A Great Gay Book: Stories of Growth, Belonging & Other Queer Possibilities

by Ryan Fitzgibbon, Dany Salvatierra (Contributor)

A Great Gay Book is a gorgeously designed collection of essays, short fiction, poetry, interviews, profiles, art, and photography from the archives of the groundbreaking queer magazine Hello Mr. , as well as new material from today’s biggest LGBTQ+ creatives.

Hello Mr. was founded by Ryan Fitzgibbon in 2012. Over its ten-issue lifespan, the beloved and groundbreaking indie magazine became the first home for some of the most prestigious queer voices of a generation.

In A Great Gay Book , Fitzgibbon has curated the most evergreen written and visual content from the magazine’s archives, as well as entries from a new class of contributors, marrying some of today’s most celebrated and emerging queer writers and artists. This is an invitation to a camp class reunion where wisdom and creativity is lovingly passed on to a generation of LGBTQ+ leaders on the rise.
The book features a mix of gorgeous, full-color illustrations alongside Q&As, profiles, short fiction, poems, essays, and comics—what unifies these myriad entries is their exploration of growth, belonging, and other queer possibilities.

Notable artists and writers featured in the book include Jeremy Atherton Lin, Lady Bunny, Alexander Chee, Garth Greenwell, Saeed Jones, Chani Nicholas, Tommy Pico, Ocean Vuong, Bryan Washington, John Waters, Kehinde Wiley, J Wortham, Hanya Yanagihara, and many more. A Great Gay Book is a triumphant celebration of the diversity of queer experience, showcased across several mediums in a beautifully designed package.

Genres: Nonfiction, LGBT, Queer, Short Stories, Poetry, Essays

432 pages, Hardcover

First published May 21, 2024

Reviews

[J]

Pros:
- gay
- the range of different genres in here (poetry, nonfiction, fiction, Q&A, comic, photography, etc.) was really a genuine highlight
- I thought I was going to pick up/put down this book but all of the writers were so phenomenal that I just read it straight through
- there were so many heart wrenching quotes in this book I can’t even pick a favorite to share. So many
- the resilience and depth of the queer experience encapsulated within these pages was so healing, especially right now
- I confess I’m relatively detached from a lot of historical queer artists and writers (and even a lot of modern literary fiction ones) and so I fully plan to use this book as a reference to find new artists to follow and books to read from the wealth that were referenced
- the lack of embarrassment and the rawness of all the pieces genuinely filled that “bullet” in my heart

Cons:
- I appreciated this and don’t think it’s a con personally, but I will note there is a lot of graphic sexual content in here, and it’s not romanticized or glamorized at all, it’s very real so just be aware of that. However, you can very quickly tell which pieces those are so it’s easy to skip
- I’m mad that I’ve been introduced to Hello, Mr. only now that it’s done because it means there’s a finite amount of this incredible publication and that feels like a crime

Overall:
This is easily a contender for my top book of the year. It’s rare to find a collection of diverse works where every single one of them is a work of art in its own right, but these pieces were picked so expertly that I have to say this is one of those rare collections

[Tara]

I've been waffling whether to round down to four or up to five stars simply because there are several sections that just cannot be included in the audiobook version (pictures only) but in the end, I'm going up to five stars.

A Great Gay Book is a collection of essays, interviews, poetry, photographs, and all sorts of things, ranging from an ode to a foot fetish to thoughtful discussions about queer spaces and honestly? This is something I would buy in physical form even though I was approved to listen to the ALC via NetGalley/Tantor Audio. This is definitely a volume I would like to add to my little queer history shelf and there is a lot of value here. There were two stories I nearly skipped, but as someone who does not DNF I waded through especially because I knew that my only reason for wanting to skip was because they were not for me, not that they did not hold value for someone else.

That being said the "Gay" in "A Great Gay Book" really is about 90%+ male-gay with very little lesbian or transwoman voices, and this is even spoken to in one of the interviews (I believe? It was the one about the Dyke Queen zine, how most publications are written by mostly cis white gays) but there is more broadness in ethnicity and a wide mix of more familiar voices (Lady Bunny, Jeremy Atherton Lee, Hanya Yanagihara, to name a few) with ones less familiar to the general public.

I really enjoyed this.

[Tina]

I listened to the audiobook and I really enjoyed it! I haven’t read or heard of the magazine Hello Mr. before but I was interested to read this based on some of the featured authors including Alexander Chee, Ocean Vuong, Garth Greenwell and Hanya Yanagihara. I do think reading the print or ebook would be even better since the book mentions several times throughout that there are pictures. I would have loved to see the images! I loved the variety in this book and all the questions explored such as what is a gay novel, the term queer vs gay, art and artist’s dispositions, what love is, seeing yourself in art, and gender expression.

Thank you to Tantor Audio via NetGalley for my ALC!

[Janice Bryson]

What I loved most about this book was the diversity of voices and experiences. Together, they create a rich and deeply human portrait of queer life. A thoughtful collection of stories that highlights the many ways people experience love, loss, identity, and belonging.

[Jocelyn]

would not recommend the audiobook version

[Sam Richardson]

Exactly as billed. Queer (mostly gay male) stories, poetry, art, interviews, essays, and more.

[Brandon]

Lovely collection of great queer writing. Shame the magazine doesn't exist anymore.