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A review by notliable
The Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon by Tom Spanbauer
3.0
Shed, short for Out-In-The-Shed, leaves his hometown of Excellent, Idaho in order to find out the meaning of his true name and what his identity is. In The Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon, Tom Spanbauer tries to create a bastardized bildungsroman where a character keeps growing and finding out more about themselves even after they return from leaving their hometown. The book is based off of Shed's quest for identity that is never truly over or completely understood.
Throughout the journey, Shed lives and interacts with characters like Ida Richilieau, who owns her own brothel and loves talking about dicks, and Dellwood Barker, who believes in the power of semen retention. The reader is never quite sure who Shed is going to meet and how Shed is going to react with them. He is a lovable and unpredictable character who's storyline will lead the reader into utter disbelief.
Spanbauer does a good job at being sexually inclusive with sexual experiences of all forms. As a gay man himself, he normalizes varying sexualities to a point where they are an add-on to the main plot instead of a major plot feature.
The same cannot be said in his use of varying ethnicities. When the Wisdom Brothers come into town, they are characterized with stereotypical vernacular, subpar intelligence, and large dicks. The Wisdom Brothers run a minstrel show where they, as black men put, on black face and sing spirituals. One scene depicts the Wisdom Brothers putting black paint all over Shed's body in a night of drunken debauchery. With the introduction of the Wisdom Brothers, the town of Excellent, Idaho does get a reason to have a war between the religious Mormons and the illicit brothel Ida owns. Because of this war between "good" and "evil," these brothers do have a reason to be in the plot. However, the inclusion of black face and their depiction in the plot seems only to be written because its over-the-top and unexpected. With a book that has been unexpected and radical at every turn, the inclusion of racialized images, within a book not about this ethnic identity, seems crass. It's inclusion seems like Spanbauer wanted something controversial to end his book with instead of trying to accurately depict a group of people. After reading scenes with the Wisdom Brothers in them, the reader wonders was this racialized imagery even necessary.
The book, in general, is an entertaining read because of the absurdity of the plot and the unexpectedness of the ending. It is inclusive to those that are LGBTQA, but not of those of varying ethnicities. I recommend this book to those that like plot-twists and want an ending they would never have guessed. I do not recommend this book to those that want to read a book that accurately and authentically represents people of varying ethnicities.
Throughout the journey, Shed lives and interacts with characters like Ida Richilieau, who owns her own brothel and loves talking about dicks, and Dellwood Barker, who believes in the power of semen retention. The reader is never quite sure who Shed is going to meet and how Shed is going to react with them. He is a lovable and unpredictable character who's storyline will lead the reader into utter disbelief.
Spanbauer does a good job at being sexually inclusive with sexual experiences of all forms. As a gay man himself, he normalizes varying sexualities to a point where they are an add-on to the main plot instead of a major plot feature.
The same cannot be said in his use of varying ethnicities. When the Wisdom Brothers come into town, they are characterized with stereotypical vernacular, subpar intelligence, and large dicks. The Wisdom Brothers run a minstrel show where they, as black men put, on black face and sing spirituals. One scene depicts the Wisdom Brothers putting black paint all over Shed's body in a night of drunken debauchery. With the introduction of the Wisdom Brothers, the town of Excellent, Idaho does get a reason to have a war between the religious Mormons and the illicit brothel Ida owns. Because of this war between "good" and "evil," these brothers do have a reason to be in the plot. However, the inclusion of black face and their depiction in the plot seems only to be written because its over-the-top and unexpected. With a book that has been unexpected and radical at every turn, the inclusion of racialized images, within a book not about this ethnic identity, seems crass. It's inclusion seems like Spanbauer wanted something controversial to end his book with instead of trying to accurately depict a group of people. After reading scenes with the Wisdom Brothers in them, the reader wonders was this racialized imagery even necessary.
The book, in general, is an entertaining read because of the absurdity of the plot and the unexpectedness of the ending. It is inclusive to those that are LGBTQA, but not of those of varying ethnicities. I recommend this book to those that like plot-twists and want an ending they would never have guessed. I do not recommend this book to those that want to read a book that accurately and authentically represents people of varying ethnicities.