Love Junkie

by Robert Plunket

The “diabolically clever, shamelessly brass-balled, wrenchingly funny” ( NY Native ) story of love, lust, and the agony of romantic disillusionment. Adored by the likes of Amy Sedaris, Madonna (who optioned the film rights), and Gordon Lish,  Love Junkie is Robert Plunket’s cult novel of the heady heyday of gay New York at the dawn of the AIDS scandalously long out of print, it is now gloriously reissued for a new generation of readers. Mimi Smithers, a modern-day Emma Bovary, is a fortyish suburban housewife who has an eye for décor and dreams of hosting lavish cocktail parties. Reflecting on her time in Tehran with her Union Carbide executive husband, she says, “In the waning months of the Shah’s regime, entertaining became more and more difficult. Hams―always a problem in Islamic countries―were as rare as hen’s teeth.” After their move to Westchester, a party she hosts for Mrs. Rockefeller goes south, and she falls into a deep funk. But then life takes an unexpected turn when she stumbles down into the gay rabbit hole of Manhattan and Fire Island society and meets Joel, a porn star with a chest “as smooth as a Ken doll.” Soon she’s helping him with his lucrative mail order business (signed photographs, used underwear, “verbal abuse audiotapes”), and her real dreams and adventures begin.

Genres: Fiction, Queer, Gay, LGBT, Humor, New York, Novels

272 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1992

Reviews

[enzoreads · Rating 4 out of 5]

ptdrrr moi dans ma delulu era

[Holt Daniels · Rating 1 out of 5]

bought this book because the cover looked intriguing and the only text on the front was a quote saying “One of America’s funniest, gayest writers” and I was like okayyyy I wanna laugh! to my disappointment the humor felt flat as it relied on a caricature of a woman who was the narrator who often times just felt like a cardboard cut out propped up on the wall and additionally lots of racist comments coming from her and other misogynistic gay male character’s observation !!!!!! I didn’t find it funny. at first I couldn’t decide from what source the racism was coming from, like was it just the authors thinly veiled thoughts? I came to believe plunket was purposefully creating these bigoted, shallow characters as the comedy, like you’re supposed to laugh at how bigoted the characters are, not necessarily laugh alongside them about their racist observations. but I just didn’t laugh at a lines like the one that went something like “and all the white twinks were as indescifrable as waiters at a chinese restaurant.” I don’t find that funny even if it’s written self consciously. it’s just bland and tired. and beyond the boredom and tire I felt from this “humor” the actual events and moments of the story didn’t really amount to much at all. okay mimi fell in love with not one but two gay men! oh no! haha! I don’t think this is the worst novel ever, like it wasn’t poorly written, but if I was promised this would be funny and I didn’t laugh once and just sat in a general feeling of slight irritation the whole time then this book didn’t work for me! maybe the satirical tone got lost on me while I tired of reading and maybe I’m boring, but eh bleh whatever

[Gregory Duke · Rating 4 out of 5]

This reissue should be one of the major reads of this year's extended summer season. Breezy, gossipy, humorous, cynical, warm, judgmental, kind, offensive, heartfelt: Plunket's got it all as he extends his narrator farther and farther beyond her bounds. I don't have the desire to write much about this for whatever reason. Not that this lacks depth, I seem to not feel equipped to explain the joke per se. Though it converses via stereotypes, it's a rather honest work. Smoothly paced with a very smart ending that both continues the novel's critical considerations of gay/bourgeois superficiality while memorializing a community in flux. I wish there were more Plunket novels to read!

[Hailey Skinner · Rating 3 out of 5]

The kind of iconic cover I couldn't wait to read in public...
but then the kind of raunchy & problematic bits that made me pray nobody in public knew what I was reading. lol

But also funny sometimes! Although I didn't always love Plunket's humor, I do respect his lore.
90s gay man who wrote 2 novels, sold film rights to Madonna, then disappeared to a Florida trailer park? Slay.

[Drew Praskovich · Rating 4 out of 5]

Universe please let me turn this into a mini series.

Sharp, hilarious, tragic, constantly well-observed with heart and bite

[emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have heard other women described as “sexually voracious” or “sexually frigid.” I guess I fall into the category of “sexually polite.” There’s no reason to forget your manners just because you are engaging in sexual behavior. A solicitous “Is that okay?” or “Is this what you mean?” or even “I think you're getting too close to the edge of the bed” is always appreciated.

[Tim Power · Rating 5 out of 5]

Delightful.

[Gregory · Rating 4 out of 5]

That was not at all what I was expecting. I found this quite dark at times. But an enjoyable read regardless.

[Ethan · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.75

This book was pure vibes.

Dog being too loud? Kill it!
Trip to fire island during the early 1980’s? Let’s invite the 40 year old woman with a flair for fashion!
Bored? Here is some cocaine!

This book was so fun because I hated all the characters and their choices each in a unique way :)

Emojis for how I’m feeling: 👀🫠🥸🩲😳

[federico garcía LOCA · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best beach books to ever do it

Read this book if you love gingers

[Alex Juarez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a fun and rompy gay read from the 1990s! It’s very visual, a great book for someone who is curious about the way queer media was received in the 80s/90s.

A modern Madame Bovary where a middle aged, dissatisfied and delusional woman becomes ensnared with the NYC homo scene. From art shows, to fire island, to a porno set, it’s silly, snarky, and always fun to read a delusional narrator

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

Unless he decides to do something about it, Robert Plunket may not ever write another book. He published two: this and 'My Search for Warren Harding' (which I've just found through Amazon 3rd-party selling). He hasn't had a new book out in years.

'Love Junkie' is a quick and quick-witted read. This is my second time with it. Not so much a novel as stand-up, it has a deliciously superficial and heterosexual female narrator taking us on a no-holds-barred tour of the extremely superficial side of gay life in NYC, just as AIDS was approaching.

It takes a few (equally hilarious) chapters before bored social climber Mimi Smithers enters the gay underbelly but, once she does, the book comes off like a sort of antidote to Larry Kramer's 'Faggots' (1978). One can sense that Plunket also has a marked attitude about the navel-gazing lifestyle his protagonist reports on in such sharp detail - but what really puts the work over is the writing. Laid-out by an objective outsider who only slowly starts to 'get it', the story has hidden landmines of hilarity generously planted on every page. We follow along as Mimi goes from perplexed 'innocent' to fast-learner to somewhat-wise woman of experience; she has something very pointed to say about everything - and she tends to be right on the money.

Naturally, 'LJ' is only skewering one section of gay society. Reading it is like listening to a famous celebrity being 'roasted' - only a roast tends to consist of baseless, wild exaggeration; 'LJ' would be much less funny if it weren't so true.

[Jacob · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Robert Plunkett so much. This was awesome.

[permanentsharpie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just beautifully, perfectly funny. I don’t often laugh out loud while reading but I did multiple times while reading this. It’s a delight, it’s wonderful, I wish I could transcribe all my favorite parts but it would be absurd. Here’s 2:

“He had once showed me some sketches of a perpetual-motion machine he was working on. It was based on electromagnetism and I saw absolutely no reason it wouldn't work.”

“I jumped up and ran to the phone.
‘Hello?’
‘Mimi?’
It was not Joel. It was a man's voice that I couldn't quite place.
‘Yes?’
‘This is Ronald Reagan.’
I was immediately suspicious. Still, it did sound like him.”

[Nick Kofler · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars rounding up. Absolutely loved the first half about a 40 something suburban woman squeezing her way into the NYC gay scene but the plot took a strange turn after the main character got back from fire island. I actually laughed out loud at parts and I always love seeing how even though this book is over 30 years old most of the gay culture still rings true to this day.

[Miłosz · Rating 1 out of 5]

Supposed to be funny, was such a hard read I stopped midway.

[Glen Helfand · Rating 2 out of 5]

I admit I bought this book partly because of the cover. It is a great piece of design, an ass in jockey shorts turned into a Valentine heart. Cute. That and the promise of this being a rediscovered gem from another era. Love Junkie feels much more like a relic than an lost classic. It is a silly, very gay farce that takes its cues from that New York genre that bred Desperately Seeking Susan (made a few years before this was written), in which the upper middle class suburban housewife falls down the rabbit hole of NYC demimonde. Like Plunket's recently reissued My Search for Warren Harding, the characters of Love Junkie are selfish, self-centered, superficial, casually racist caricatures. The narrator here is Mimi, the judgmental housewife who is captivated by a charismatic gay man who takes her under his wing, while she develops a crush, somehow clueless that she's fallen in with a group of bitchy queens. The shenanigans are a mix of the film After Hours (in which Plunket has a cameo) and Queer Eye. The plot is farcical-- Mimi next falls in with a porn star who she assists in his mail order business of selling his used undies (hence the book cover), and a whole range of sex work. This isn't a book about realism, but its outlandishness is full of arbitrary moments and pop culture references that don't add up to much.

[Merridith · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is filled with raunch and is TOTALLY HILARIOUS. I laugh out loud reading it--even now, and I've read it at least 30 times. My hardcover version is falling apart but I'll keep taping it together and will keep re-reading it.

[Cheryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

I only read this because Sara Nelson raves about it in her book”So Many Books, So Little Time” ... saying how she found it so LOL funny.

I don’t agree

[🐴 🍖]

owe this a full review. funnier and sadder than warren harding imo. descrip of proust as "a frenchman who accidentally smelled a cracker" was lmao

[Tyler Burgese · Rating 5 out of 5]

FUNNIEST BOOK EVER WRITTEN

[Isabella Zanobini · Rating 3 out of 5]

mimi the dumbest woman alive <3

[Vanessa Keith · Rating 3 out of 5]

This made me sad

[Dennis Holland · Rating 5 out of 5]

A delightfully absurd bender.

[Lukas Vanneuville · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ik heb talent voor het kopen van vage boeken; wat een fever dream. Ben er nog niet aan uit wat ik van het boek denk; sommige passages ging ik aan stuk.
De volgende bladzijde dacht ik dan weer: “wat de fuck ben ik aan het lezen?”

Veel ongepaste opmerkingen t.o.v. zowat elke minderheidsgroep, verwerkt in het perspectief van het hoofdpersonage. Voor mij was dit er eigenlijk altijd teveel aan, aangezien deze niet aan het verhaal toevoegden en me uit het verhaal haalden.

Het hoofdpersonage in kwestie is een veertigjarige huisvrouw, gesloten van geest, waar dan ook veel van de “opmerkingen” van stammen. Ze leeft in een zowat constante staat van ennui, wenst door te breken in de gesofisticeerde “high society” van New York circa 1980.

Ze doet alles om te behagen en komt zo in allerhande situaties terecht. Een « love junkie » is ze zeker.
Evenzeer tragisch als komisch als gewoonweg vervelend.
Heel fucking vreemd, weet niet goed wat te denken.

[Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun, funny, and yet so heartbreaking, Love Junkie follows the misadventures of Mimi Smithers, who is desperately trying to find her way in New York-area society. It's the dawn of AIDS, and Mimi falls head first into the underbelly of gay Manhattan in the waning days of its hedonism. Written in the early 90s, it's definitely of an era—I'm still not sure if the casual racism is intentional or not (I’m choosing to say it was, to make a point)—but so much of the story remains unchanged, for better and for worse. Great read to kick off Pride season, and I'm holding onto hope that Madonna's film adaptation becomes a reality!

[William Hsu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gagged is the only word I can think of as I was finishing this book. Gagged because this book was so hilariously unserious but also vulnerable and extremely melancholic. Gagged because it’s so gay and there are so many niche references that I never even bothered looking up but I just knew it was gay. So gay. This book is a perfectly orchestrated chaotic gay mess that made total sense in the most campy way possible. It makes me think about how selfishness invites tragedy, like a cautionary tale of narcissism and a big ego in the most unintentionally silly way possible. Anyway, really enjoyed this experience, thanksssss!! 🙏😴😇🔥🤩😍🤑

[McKinzie Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe the funniest book I’ve read as an adult. I’m not known for laughing out loud but I did laugh multiple times throughout reading this one. It’s completely absurd and yet real and relatable (as a hag). Yes, a lot of it is peppered with dated pop cultural references, but I found plenty of it interesting once I gave it a Google, so I wouldn’t consider this an issue unless you don’t find this period of history (1980-ish pre-AIDS NYC) interesting. And I just can’t picture wanting to hang out with someone who doesn’t find that interesting, so that’s your loss! Only thing that kind of upset me is the dog :( Otherwise Mimi is a queen…. hag supreme

[Ileanna Guerra · Rating 3 out of 5]

lol found this book at a random bookstore in Portugal and was intrigued by the cover (the alternate pink one) so I decided to take a gamble as it was only 3.50 euros :’) what an interesting, raunchy, problematic read hahahah it is so early 90s-esque and would be cancelled immediately if it were published today but I appreciated for what it was and the time period it was written 😂 I was thoroughly entertained the whole way through even if a bit embarrassed by what I was reading.

[Maxwell · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was not what I expected when I found it on the library shelves before a backpacking trip. I enjoyed the first half but it took a turn for the worse. The protagonist became an idiot and I do not have sympathy for stupid decisions.