Book Review	Book Reviews Archive

Mala NocheNoche
By Waly Curtis
Bridge City Books
How to order Latino Gay Men and HIV
By Rafael M. Diaz
Routledge Press
How to order Alec Baldwin Doesn't Love Me & Other Trials from My Queer Life
By Michael Thomas Ford
Alyson Books
How to order

In 1984, film director Gus Van Sant (Drugstore Cowboy and Good Will Hunting) began his career with a small, black-and-white independent movie called Mala Noche. Van Sant's film was a gritty look at a gay man's relationship to Latino teenagers in Portland, Oregon's Little Mexico. The film was based on a novella by Walt Curtis, a street poet with a devoted cult following. Curtis's small chapbook has never been widely available, but is reprinted here with more material by him and an introduction by Van Sant. If you are tired of gay male writing that slickly describes life in the post-90s urban gay ghetto, or of "transgressive" gay texts that glory with tired seriousness in teen-angst, Mala Noche (Bridge City Books, paper, illustrated, 220 pages, $14.95) is both a treat and a find.

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Walt Curtis has an authentic voice that sounds like a cross between Allen Ginsberg and the over-narration on an urban travelogue. The beat tone of his language melds perfectly with the heartbeat of the city. He is unstinting in his self-revelation, and the energy and love he has for his characters-- the city of Portland is as much a person here as his fellow humans-- is palpable. Mala Noche will be a revelation for anyone who loves Van Sant's film, and a fine introduction for those who have yet to watch it. But even more, the book introduces Walt Curtis to a larger readership than he ever had before, which can only be a good thing.

A virus in nuestra casa

Over the past ten years, the best AIDS educators have driven home the point that you can't talk about HIV and safe sex without talking about how people live their lives. This message resonates through Rafael M. Diaz's Latino Gay Men and HIV (Routledge, paper, 176 pages, $17.99). Diaz, trained as a social worker, teaches at University of California, San Francisco, and homes in on the issues Latino gay men face around safe sex. Diaz discusses poverty, class, ethnicity, gender, and concepts of manliness in Latin culture, all leading toward specific proposals for reducing the spread of AIDS among Latin men.

But perhaps more important, Diaz paints a nuanced portrait of gay Latino men's lives. Diaz is at times a poet as well as a social scientist. Perceptive and intelligent, Latino Gay Men and HIV is an important addition to AIDS literature as well as to the growing body of work that examines the diversity of gay life and culture.

Not just for yucks

The short humorous essay is a form that few writers can master. Sure, pithy and funny are easy enough (if you are, in fact, pithy and funny). But most humorous essays fail because they lack the one quality never associated with them: seriousness. Humor is most effective (and funny) when articulating a clear, thoughtful point of view. The essays in Michael Thomas Ford's Alec Baldwin Doesn't Love Me & Other Trials from My Queer Life (Alyson Books, paper, 248 pages, $10.95) are models of the form.

Ford writes a syndicated column, "My Queer Life," and muses on everything from Martha Stewart's manias to his devotion to Alec Baldwin's chest, from the elusive gay gene to fundamentalist Christianity (in which he was raised). Throughout, Ford manages to make us laugh-- and sometimes cry. He understands the banality of most of our lives-- empty romantic crushes, pop-TV personalities, tedious family relationships, house cleaning, bad porn, and the weather. Ford both skewers and celebrates these ordinary things. Even on more serious topics-- like waiting for the Second Coming as a child-- he manages a view of human nature both nurturing and critical.

Ford's ironic world view dovetails perfectly with his desire for world peace, freedom for gay people, and better sex. On the surface, almost everything in Alec Baldwin Doesn't Love Me & Other Trials from My Queer Life is superficial. Yet beneath this gloss of pop culture and ephemera both seriousness and intelligence lie. Witty, funny, and surprisingly moving, Michael Thomas Ford explains life to us, and it actually sometimes begins to make sense.

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