CHAMPION WOMEN

The Feminist Book Festival winds up this week with Emma Donoghue's talk in Cambridge, enticingly titled "Dirty Deeds of Daring Dames" (see below). The organisers have pulled together their "Dirty Dozen" recommended books, which rather raises hopes of a feast of feminist filth, but alas is more to do with: "dishing and digging the dirt ... dirt poor, dirty tricks, dirty tempers, the dirty words of sex". And an impressively cosmopolitan list it is, with Welsh short stories, novels about African-American quests for identity, lesbian artists in Newcastle and Bollywood stars in New York, alongside non-fiction like Sally Festing's Barbara Hepworth biog, poetry from Carol Ann Duffy and Katherine Pierpoint, and Elisa Segrave's Diary of a Breast.

You wouldn't normally associate Eastbourne with feminism, but tying in with the International Ladies' Tennis championship is a programme of events celebrating local women. On Tuesday Victoria Glendinning reads at Knole, childhood home of Vita Sackville West, Grace Robertson photographs six local "Champion Women" and on Fri 23, Virago Press hosts an evening with Waterstone's, featuring Fidelis Morgan, Celia Imrie, Virago's Lenny Goodings talking to rock journo Karen O'Brien, and Carol Stone, Sophie Parkin and Harriet Walter discussing their mothers.

! For a free copy of the Dirty Dozen booklist, send an A5 SAE to Kiran Rao, 7 Park Close, London NW10 7DY

! Champion Women: 01323 639554