more, Melissa Fitch outlines a bold new direction for both feminist and cultural studies focused on female sexuality."
~Suzanne Ferriss, co-editor of Chick Lit: The New Woman's Fiction
"Melissa Fitch serves up an enticing array of Latina 'side dishes' in this collection of broadly interdisciplinary essays. Her menu includes chapters on Latin American and Latina stand-up comedians, science fiction writers, filmmakers, cartoonists, 'smut' artists and more—a range of creative and intellectual treats mostly excluded in standard academic fare. A delightful sampling of the richness, variety, and complexity of Latina identities and cultural production."
~Myra Mendible, editor of From Bananas to Buttocks: The Latina Body in Popular Film and Culture
"Side Dishes, at times more tasty, original, and irresistible than 'the main dishes,' is a delightful, playful, and innovative work about Latina, Brazilian, and Spanish Americanwomen writers, filmmakers, cartoonists, and science fiction producers. Invaluable works by women in Side Dishes are found outside the usual diet of canonical texts by LatinAmerican women. They broaden our knowledge and understanding of different ways and approaches of looking at cultural narratives of women."
~Feminist Review
"Fitch sets aside the canonical works of contemporary Latina and Latin American women in an attempt to draw attention to other examples of women's cultural production that are underexplored. The result is a readable study that makes the case that many of the artifacts of popular culture are more representative of the region than the novels and novelists that routinely populate college curricula. Recommended."
~Choice
