Constellations by Sinéad Gleeson

244 pages

Book club read

Blurb

I have come to think of all the metal in my body as artificial stars, glistening beneath the skin, a constellation of old and new metal. A map, a tracing of connections and a guide to looking at things from different angles.

How do you tell the story of life that is no one thing? How do you tell the story of a life in a body, as it goes through sickness, health, motherhood? And how do you tell that story when you are not just a woman but a woman in Ireland? In these powerful and daring essays, Sinéad Gleeson does that very thing. In doing so she delves into a range of subjects: art, illness, ghosts, grief, and our very ways of seeing. In writing that is in tradition of some of our finest writers such as Olivia Laing, Maggie O'Farrell, and Maggie Nelson, and yet still in her own spirited, warm voice, Gleeson takes us on a journey that is both personal and yet universal in its resonance.

Review

…and then there are those times when I feel totally unprepared and even less equipped to write a ‘worthy’ review. Never mind that I’ve been sharing my thoughts about the books I read for at least fifteen years. Maybe fiction is easier because it gives you a linear story to follow, but I think that’s not really the issue here.

For starters, Constellations and Sinéad Gleeson are in a league of their own when it comes to language—beautiful language, fluent language, descriptive language, emotive language, efficient language… I could go on, but you get my  drift. Every single word on these 244 pages has a purpose, and most of them left me in awe. The book as a whole left me in no doubt that my ‘second language’ English is just not up to the task of doing Constellations justice.

But it’s more than that. I recognised so very much in this book, despite the fact that my background couldn’t be more different from the authors. My (medical) history doesn’t compare to Gleeson’s but many of her thoughts and feelings about dealing with a chronic condition and its life-long consequences struck home. But despite all the ‘oh yes, me too’ moments, there were at least as many where my reaction was the almost exact opposite of what I found on the page.

I’m not sure I have ever taken as long to read 244-page book. Nor did I ever stick as many sticky notes between two covers or fill as many pages with quote after quote after quote. You’d think that those notes would make writing a review easier but most of those ‘highlighted’ paragraphs and quotes are strictly personal to me, food for thought that will keep me thinking for days, weeks, months to come and may even encourage me to write that book I’ve been thinking about for the past twenty-odd years. All of them are fascinating, while none are helpful when it comes to giving an objective overview of this breath-taking book.

January hasn’t quite ended yet, but I think that with Constellations I may have finished the best book I’m going to read this year. Thought-provoking, enlightening, and touching this deeply personal memoir resonated with me in a way other people’s experiences rarely do. I have no doubt others will go through the same process of recognition and reflection—about being female, about life and death, and about learning to live with a chronic medical condition—I experienced and for that reason alone I’ll probably never stop talking about this book and recommending it to anyone who asks for my opinion.

#IsHeHereYet by Dr.Tony Ortega - Blog Tour

Book Title: #IsHeHereYet: Being the person you want to be with

Author: Dr. Tony Ortega

Publisher: Ortega Psychology LLC

Genre/s: Non-Fiction, Self-Help, LGBT, Dating/Relationships, Motivational, Psychology

Length: 172 pages

Goodreads

Blurb

#IsHeHereYet: Being the Person You Want to Be With is an extremely raw (and funny) look at the perceived epidemic of being single in our quest for love. It dismantles the notion that there is something that we need to do in order to bring in "The One." Instead, it challenges you to be "The One" and see what shows up then. Regardless of the outcome, the end result will be the best version of you possible. This book is geared toward single and partnered people alike. Through personal and professional accounts of real life situations, as well as thought expanding exercises and meditation tools, the reader will leave with a greater understanding and concept of themselves. They will be able to "date themselves" and create the space to naturally attract loving and authentic relationships.

Buy Links - Available on Kindle Unlimited

Availability: Paperback, eBook, International distribution

Amazon UK  | Amazon US

Excerpt

They say your deepest pain becomes your greatest purpose. And this pain was fucking deep.

The catalyst of this book was a breakup. It is ironic that a breakup influenced the development of a relationship book; or, maybe not so ironic. For centuries, artists have created beautiful things from unrequited love. A broken heart has been at the foundation of many of history’s greatest masterpieces.

So, here is a little history: I pride myself on being a very accomplished man. Most of my endeavors are met with a great deal of success. However, there was one area that had eluded me most of my life: relationships. I was convinced I was doomed to be single—as every relationship with a guy I ever had ended in a disaster. I was so miserable being single that I would do everything in my power not to be single. When relationships ended, I did everything I could to avoid the pain. I thought I wasn’t good enough for relationships.

I lived in this story for many, many years. As relationships kept failing, I would shake my fist at God, or see myself as “different” or “less than” because of it. This all led to me getting into some very dark places in my life.

The evening of Friday, November 2, 2012, I was sitting on the toilet in my apartment in Queens, half drunk on frozen margaritas, smoking a Marlboro Light, and arguing with my “boyfriend” over forty dollars. (I use the word “boyfriend” in quotations because it was a relationship he had no idea he was in.) At that moment, I woke up—with a deep knowing that this relationship was over. I felt so pathetic that I ended the conversation, took a long last drag off the cigarette, and knew something had to change.

I decided to take hold of the wheel of my life and change direction. Over the next couple of years, the right people, the right books, and the right programs came my way. While some bounced in and out just to jumpstart my spiritual path, others have remained, mainly my study of the metaphysical text A Course in Miracles. It was the teachings in this text, combined with my spiritual and metaphysical work, which led me to unravel the things I was using to numb out and begin to feel more alive.

After beginning my spiritual journey and immersing myself in A Course in Miracles, I decided to work with a life coach; someone who seemed to have the well-rounded kind of life that I wanted— including a wonderful relationship. A relationship was one of the things I had not yet been able to successfully work out at the time, maybe because I was avoiding, or too busy working on myself. Through my work with this coach, I was able to rewrite the scripts I had been living under for most of my life and dive head first into the dating pool. It was easy at first, and I still stumbled on many occasions as my dating muscles had atrophied quite a bit in the years that I had not exercised them, but I kept taking that next right step.

On March 3, 2016, I met Fernando, the man of my dreams (or so I thought back then). While we had been talking for months online, we had not met before our date. I turned him down for sex over and over again as I was initially not really into him. But I began to think he seemed to have all the qualities I wanted in a man, which is why I continued to hold off on a one-night stand. He was equal parts sexual and spiritual. He was gainfully employed and seemed as motivated to work on himself as I was.

Fernando even matched most of the qualities I had listed in my “Manventory” I had completed New Year’s Day 2016 (more on Manventories later). I figured, Let’s meet and see what happens. When I first met him, I was like, Homeboy photographs a lot better than he looks in person. After chatting with him for a while over drinks and then ending the date with an intense make-out session in the streets of New York City, I was smitten.

However, there were some speed bumps along the way. He was dealing with some personal issues that I felt would get in the way of anything blossoming from our union, but something told me to give him a chance. I made myself wrong for feeling this way and dove in with my eyes closed. We had a lovely relationship that lasted sixty-nine days. It wasn’t perfect, but it broke my then eight-year dry spell, and I was in love.

After a few weeks, he even said, “I love you.” This was thrilling because no one had said that to me in such a long time. I thought that I had achieved the prize from all my hard work since that fateful Friday night in 2012. I had learned my lessons from all my previous failed relationships and now found what I was longing for.

He even gave me the title of “boyfriend,” which only lasted seventy-two hours before he decided to take it away.

I turned into a state of fear for the remainder of the relationship and he ended things quite abruptly on May 10, 2016. I was devastated.

For the next six weeks, I felt completely at a loss over what to do to manage the pain. I numbed it through alcohol and sex. When I was more rational, I searched the Internet for books on gay relationships and breakups, but everything was so out of date. My coach was very supportive, but he was still in his wonderful relationship, and I felt like I couldn’t relate to him because he had what I wanted and but just lost. This is no reflection of his capacities as a life coach. On the contrary, the man is simply amazing. I just had to go through the emotions.

I decided that if there wasn’t a good, up-to-date, dating and breakup book for gay men, then I would write it. I was fed up with the “single-to-relationship” books that were currently on the market. It seemed that all of these particular books were “do this and get the relationship.” I decided it was time to write a dating and relationship book that was more along the lines of “do this, be the person, see what shows up.” At the time of writing this book, I am still single and dating.

About the Author

Dr Tony Ortega is a first-generation Cuban American gay man. He is a licensed clinical psychologist, life coach, and author who has been in practice since 1992, currently serving the LGBTQ population in his private practice located in Brooklyn, New York. Tony (along with his teaching partner, John Davisi) is the co-creator of the movement, RawSexySpiritual: Spirituality for Gay Men (www.rawsexyspiritual.com). Tony combines cognitive behavioural techniques along with active coaching and metaphysical principles in his work with clients. Additionally, Tony provides spiritual life coaching for individuals seeking a different way to live. He works with his clients within these three principles: Rewrite Your Story, Find Your Voice, and Live Authentically.

Social Media Links: Website | Online profile | Twitter | Facebook

Giveaway

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Circles Around the Sun by Molly McCloskey

233 pages

Non-Fiction: Autobiography / Memoir

Blurb

When Molly McCloskey was a young girl, her brother Mike - fourteen years her senior - started showing signs of paranoid schizophrenia. By the time Molly was old enough to begin to know him, he was frequently delusional, heavily medicated, living in hospitals or care homes or on the road.

When Molly reached the age Mike was when he became ill, she found herself suffering from deep anxiety and drinking heavily. She knew that schizophrenia runs in families, and at times the anxiety was so bad as to make her wonder about her own sanity. As the years passed, years when Molly — having moved from the US to Ireland — hardly ever saw or heard from her brother, she became deeply curious about his life and about what might have been. Through reading an astonishing archive of letters preserved by her mother and grandmother, and interviewing old friends of Mike’s, she began to piece together a picture of his life, before and after the illness struck — the story of how a gifted and well-liked student and athlete was overtaken by a terrible illness that rendered  him unrecognizable.

Now, in Circles in the Sun, she tells that story — which is also the story of her own demons and of how a seemingly perfect family fell apart and, in the end, regrouped. It is a work of extraordinary intensity and drama from a wonderfully gifted writer.

My thoughts

“But it isn’t always those closest to us who see things clearly, or see them coming.”

I always find it harder to review non-fiction books than I do fiction. With a fictional tale there’s the question as to whether or not I liked it, enjoyed it, could lose myself in a different world and felt a connection to the characters. Of course those are aspects I don’t get to investigate with a memoir / biography, especially one that tells the tale of something as stark as schizophrenia.

On the other hand, there are a few things I can and will ‘judge’ all books on, such as the question whether or not the narrative was well written and how easy or hard it was to stick with the tale. So I’ll talk about that.

Circles Around the Sun is a very well written book. Apart from the fact that I’m convinced the author did all the research required to give her personal story a factual backdrop, she managed to turn what could have been yet another ‘woe-me-tale- into an intriguing and informative narrative in which the mixture of personal and general information was just right for me personally.

“What the rest of us will do is reinterpret that past. We will say there were signs — the separateness, the sensitivity, the bouts of introspection inappropriate to his age — but this may have less to do with him than with a desire to console ourselves. For some reason, we must believe that there were clues and that we saw them. That it was a secret he couldn’t altogether keep from us.”

This book is brutally honest, or at least, it reads as such. It can’t have been easy for Molly McCloskey to publicly confess to her long lasting indifference to her brother and the struggle he’s living, or to their parent’s inability to recognise that something is wrong. Still, it is the combination of almost clinical distance and heartbreaking detail that made this book both an intriguing and devastating read.

And yet, no matter how much it sometimes felt as if the author had distanced herself from the person and problem she was writing about, the book feels deeply personal. She doesn’t spare herself, doesn’t try to excuse her thoughts, feelings, and behaviours, and doesn’t hide from her own struggles with mental health issues. That wasn’t always easy to read, and there were times when it was very easy to actively dislike Molly, but underneath it all was her desperate need to discover what had happened to her brother, her family, her life, and that desire was so understandable that I found myself relating to the author more often than I wanted to criticize her.

“Anxiety is essentially the condition in which fear is fearing itself. (…)If alcoholism is the condition that keeps telling you that you don’t have it, anxiety is a state of mind that keeps reassuring you that you are in its grip.”

And I can’t deny that the book was filled with more than a few statements and insights that spoke to me, such as the one below.

“Hell, of course, is not other people. Other people are merely irritating. Hell is the unrelieved self.”

Only a few days ago I finished When Light is Like Water a book I was less impressed with than I’d expected to be based on all the positive blurbs I’d seen. Now that I’ve finished Circles Around the Sun I have to admit that Molly McCloskey is indeed very good with words. Her descriptions, be it of people or of places, are vivid and her writing flows. But, I also think I much prefer this non-fictional work over the novel. And that’s saying something because I’m not really a non-fiction reader.

In my review for When Light is Like Water I wondered how much of the story was auto-biographical. This book answers that question with a resounding: quite a bit. The escape to Ireland, to the marriage to an Irishman, the house at the foot of a mountain, and the journeys to Kosovo, and Africa are all occurrences in both Alice and Molly’s life. So despite Molly saying in an interview on Irish radio that the her novel contains a kernel of truth around which she constructed a fictional story, I’m inclined to think it may be a wee bit more than ‘just’ a kernel. But then again, as she says in Circles Around the Sun, our memories and our realities can’t always be trusted. Why wouldn’t the same be true for what we see as fact and fiction?

“AS WE SEE THE CONSTANT CIRCLES AROUND THE SUN WE KNOW THAT THERE IS A REASON FOR OUR SUFFERING IN LIFE.” – Mike

Related Review: When Light is Like Water

The Bend for Home by Dermot Healy

307 Pages

Book Club Read

The blurb

One day, years after he's moved away from his childhood home in rural Ireland, Dermot Healy returns to care for his ailing mother. Out of the blue she hands him the forgotten diary he had kept as a fifteen-year-old. He is amazed to find the makings of the writer he has become, as well as taken aback at the changes his memory has wrought upon the events of the past. Here is the seed of his story-the vision of the boy meets the memory of the man-which creates a stunning, illusory effect.

The strange silhouettes who have haunted his past come back to inhabit these pages: his father, a kind policeman who guides him back to bed when he stumbles down the stairs sleepwalking; his mother, whose stories young Dermot has heard so often that he believes they are his own; or Aunt Masie, whose early disappointment in love has left her both dreamy and cynical. In this billowing and expansive series of recollections, Healy has traced the very shape of human memory.

My thoughts

‘What happened is a wonder, though memory is always incomplete, like a map with places missing. But it’s all right, it’s entered the imagination and nothing is ever the same.’

This was a fascinating read, and I have no idea what I want to say about it, or how to say it. The Bend for Home is as much a book filled with memories as it is a reflection on what memories are and what shapes them. It reminds us that memories can’t be trusted.

‘Language, to be memorable, dispenses with accuracy.’

But it also shows us that sometimes memories are better off staying hidden because not all our moments were such that we can be proud of them retrospectively.

‘Are you reading about the good old times? asked my mother.

I am, I said, wincing.

Aren’t you glad I kept it? she said.

Oh yes, I agreed.’

But, maybe more than anything this story is proof that the more things change, the more they stay the same. Families have always been and will continue to be a wonderful blessing interspersed with moments of pure frustration. Teenagers have always and will continue to push boundaries, try to spread their wings before they’re really ready to do so, and experiment with attraction, lust and love.

This is a book about beginnings and endings. Most of the book deals with Dermot Healy’s childhood and teenage years; the time when others looked after him, or tried to do so. The last section of the book tells of the time when Healy took care of his now elderly mother and aunt and life has gone full circle. He whose antics had been frowned upon but lovingly dealt with, now finds himself having to find the same patience while he looks after two strong minded but no longer able bodied women. This last part of the book was heartbreakingly honest.

‘Looking after mother is like watching language losing its meaning.’

If I had to label this book I’d call it a combination between memoir and philosophical essay. I enjoyed the historical look at Cavan, the county I live in, and the towns where I do my shopping, but I loved the all the statements and observations that made me stop reading and think. I could have filled this post with endless amounts of quotes and had a hard time limiting myself to those I did use. If you like a thought provoking and somewhat poetical memoir I recommend you pick up The Bend for Home.

‘What has happened repeatedly turns into a ritual. What has not happened turns into the mystery.’

Dirk Tales, The Book by Dan Skinner

It’s my pleasure to welcome Dan Skinner and his ‘Darn Muse’ to my blog today and I’m delighted to be able to help them promote their fabulous Dirk Tales. Below you’ll find an inspirational guest post, all the details about the book, as well as my review. Please don’t forget to scroll all the way to the end and enter the Rafflecopter giveaway for a chance to win a paperback copy of the book signed by both Dan and Dirk—does it get any better?

HOPE

A funny thing happened on the way to mine and Dirk's friendship. His little oddities amused me and so I began sharing them with my friends on social media. No big deal. They were something that made me smile and I offered them as a way to make others smile. More and more people came every day to see what quirky little things he said and how I reacted to them. After all, we were two different generations of gay men. I grew up on Streisand and Aerosmith. He was a Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana and Justin Bieber baby. Not so much polar opposites in personality because of our mutual ADHD as generationally distinct. But a friendship formed and a bond cemented and somehow our lives became intertwined on a daily basis, even when we were separated for a year by the distance of my move.

Our friendship, and what we shared of it with others, became even bigger. People began writing us sharing the quirks and foibles of their lives, which were just as funny and proof that none of us is really ordinary. Each of us has our own purpose and significance and place among others in the world.

More than that, what we proved to each other was that in spite of differences, be they generational or personal, friendship has a way of doing something remarkable to all of us. It gives us... HOPE.

So we want to thank you for letting us in and accepting us... Your love has given us proof that good things still exist; nice people are not a rarity and HOPE does spring like youth eternal in all of us!

Love to you all

 D&D

The Book Blurb

Dirk Tales, The Book includes previously released Misadventures of Doc & Dirk volumes, available now for the first time in paperback, an additional episode, and more!

He's a middle-aged, newly single, gay photographer starting life over. Along comes a freshly out nineteen-year-old, irreverent free spirit who wants to be his apprentice. Mismatched by more than a generation, what could possibly go wrong? Everything! And it's AWESOME!

Dirk's First Time: Every gay boy has his first experience. Usually it's a memorable, exciting personal time of discovery and intimacy between two young people. But two comic book characters? Is it horseplay or Cosplay?

The Boy At The Gym: First impressions can be deceiving. Sometimes that boy in the baggy clothes, talking to himself in the gym isn't as shy as he appears. Sometimes there's a deviant imp lurking beneath that freckled mask of innocence. Beware the Trojan Nerd!

A "Muse" ing: Most authors struggle with the voices or "muses" in their head when writing. Tuning that voice out becomes a little more challenging when your muse is a real-life nineteen-year-old who inhales espresso and turns out ideas at light speed. Danger Will Robinson!

Daddy and The Rent Boy: In sales, advertising is half the battle. That can become hazardous when you're in the company of an irreverent walking billboard.

Sex Dolls and Bad Dates: We’ve all had one of those dates where we think we've bitten off more than we can chew. The trick to know is Bite or Flight?

Dirk's Quirks: Everyone has idiosyncrasies; that's what makes us interesting. If you're lucky, you get a heaping helping and can share them with everyone.

Make it Naked:Teaching a nineteen-year-old walking hormone photography apprentice to shoot nudes is more than an adventure...It's a human obstacle course.

Buy links:      Amazon         Amazon UK    Smashwords

My Review

Muse – A living, breathing, never-ending pest that prodded me forward where I normally procrastinated.

First things first. This is not ‘just’ a compilation of the first three episodes in the ‘Dirk Tales’. Far from it in fact. This book contains added ‘Dirkisms’ as well as a new, and possibly my favourite so far, episode all about Doc/Dan’s first photo shoots and the first time Dirk shot nudes by himself.

As I mentioned in my earlier reviews, what I really love about these tales is that they describe a wonderful, hysterically funny, but ultimately beatiful relationship in which two people learn from and teach each other in equal measure. Sure, it started as Doc/Dan accepting Dirk as his apprentice, but I think it’s fair to say that for everything Dirk learned about photography, Doc/Dan learned how to embrace life again. Dirk is an unstoppable life-force and Doc/Dan has been swept up in his passion—or, in Doc/Dan’s words:

Change is what dreams are made of…and I was dreaming again, and looking forward to the next wave. Wherever it may take me.

These anecdotes show us the amazing, fun, inspiring, and heartwarming journey two men make as they create a deep and honest relationship which appears to be far more than just a friendship or teacher – student dynamic and yet hasn’t evolved into a romance (although I can’t help feeling that possibility is always just a heartbeat away).

It is impossible not to fall for Dirk who is clearly highly intelligent and very quick-witted.

“I like that word, foolhardy. (…) Sounds like a word that means your brain has a battle to do something smart or something fun, and fun wins.”

It is so tempting to go into detail, accompanied with a long lineup of quotes, and share all the (more often than not) juicy details of that new episode. I’m resisting, but do urge you to make sure you get your hands on it and read it. Like I said, this one may well be my favourite so far because apart from funny and sexy, it also touched me deeply. It shows so very clearly the honesty between these two men and how very close they have grown. I smiled as often as I always do when reading about the ‘Muse-Nerd’ but my heart melted on more than one occasion too.

“One day you’ll have an apprentice telling you their tales of terror and how they made it through them. And you’ll be as proud as I am of you right now.”

Oh, I have one piece of advice for you. Do not stop reading when you think you’ve reached the end of these tales. There are quite a few Dirkisms hidden among the author and book information and you do not want to miss them.

For my thoughts on the episodes shared in the first three books I refer you to my reviews about those—the links can be found below. All I can say (again) is that I highly recommend these stories. They will lift your spirit and brighten your day. And goodness knows we need that more than ever these days.

Links to my reviews for the individual books: Book 1     Book 2          Book 3

THE GIVEAWAY

Please enter the give-away for your opportunity to win one of five copies of the paperback signed by both Doc/Dan and Dirk!

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ABOUT DAN SKINNER

I’m a single gay man living in the Midwest. I write because I consider myself to be an old-fashioned storyteller. I’ve been a photographer for half my life, specializing in male romance cover art. My dream is to one day live on the beach with my dog and continue to tell tales that inspire and entertain.

Social Media Links

That Darn Muse Blog          Facebook       Twitter         Tumbler        Deviant Art

The Misadventures of Doc and Dirk Vol. 2 – That Darn Muse by Dan Skinner

38 pages

Buy links: Amazon    Amazon UK

The Blurb:

He's a middle-aged, newly single, gay photographer starting life over. Along comes a freshly out nineteen-year-old, irreverent free spirit who wants to be his apprentice. Mismatched by more than a generation, what could possibly go wrong? Everything! And it's AWESOME!

My Thoughts:

“Because that’s how dreams find life….words…..Words.”

This book could also have been titled ‘The Birth of the MuseNerd’ as we learn how he inspires Doc/Dan to write A Summer of Guiltless Sex (and thank you very much for that moment of inspiration, MuseNerd; I simply adored that book) as well as this particular series of delightful reads.

Getting to know Dirk is a pure pleasure. I imagine it might be quite exhausting in real life, but on my Kindle he is wonderful company. His honesty and lack of filters are in fact refreshing in a world where political correctness does appear to have gone mad. All of us have been programmed, from a very early age, to think before we speak and to not stand out – fade to grey, don’t look for the spotlight, don’t stand out from the crowd. Dirk isn’t built that way and couldn’t stop standing out if you paid him to do so. Personally I think the world would be a nicer, probably more tolerant and definitely more entertaining place if we could all take at least a small leaf out of Dirk’s book and occasionally approach life with uncensored honesty without fearing the repercussions.

While we obviously get to know Dirk better with each subsequent instalment of this series, the same can be said for Doc/Dan. Not that he describes himself in details similar to the one he uses for his apprentice. It is more that we get an insight in to the author from the way he reacts to and thinks about Dirk as he describes their misadventures.

Our Dirk is an undemanding muse. He’s not in it for recognition. He just has these genius ideas for stories and sequels to stories and, because he has no filter, he blurts them out, leaving Doc/Dan scrambling to keep up while writing them all down on whatever writing material he can find.

“…sometimes only ten words out of a thousand I say make sense. So if you can make sense of it, more power, dude.”

The Dirkisms, both those shared by Doc/Dan on Facebook and the ones you’ll find in this book are fun. I thought about sharing one or two of them here but that would mean having to choose, pick favourites, and that’s just impossible for me. I’ll say this much though, if you want to read with a huge grin on your face and happy spreading through your body, read them these books and the Dirkisms they contain for yourself; they will, without a doubt, brighten your day.

“He puts both the whip and snap in whippersnapper.”

My review of The Misadventures of Doc and Dirk Vol. 1

That Darn Muse: The Misadventures of Doc and Dirk by Dan Skinner

42 pages

E – book

Buy links:      Amazon         Amazon UK    Smashwords

The blurb:

He's a middle-aged, newly single, gay photographer starting life over. Along comes a freshly out nineteen-year-old, irreverent free spirit who wants to be his apprentice. Mismatched by more than a generation, what could possibly go wrong? Everything! And it's AWESOME! 

Dirk's First Time. Every gay boy has his first experience. Usually it's a memorable, exciting personal time of discovery and intimacy between two young people. But two comic book characters? Is it horseplay or Cosplay? 

The Boy At The Gym. First impressions can be deceiving. Sometimes that boy in the baggy clothes, talking to himself in the gym isn't as shy as he appears. Sometimes there's a deviant imp lurking beneath that freckled mask of innocence. Beware the Trojan Nerd!

My thoughts:

I’ve been following (or is it stalking?) Dan Skinner on Facebook for some time now, and it’s safe to say that his ‘Dirkisms’ are one of the highlights of my day. I look forward to finding out what new pearls of wisdom (or is it comedy?) young Dirk has come up with, what his T-shirt might be saying on any given day, or how he’s interacting with his mother (the woman deserves a medal). So, when I discovered Dan Skinner had put together a short book about his friendship with Dirk I didn’t think twice; had to have the book and had to read it.

“This kid is more than a muse…He’s a prick tease. No doubt about it.”

The blurb tells you everything you need to know about this book. In two episodes and an intermezzo filled with ‘Random Dirkisms’ we are told the story of Dirk and Dan meeting, Dirk becoming Dan’s apprentice, and the early months of their acquaintance and getting to know each other.

This is a feel good read, and the fact that these events and conversations really took place only makes that feel good factor skyrocket. These words will either make you smile or laugh out loud. It is impossible not to marvel at the wonder that is Dirk. Clever, quick, and to the point, he’s never lost for a smart comeback. And I love what I’ve seen of Dirk’s mother so far. It is so refreshing to read about a mother – son relationship that actually works, where the two individuals involved get each other, bounce off each other, and obviously trust each other deeply.

I like putting quotes in my reviews and, as shown above, I started doing just that. Then I realised I would have to copy about half the book if I wanted to share everything that had touched me, made my smile, or made me laugh so hard I actually had to stop reading. And since I know without a shadow of a doubt that all these potential quotes are far better when read in context, I decided to leave it at just one, just to whet your appetite.

This is a short read, our opportunity to get to know Dan and Dirk beyond the glimpses we get on social media, and as such it is a treasure. I’m delighted it also ‘just’ the start of the tale. More books are coming and the second one already has a title – That Darn Muse, Volume Two: Daddy and the Rent Boy & A-MUSE-ING – and should be coming soon. For me personally it can’t come soon enough. J