Collegiate Maneuvers

 

Meet Jake Castile, son of a snooty French mother and a father that was a well-known matador many moons ago in his native country, Spain.The story follows the dashing college student through three different colleges and many, many cringe-inducing, drunken antidotes. Jake is a somewhat likeable person but he’s also immature, confused, sneaky and extremely fickle. Sometimes you just want to shake him and say, “Dude, you’re a freakin’ mess. You need to get your act together !”. During the first half of the book, I was riveted and could barely put it down but during the last half, I began to really tire of Jake’s shitty attitude toward life and continual drunken escapades.

When Jake is back home in Queens and between colleges once again, he meets Chase, a fey, good-looking, rich playboy that instantly falls in love with Jake so hard that he buys Jake a BMW and hands him his own unlimited platinum card before he sends him off to college again.

Yeah, right...

  

This book was well written and interesting but I have to say that I didn’t care for the main character (much). I absolutely know I wouldn’t be friends with Jake in real life. It will be interesting to see what John Lindo comes up with next.

* I have to say that the first thing that attracted me to this book was the fantastic retro-style cover-art. Somebody needs to track the illustrator down and hire him while they can still get him relatively cheap before he's discovered by the right people.

Rating: 6.5

The Loving Couple

 

By Virginia Rowans aka Patrick Dennis (author of Auntie Mame)

Being a modest gay man possessing flawless literary tastes, I adore anything written by the late gay author, Patrick Dennis. This early novel of his written under the pseudonym of Virginia Rowans details an argument by a young married couple. The events of the entire book takes place in the space of one exceedingly long day.

I like to think I’m fairly well read but I have to be honest and tell you that no book has ever sent me running to my dictionary so often to look up the definitions of words as much as The Loving Couple. Historically, it was really interesting to experience the type of mid-century chit-chat one would have heard from a member of New York’s literary scene at that time.

Patrick Dennis really pulled out all the stops when he wrote this book and flexed his literary muscles. Yes, there is mucho conceit (and a firm belief in his own genius) behind the writing of The Loving Couple. Patrick Dennis is definitely showing off and trying to “wow” his readers and in my opinion he does succeed in that endeavor.

It took me almost two months to finish this book. The Loving Couple isn’t for everyone and honestly, I didn’t particularly find it to be a fun reading experience but if you’re already a Patrick Dennis fan, you’ll surely enjoy it.

Rating: 7.5

*Note - this book is well out-of-print but if you dig around a bit you can find a copy fairly easily.