Book Club Saboteur
Posted by: Admin
Spying? Me? Well, sure, for the right cause, I’m up for a little covert operation. When rivals spring up, investigation is called for. I’m up for crossing the border into enemy territory to see what I can see.
Back during the planning stages for the Seattle Gay and Lesbian Book Club, we sincerely thought we would be the only game in town. Then someone noticed a tiny ad in the Seattle Gay News about the Q-Squared Book Group. Well, surprise, surprise, we would not be the only gay book club. Like more conventional clubs, Q-Squared meets only once a month, and it’s also for men only.
I promptly sent them an email introducing myself and our club, and proposing that we get together to chat. Q-Squared did not respond. Not interested.
They’d chosen some good books to read – Armistead Maupin’s The Night Listener, Randy Shilts’ The Mayor of Castro Street, and Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty, all respectable titles, although Q-Squared’s promotion repeatedly assures us that they’re not above choosing “beach reads” now and then. And this coming Saturday they’re going to be discussing Scott Heim’s novel, Mysterious Skin.
My dear friend, Gabriel, who works in the Portland film industry, has passionately admired Gregg Araki’s film of Mysterious Skin ever since it came out, and when I mentioned the Q-Squared choice to my pal, Dave, it turned out he loved the movie so much he’d actually bought it – and before I knew it, Friday night I was settled in watching that gorgeous, disturbing film, falling into the trap of it, and getting that satisfying surprise at the end when the pieces all fit together.
What I didn’t expect Saturday morning was that, instead of writing the book reviews and articles that were due, I would settle into my reading armchair and open up the paperback Mysterious Skin that I’d brought home from the bookstore out of curiosity. One hundred pages later, I realized I would not be getting anything else done. The book and film complement each other nicely.
This coming Saturday I’m going to catch a bus up to the Capitol Hill Branch of the Seattle Public Library, where Q-Squared will be having its monthly meeting. They’re going to have a new member. It will be a perfect opportunity to see how another gay book club operates, and thoroughly relaxing for me to be a member instead of the facilitator leading the discussion.
Who knows what good ideas this clandestine adventure may unearth? And if I discover one or two gay readers who have enough time and energy to belong to more than one club, well, I’ll have a few of our book club postcards to hand out, and maybe we’ll get some new members out of the deal.
