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By
Michael Bronski
The Boys in the Brownstone
Kevin Scott
Harrington Park Press
How to order
Kevin Scott's The Boys in the
Brownstone (Harrington Park Press, $22.95, 261
pages) is essentially a pulp novel-- and in the best sense. Highly readable
and compulsively page-turning, it's is a cross between Ethan Morden's "Buddies" cycle and an older-guy's version of "Queer As Folk." Set in a piano bar on New York's Upper East Side,
Scott chronicles the lives, loves, fortunes, and misfortunes of a group of diverse men as they rush or stumble through city life to find not just happiness, but a sense of community and
security. While Scott's sense of plotting and characters is sort of well-made-play-- think Moss Hart and Edna Ferber's
Dinner at Eight with more than one Marie Dressler-- he overcomes this
old-fashioned literary trait by endowing his characters with a fullness that makes them appealing even in their flaws. Scott has a good eye for the colorful personality, and a sharp sense
of theatrics and clashes. And while in the end the doom of 1950s gay tragedy makes itself felt,
The Boys in the Brownstone feels delightfully old-fashioned and comforting.
| Author Profile: Michael Bronski |
|
Michael Bronski is the author of
Culture Clash: The Making of Gay
Sensibility and The Pleasure
Principle: Sex, Backlash, and the
Struggle for Gay Freedom. He writes
frequently on sex, books, movies, and
culture, and lives in Cambridge,
Massachusetts. |
| Email: |
mabronski@aol.com |
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