gay count

So I got this book from Molly, who likes to turn over teh gay books to me (not that she couldn't read them; just that she knows I like to keep my lesbian thumb on the queer pulse of gay literature).

Quick summary: Bobby, a senior at a southern Cali high school, serves as the star quarterback on his football team, and he has just started to deal with the fact that he's gay. Should he come out? Should he tell his best friend? Should he trust his secret to the reporter at the school paper who needs a big scoop in order to secure said reporter's place at Stanford? (Sorry, a bit of foreshadowing there. If people in YA books, and adult books for that matter, didn't make bad decisions, what kind of books would we have, y'know?)

(Bobby's not buggering the linebacker — that's a quote [for those of you who weren't in high school between 1989 and 1995] from the movie Heathers, and I just could not resist.)

My take on Out of the Pocket: Well, I'm glad there's a book about a gay football player out there. And Bobby certainly thinks a lot about football, training, running the game, figuring out how to hit his running backs, etc. As a matter of fact, he thinks about it more than I ever, ever want to read about again — but this book is not aimed at me, so that's not surprising.

There are issues around acceptance, the locker room, the showers, etc., and trust, discussion, talking, being open, that go into interesting and challenging places, esp for kids who are gay sports players. Personally, I'm glad this book is set in southern Cal. I imagine it set in Iowa or Missouri, or perhaps Nebraska or Ohio, and I imagine a way different outcome for Bobby. (I'm allowed to say this because I come from two of those states. Any of you snotty-ass West Coasters try to go all Midwest-phobic on me, and I'll [metaphorically] bite you with my Big Lesbian Teeth.)

My advice: Rent But I'm a Cheerleader! and read this book in the same night. What could be more perfect?

Oh, and check out Alex Sanchez's Rainbow Boys and its sequels for two more characters who are TEH GAY ATHLETES! We likes teh gay athletes.

And that reminds me: MATTHEW MITCHAM! (Even though the cameras manage to cut off his partner, Lachlan, about 95% of the time. Bastards.)

This book, Sex Variant Woman: The Life of Jeannette Howard Foster by Joanne Passet, appeared on my desk yesterday or the day before (meaning I may have requested it, so I'm not sure it should be part of the Gay Count):

Maybe because I'm a lesbian history geek, this one completely appeals to me (I also loved reading Boots of Leather, Slippers of Gold, for instance ... history! So interesting!). Every page I open to makes me tear up with admiration for the subject of the book.

Jacket flap:

Jeannette Howard Foster was to lesbianism in the mid-twentieth century what authors such as Gore Vidal and James Baldwin were to gay men. The first librarian at the famed Kinsey Institute for Sex Research, Foster unapologetically blew the lid off Cold War sexual repression in 1956 with her Sex Variant Women in Literature — the first-ever study of homosexuals, bisexuals, and cross-dressing characters appearing in more than 300 works, from ancient times to the present. ... Now Joanne Passet offers a captivating, entertaining biography of this singular woman whose life defined the history of lesbianism in the twentieth century.

Also? Foster lived in Kansas City for a time. My foremother! (When I head to visit the fam this weekend, I'll try to make a pilgrimage to the house and post pix.)

Book: $27.50 at Powell's (linked above), pubbed by Da Capo Press. Joanne Passet, the author, is a prof at Indiana University East. Go, Midwest!

Book in my mailbox a minute ago:

Description on back of book:

Adult film legend Aiden Shaw follows up his bestselling memoir, My Undoing, with a searing look at sexual excess. In Brutal Uncut Paul's life is spinning out of control with his hardcore partying, leading him to seek out abusive and degrading sex. But this comes with a price — one that nearly destroys him on his hazardous path to redemption.

Brutal Uncut, available at Powell's for $14.95.

Or, if you're the resident gay, here at the EW.

Just so you know, Shaw's other book titles are Brutal (um ... hm), Wasted and Boundaries.

You know what's hilarious? Edmund White, Blake Morrison and Simon Callow blurbed the book. Seriously.

Callow:

Somewhere deep inside its harrowing pages is an unexpected quality: innocence. It takes you all the way with it down the vertiginous tunnels of the story.

Morrison:

His accounts of sex, drugs, sado-masochism, therapy and clubbing are brutally candid ...

(I love the juxtaposition of S&M with therapy ... and clubbing!)

White:

If you enjoy reading about young male prostitutes and their lurid exploits, you'll love Aiden Shaw's new novel.

OK, well, I have nothing particularly against S&M oriented, therapy-going, drug-taking, tunnel-burrowing young male prostitutes, but it's true that I'm probably not dying to read about 'em. So if you want this book, write me a 100-word email explaining why you deserve it.

suzi at eugeneweekly dot com

I look forward to your super-gay missives.

Apparently, I finally passed some kind of "resident gay" test.

(Read more here.)