Race, Gender, and Genre
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her blouse had been ripped down to her waist. Yvette’s maid’s
uniform was still fairly intact; the jailer and his assistants were
having a little rest before they raped her too. (176)
Readers may wonder why the jailors have chosen to assault one victim at a
time. If there is a racial element involved, it seems to promote the idea that
Inga’s whiteness makes her more “worthy” of rape at least to her Arabian
attackers. In any case, within this context the characters involved acknowledge
the severity of rape as a physical violence. Yvette offers her sympathies to Inga
as a victim by saying, ‘“Don’t you worry, honey, when that man gets close to
me, I gonna kill him with my elbow’” (176). Inga, in the suppressive fashion of
the Baroness, states, “‘It doesn’t matter’” and helps to steer the conversation
toward plotting an escape (176).
A third trope of Moore’s is the addition of love and sexuality into a
previously chaste genre. In this way. The Baroness series more than makes up
for its predecessors. Readers quickly learn that Penny will eventually bed any
man that the narrator describes as “handsome” with the only exception being La
Sourd, a villain in Sonic Slave. Of course, as she is willing to do anything to
protect US interests, she is aware of the possibility that she may need to sleep
with a criminal in order to gamer information or gain access to restricted sites.
To be fair, her team is expected to do this as well. Sumo, after infiltrating the
Red Army, seeks out details on the army’s plan by asking a female soldier,
“‘Where have you been assigned F