Reviews for The Man I Might Become: Gay Men Write about Their Fathers

The average rating for The Man I Might Become: Gay Men Write about Their Fathers based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2008-08-18 00:00:00 Ray Kraus Perhaps because my own relationship with my father is complicated, or perhaps I just expected something else entirely- whichever it is, I tried to like this book but was fairly unimpressed. Many of the essays were decent, but none really stuck out and there weren't any that to which I could relate very well. A handful of essays were quite touching (for example, Alexander Chee's Self Quiz), but in all honesty, the fact of the author's sexuality felt very trivial in those cases- the dynamic would have felt much the same if written by a heterosexual man. There were also a few I genuinely did not enjoy reading, such as the essay Daddy Was a Hot Number, in which the author recounts his own sexual attraction to his father, and then authoritatively states all gay boys feel the same (granted, it's a good deal more complex than that, and I'm not doing the essay full justice. Honestly, the very thought just made me squick). All in all, it is a decent read, but I hardly feel it paints a truly representative picture of the father-son experience shared by gay men- it certainly didn't for me. It did, however, at many points, make me thankful that my father was not as bad as some of the fathers portrayed here.

Review # 2 was written on 2021-01-07 00:00:00 Anastasios Zachariadis Interesting variety of stories and styles. I enjoyed many, struggled with some, appreciated them all.