Sunday, April 29, 2012

Cocktails and Cockpics - A Grindr Love Story by Chris Tracey

This novel is gay. I mean it: this is a gay novel. The action happens nowadays and it is reminiscent of the show "Friends". It is the story of 4 flat mates: the gay rich closeted and shy man, the slutty and mean gay guy who knows the scene, the fag hag who is secretly in love with one of the gay guys and the  straight guy  pretending to be gay in order to live in a nice apartment with cheap rent. You can guess the implications of this.


The novel is quite predictable, once you start knowing the characters. From the first quarter you will know how it ends. On the other hand, I believe it to capture a lot of the phases of gay life, so it is not about the destination, but the journey. Amazingly enough I found out that the scene and all the problems a gay man has are the same everywhere: from coming out, to finding a boyfriend and even discussing about having an open relationship.

The novel brings something I haven't seen before in the genre: no explicit sex scenes and the perspective of the fag hag. You might think that a book about a shy man who wants a boyfriend might lack substance, but you'd be wrong.  "What's perfect isn't perfection, it's what's enough for you and for me." - Peter (the main character) discussing his relationship with Dave (the boyfriend).

As a gay man I had asked myself the question: "What happens to gays in the end?".  Read the book and find out.

I haven't decided what new book to start, so check my blog later for an update. :)


Saturday, April 28, 2012

404 Self Improvement Tips by Bob Bastian

Since this is my first post, maybe I should introduce myself. I am Vlad and about 3 months ago I got my first eBook reader. Since then I had read more books than I had read in the last 2 years prior to the acquisition. So I figured this blog would be a good way of keeping track of the books I am reading. Without further ado I bring to you: 404 Self Improvement Tips  by Bob Bastian.

The book was good, considering it is a self improvement book. Out of those 404 tips I had realized that, let's say 25% of them, I have been doing already. The book is comprised into 4 categories, each with its 101 tips: 1 Money saving tips, 2 Success tips, 3 Health and fitness tips and 4 Romance tips.

Truth be told I had found some to be puerile, others to be inspirational and others simply not applicable to me. An example of silly tip is: "wrapping paper and bows" - create your own to save money. I would agree with this if I had my own wedding consulting company, thus cutting costs. As a simple gift giver I just buy a cheap gift bag and put in it whatever present I got. Easy and effective. An example of an inspirational tip is: "have balance in your life". I had realized that between work, school, family, love life, friends and time for myself, some part suffers because of the others. I know I should find some balance in this, but I am still working on this one. I will chat up my significant other after this review. The non applicable one would be: make women feel good. Since I am gay, I do not care about that, but I did take the advice about "make men feel good" and it worked.

As a conclusion: read it, I am sure you'll find it more useful and you'd think. I don't like self improvement books, either but this one will be worth your time. One thing I forgot to mention is that  the success tips are mainly for business owners or people who want to start a business, be warned that the chapter might get boring after the first tips.

Ok, so this was my first book review. The book I am currently reading is: "Cocktails and Cockpics - A Grinder Love Story" by Chris Tracey. So come back and check out the next post.