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stardust_ashes 's review for:
Bad Gays: A Homosexual History
by Ben Miller, Huw Lemmey
On paper, I love this book. Queer villains? I am so in.
In reality, however, it kind of felt like a miss.
To start with, the book sold undeniable villains, the title made me want juicy horrible stories. But here, most of the guys are ambiguous, if not partially bad only from a modern point of view because now we know better. Even though it is interesting to question what is good or bad and to show that not every LGBTQ+ throughout history fought for all minorities and sometimes only defended their interests, I feel like it does not truly meet the readers' expectations.
There's another issue with the people chosen for the book. There is a terrible lack of Queer diversity, whereas I don't doubt there is a plethora of ambiguous LGBTQ+ to choose from. On the good side, the people picked are not necessarily known but are really representative of their time.
I wish the book was written more orally or simple manner because something about the text does not work well. The sentences are often long and full of pointless fancy words. There is a few queer jokes (which are enjoyable) but they fall flat because they are not enough for the book not to fall into the boring history book. The jokes do not fit with the historical text. That huge discrepancy makes it hard to read when it could be a fun yet educative book.
Too bad that the best part of the book is the conclusion. It is what helps to put in perspective all the stories of the book but it comes a little too late.
I am curious about the podcast though because I am sure everything about it fixes the misses of the book but for now, the book is bad publicity for it.
In reality, however, it kind of felt like a miss.
To start with, the book sold undeniable villains, the title made me want juicy horrible stories. But here, most of the guys are ambiguous, if not partially bad only from a modern point of view because now we know better. Even though it is interesting to question what is good or bad and to show that not every LGBTQ+ throughout history fought for all minorities and sometimes only defended their interests, I feel like it does not truly meet the readers' expectations.
There's another issue with the people chosen for the book. There is a terrible lack of Queer diversity, whereas I don't doubt there is a plethora of ambiguous LGBTQ+ to choose from. On the good side, the people picked are not necessarily known but are really representative of their time.
I wish the book was written more orally or simple manner because something about the text does not work well. The sentences are often long and full of pointless fancy words. There is a few queer jokes (which are enjoyable) but they fall flat because they are not enough for the book not to fall into the boring history book. The jokes do not fit with the historical text. That huge discrepancy makes it hard to read when it could be a fun yet educative book.
Too bad that the best part of the book is the conclusion. It is what helps to put in perspective all the stories of the book but it comes a little too late.
I am curious about the podcast though because I am sure everything about it fixes the misses of the book but for now, the book is bad publicity for it.