Books

Michael Chabon — Pulitzer Prize winning author and homo-neurotic fav – won the 2008 Hugo Award for Best Novel last week for The Yiddish Policemen’s Union (HarperCollins). At least one blog thought it a controversial win. Chabon isn’t exactly known as a genre writer. He’s more at home in the pages of The New York Times Book Review  than, say, Locus Magazine.

Certainly it’s a brilliant novel, and is undoubtedly a work of SF-ish alternate history, but it felt a little wrong to me that the award went to somebody who writes mainstream literary fiction that merely borrows a few tropes from SF. [io9]

If the novel seems daunting (at 400+ pages), then you can wait for the movie version – a film adaptation of The Yiddish Policemen’s Union is in pre-production, to be written and directed by, none other than, the Coen Brothers.

AURAL STIMULATION – Some of you may be too young to remember this, hell, I’m too young, but our favorite self-deprecating memoirist David Sedaris started his career on radio thanks to NPR’s Ira Glass. Glass heard Sedaris performing at a Chicago comedy club, and with a wave of a magic wand, Sedaris’ life was changed forever.

I’d argue that hearing Sedaris’ voice is tantamount to understanding his appeal–you gotta hear this guy speak. So, I’ve always advocated listening to Sedaris read instead of, say, imagining him reading in your head. Now that he has new book out it’s time to bone up on a few Sedaris classics. Relax, I’m not forcing you to read anything.

PROS: The Ultimate David Sedaris Box Set contains 22 (!!) hours of Sedaris in one box and includes all the big titles: Naked, Me Talk Pretty One Day, Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, his 2003 Grammy Award nominated Live at Carnagie Hall, a cameo by his sis (and fag fave) Amy Sedaris and more.

CONS: There are no track listings — good luck finding that one part of that one essay you liked — and the box set will “set” you back about $100 (worth every penny).

Missed Madonna’s “Confessions” Tour? No worries.

For $49.95 you can pre-order a copy of the book MADONNA: CONFESSIONS. Published by powerHouse Books, this is the official book of quintessential images taken by manager Guy Oseary. Replete with 250+ never-before-seen images, CONFESSIONS is almost as good as a front row seat and a backstage pass. The book “drops” on October 4, 2008 in conjunction with the premier show of Madge’s “Sticky and Sweet” Tour.

ARCH NEMESIS — In 1948 a 23-year-old Gore Vidal published his first bestselling, and controversial novel The City and the Pillar. That same year, 24-year-old Truman Capote published his own groundbreaking novel Other Voices, Other Rooms. From then on their names would be forever linked on bestseller lists and among literary critics alike. Perpetual rivals, it didn’t take long for the mudslinging to begin. Capote told stories — often fabricated — about Vidal’s relationship with the Kennedy’s. Vidal rebuffed. Years later, on the subject of Capote’s death, Vidal wrote that it was “a good career move.” Ouch! Think San Laurent and Lagerfeld had a nasty fall out — you haven’t heard the best of it. More AFTER THE JUMP. More… »

THE METAMORPHOSIS — Having successfully weathered the shifting winds of fashion and undergone remarkable physical transformations of his own, Karl Lagerfeld has focused his attention on a different variety of metamorphosis in his latest photography collection. In this case we watch as Mr. Lagerfeld shifts his aesthetic eye from the sphere of women’s fashion to the physical and emotional development of top male model and Lagerfeld muse, Brad Kroenig. A while back, fellow Homo-Neurotic “deadpixl” and I dropped into the launch party for Metamorphoses of an American to check out the photos, mingle with glitterati, and catch a glimpse of the Kaiser himself. Join me for a look at the new book.

Conceived in part as a photo-documentary of the rise from humble All-American boy to billboard beauty, Lagerfeld follows Brad from his first forays into modeling in 2003 and along his ascent to the top of the male modeling world. Organized loosely chronologically, the photos capture the early innocence and ease in front of the camera that slowly gives way to the world-worn composure of an experienced model. In addition to capturing the natural metamorphosis of a rising star, Kroenig and Lagerfeld collaborate in exploring the malleability of the model’s persona through interpretive allusions to James Dean, Errol Flynn, Rudolph Valentino, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Puccini’s Madame Butterfly. With 1,200 images taken around the globe and spread over five years, it parallels the way classical landscape photographers returned year after year to explore the subtle variations imparted on their subject matter by changes in light and the passing of seasons. Only here we see the meditation of a photographer on the same physical being, capturing the fleeting beauty and changes, both subtle and dramatic, which define the passing of time.

Now available from publishing house Steidl as a handsomely cloth-bound, four-volume collection, Metamorphoses of an American makes an attractive addition to the Homo-Neurotic photography library. NY Magazine also caught up with Mr. Lagerfeld at the book launch to query the Kaiser on fashion, photography, and politics. Check it out.

NON-FICTION/MEMOIR – “You can tell a lot about how a guy masturbates by the way he touches you.” Or by the lube he uses for that matter. In this case it was Elbow Grease as mild-mannered grad student Cray Seymour embarked on the lesson of a lifetime amidst the naked gay strip clubs of our nation’s capital. In his entertaining and often explicit memoir, All I Could Bare, professor Craig Seymour recounts the many roles he’s played from unadventurous Ph.D student, to intrepid naked stripper, to celebrity music writer. You’ll never look at your English professor in the same way again. — ANTONIO CERNA

All I Could Bare (Atria Books); $23.00; Hardcover

Watch our interview with author Craig Seymour here.

VIDEO VIRGIN - Professor Craig Seymour teaches English at the University of Massachusetts. But in the 90’s, while studying towards his Ph.D., he spent some time stripping at some of DC’s most notorious gay bars — ahem — Naked. He sat down with me to discuss his new memoir All I Could Bare (Atria) – and to teach me a few stripper moves of my own. Do I have what it takes? You’ll have to watch. (Videography by Mark Lovato)

 

More video of  Craig Seymour after the jump.

More… »

Unless you subscribe to The Atlantic or The Paris Review, you’ve probably never heard of Kay Ryan — and we suspect, Ryan prefers it that way. Because although Ryan has been awarded some of the most prestigious poetry prizes in the country, she remains a sort of literary loner. Until today. This week she was named the country’s 16th Poet Laureate by the librarian of Congress. Her style has been described as ”carefully positioned” and “spare.” “An almost empty suitcase, that’s what I want my poems to be, few things,” Kay Ryan told The New York Times this week. “The reader starts taking them out, but they keep multiplying.” A video of Ryan, along with links to her work, after the jump. More… »

Desire, fear, jealousy… just a few of the emotions likely to fly through your head as you leaf through Taschen’s follow-up to the wildly popular Big Book of Breasts. Compiled by the witty and irreverent editrix, Dian Hanson, who spent much of her career overseeing men’s magazine publishing, The Big Penis Book measures a period of the long and growing history of our fascination with the well-endowed man. (NSFW photos after the jump) More… »

In a new tell all published by Wiley, of all places, author Stephen Watts recounts two previously unpublished stories of Hugh Hefner’s already overexposed sex life. Here’s an excerpt from Mr. Playboy due in October:

Hefner’s thirst for sexual experience became so strong that he even had a one-time homosexual experience. One evening in downtown Chicago he was propositioned and, according to Sellers, he ‘thought, what the hell. Found it an interesting experience. As far as I know, the guy just gave him [oral sex].

• Bio Details Gay Sex, Incest in Hugh Hefner’s Past [gaywired]

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David Sedaris is kicking Augusten Burroughs ass on the New York Times Bestseller Lists. So much so, that Burroughs’ A Wolf At The Table has dropped onto the extended list. Bet you didn’t know there was an extended list, did you?

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Homo-neurotic is set to interview Craig Seymour about his new memoir All That I Could Bare on Friday. Let’s see if he can teach us a few stripper moves. Also coming soon are reviews/interviews of Joel Derfner’s Swish: My Quest to Become the Gayest Person Ever, and Fellow Travelers by Thomas Mallon.

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WW Norton is re-releasing all of Patricia Highsmith’s Ripley series including The Talented Mr. Ripley and Ripley’s Game this month. A collectors edition $100 box-set The Complete Ripley Novels is set to release in October 2008. If you don’t know who Patricia Highsmith is, please log off right now. Because she could be one of the most interesting (tourtured) writers of the past century.

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Want more Broadway Bares nakedness? Buy the book Backstage Pass by event creator and Executive Producer Jerry Mitchell. The book features sizzling behind-the-scene photos, performance shots, and stunning studio stills of half-naked boys. Proceeds from the sales of Backstage Pass benefit BC/EFA — so you can feel like you’ve done your philanthropic duty for the month.

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