Glamourpuss Book

And now for something completely different. I only know of two titles by Christian McLaughlin (the other one being Sex Toys of the Gods), and I wish he'd written -- or would get on and write! -- more, because Glamourpus was one of the funniest books I ever read.

It was done originally by Dutton but the edition I have is the Plume/Penguin reprint of 1995.

This was McLaughlin's debut novel and I think we all expected him to go on and write a slough of books, hopefully with gay twists and great gay characters. Well, 13 years after I bought the reprint of Glamourpus, we were still waiting, and I never tracked down anything else by this writer.

I guess McLaughlin 's life took him in different directions -- and that's fair enough too. (Life usually takes us in directions we never guessed. McLaughlin could be enormously prolific under another pen name for all I know.)

Glamourpuss is about Hollywood having a laugh at itself. It features daytime soapie TV ... you know, things like The Bold and the Beautiful and The Young and the Restless. In the novel the show is entitled Hearts Crossing, but if you see one of these things, you've seen 'em all.

One of the stars of the show is a new actor, Alex Young, who plays a cute sociopath named Simon Arable, the son of a mad scientist. And Alex has a major secret.

He's not a sociopath. He's gay. When the books starts, his fans don't know. Yet. He has a boyfriend who's just way too hard to get -- Nick. And he's trying to keep his love life under wraps.

Then a nation-wide gossip rag gets its hooks into Alex and runs a story that blows his secret, and ... suddenly Alex is not that popular in Hollyweird. His fans are dead nuts, and his part in the show doesn't look too secure. To top it off he's got a stalker. The story takes place in 1990-1991, when there was still a lot more homophobia than you have today. In today's movie and TV industry you have hunky actors who're out and proud of it, and beloved for it. Not the case in 1990 ...

The plot of Glamourpuss could also have been done dead-serious as a thriller. It would have worked if McLaughlin had played up the fear and dread aspect ... though he'd have had to write a different ending! But McLaughlin picked the right way to go and did it as a sexy gay comedy -- right down to the last line in the book, which makes anybody who knows anything about romance novels break a rib.

(Let me explain. Mills & Boone (Harlequin) actually used to run night school courses in how to write the romantic goo they publish. The DIY romance of the month course is called, And Then He Kissed Her. The last line in Glamourpuss is, "And then he kissed me." I laughed and laughed.)

In fact, I laughed right through the whole book. I'd recommend this for anybody who's looking for a funny, sexy gay read; anybody who knows for a fact Hollywood is gay-controlled and wonders why there aren't more gay TV shows; anybody who likes more or less contemporary books; and anyone who enjoys those movies where Hollywood makes films about itself (Hooper is still the best one I know).

The characters are numerous and well drawn. The book is written in the first person ... which is a neat trick, if a writer can pull it off. McLaughlin does, and the first person style gives him the opportunity to keep up a banter between writer and reader that far outstrips anything that can be done plausibly in third person.

If the book has a downside, it's only that the narrative is VERY American. If you're a fan of all things US, you're going to lap this up. If you're not that far into American culture, you might find the narrative a bit abrasive. I don't call this a downside ... because it's a story about Hollywood, and how are you going to tell it without Americana? (Some critics and readers are not so understanding. Example: the stupidest criticism I ever read of the Lord of the Rings movies was that all the characters have English accents. How ludicrous would an American or Australian, French or German accent have sounded in Middle Earth?!) Personally, I don't have a bone to pick with Americana. I like reading about other people's cultures.

Highly recommended. AG's rating: 5 out of 5 stars.