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Men on Men #5
Men on Men 5: Best New Gay Fiction
This fifth volume in the acclaimed Men on Men series brings readers 20 new stories that pulse with humor, energy, and eroticism, as they explore the tender, often painful truths of our lives. Gay writers have stepped out in front of the contemporary literary scene, and so the stories in this collection refuse to conform, be politically correct, or embrace conventions. The "coming out" tale appears in the works of Adam Klein, Joshua David, and Michael Lowenthal, but no longer confessional, no longer familiar, each story will shock and surprise. D. Lee Williams's "Toilet Training" breaks taboos with its portrayal of exploitation, anger, and revenge set in a public men's room. The irresistibly sensual combination of chocolate and sex permeates a wickedly funny tale of seduction in Brian Kirkpatrick's "Hot Chocolate Drops." And Paul Bonin-Rodriguez establishes himself as a writer to be watched with his poignant, hilarious, and bawdy story of gay love at a Texas Dairy Queen.
Again breaking fresh ground with both established and first-time authors of extraordinary talent, Men on Men 5 addresses issues that are immediate and real - and dares to be naughty, sexy, and fun. This is the collection that once again sets the standard for stimulating, provocation, uncommon prose: not just remarkable gay fiction, but remarkable American writing.
352 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 1994
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
November 26, 2019
Although many of the stories are dated, having been written in the mid-1990's when the AIDS crisis was at its height, this is still a fine collection of good quality gay fiction. The writing styles and themes are varied but all are excellent writers. Looking forward to reading one of the other collections in this series.
February 17, 2015
Good stories, especially “Fearless” by Jameson Currier
August 22, 2019
Great collection of stories. It feels like a time capsule because I am reading them 25 years after the book was published.
August 31, 2024
Although I did not read this, or any of the Men on Men anthologies, at or near their time of publication I did read them all during the COVID lockdown a few years ago and posted positive reviews against this and all the MonM anthologies. I am gradually revisiting them and posting more considered reviews, though I have no reason to think I am going to change my positive opinion of the series, because I want to explain why I think these anthologies are still worth reading.
Men on Men 5 was published in 1994, thirty years ago (I am writing in 2024), and even for those of us who lived through that time (I was 32 at the beginning of the 1990s) it requires thought to recall just how much, for gay men, the world has changed (or at least gay men in some places have changed, though how permanent those changes are is still debatable), and the question needs to be asked does thirty year old gay fiction have any relevance, even for today's gay me?
My answer would be yes but, I would say the best gay writing in this anthology is relevant not because it is gay but because it has moved beyond being 'gay' to being universal. To be simplistic, Saul Bellow and Philip Roth (to be simplistic), are Jewish writers but although what they have to say comes and is inextricably linked to their Jewish background and particular historical setting, culture and milieu, on first publication and subsequently, has always spoken to a universal audience not simply in America but elsewhere.
The same can be said for most of the stories in this anthology. When in 'Club Feet' Adam Klein writes about a gay teenger and his rebellion and struggles with family it resonates because teenagers clashing with parents is universal (On the strength of 'Club Feet' I have just ordered Klein's story collection 'The Medicine Burns'). The same can be said about the work of Wesley Gibson, an author I don't know but whose novels I will also have to acquire.
Because Men on Men 5 comes from the USA it provides those of us who aren't USA based, an insight into writers we might easily miss like David Rakoff and Robin Rodi. It was via anthologies, like this, that I discovered what for American readers might seem established writers like Jaime Manrique, or one of my favorites, Richard McCann (I strongly recommend you search out his 'Mother of Sorrows').
Like all the Men on Men anthologies there are pieces by writers of whom nothing further is known, like Joshua David (I suspect not even his real name) whose 'Land of Love' is one of those excerpts from forthcoming novels, which never appeared, that leave the reader in pangs of frustration for what might have been. Fortunately some of the young writers did go on to publish more, like L. Dee Williams the author of the incredibly funny 'Toilet Training (the ABCs)' would produce the wonderful novel 'After Nirvana' (as simply Dee Williams).
There are prose pieces from poets like Justin Chin and Reginald Shepherd which makes me, who rarely reads poetry, want to seek out their work. Their work, like that of all the authors mentioned, stands out because it doesn't only speak to or have relevance to gays, it speaks everyone, even if everyone isn't listening.
I believe that this universal quality is what eventually doomed anthologies like Men on Men to redundancy. I don't say they were no longer needed, just that in publishing first literary fiction they ceased to be parish magazines of the gay community reflecting its particular concerns. There are gay stories and gay themes but it is interesting that most prescriptive 'gay' fiction (love stories, falling in love with the secretly closeted high school jock - surely you know what I mean?) is not written by gay people, but hetersexual writers reducing 'gays' to a heteronormative niche cliche.
The final area should comment on is the AIDS stories within Men on Men 5 and any 'gay' anthology in 1994 or for the next twenty years. I have mentioned those stories because I am unable to either read or critique them at the moment because although I am sure some of them are good and will last an awful lot of them won't, possibly the majority. I can't separate myself, yet, from the knowledge of the times that gave them birth. But passion, cause, or immediate relevance, doesn't create great literature, it creates campaign literature. Outside of Daniel Defoe's 'Journal of a Plague Year' the millennial old history of plagues, the great of Justinian, the Black Death, the innumerable Cholera and flu epidemics down the Spanish flu after WWI have produced now great or significant writing. I am pretty sure that novels set during the COVID epidemic are already being forgotten. The literary fiction on AIDS is huge but I fear there will be a brutal winnowing and I am sure the more immediate a response to the AIDS crisis the more likely a work is to vanish. AIDS was horrendous, but what is in the end most significant is that life went on. With a few years of it HIV/AIDS becoming the nightmare of gay men who came of age before it, there was an unending succession of young gay men coming along for whom there was no before time, only a present to negotiated and lived with.
My final judgement on Men on Men 5 is that it is a first rate anthology of brilliant writing, some of the authors like Paul Bonin-Rodriquez (a particularly good piece) used their talents in performance, others like Chin and Shepherd in poetry, others disappeared like the wonderful Joshua David or like 'Boys on Fire' by Raphael Kadushin, remain his only fiction, though he subsequently had a career as editor. It provides evidence of the skills of writers like Gary Glickman (though I am sure I will never read his novel 'Years from Now') and Clifford Chase whose novel 'Leaving the Beach' may be one of the novels dealing with AIDS which survives and which I intend, one day, to read.
Footnote: I have deleted my first review because everything I said in it worth saying has been said in the above review. If I had changed my opinions I would have left the review as a record of my changed opinion.
Men on Men 5 was published in 1994, thirty years ago (I am writing in 2024), and even for those of us who lived through that time (I was 32 at the beginning of the 1990s) it requires thought to recall just how much, for gay men, the world has changed (or at least gay men in some places have changed, though how permanent those changes are is still debatable), and the question needs to be asked does thirty year old gay fiction have any relevance, even for today's gay me?
My answer would be yes but, I would say the best gay writing in this anthology is relevant not because it is gay but because it has moved beyond being 'gay' to being universal. To be simplistic, Saul Bellow and Philip Roth (to be simplistic), are Jewish writers but although what they have to say comes and is inextricably linked to their Jewish background and particular historical setting, culture and milieu, on first publication and subsequently, has always spoken to a universal audience not simply in America but elsewhere.
The same can be said for most of the stories in this anthology. When in 'Club Feet' Adam Klein writes about a gay teenger and his rebellion and struggles with family it resonates because teenagers clashing with parents is universal (On the strength of 'Club Feet' I have just ordered Klein's story collection 'The Medicine Burns'). The same can be said about the work of Wesley Gibson, an author I don't know but whose novels I will also have to acquire.
Because Men on Men 5 comes from the USA it provides those of us who aren't USA based, an insight into writers we might easily miss like David Rakoff and Robin Rodi. It was via anthologies, like this, that I discovered what for American readers might seem established writers like Jaime Manrique, or one of my favorites, Richard McCann (I strongly recommend you search out his 'Mother of Sorrows').
Like all the Men on Men anthologies there are pieces by writers of whom nothing further is known, like Joshua David (I suspect not even his real name) whose 'Land of Love' is one of those excerpts from forthcoming novels, which never appeared, that leave the reader in pangs of frustration for what might have been. Fortunately some of the young writers did go on to publish more, like L. Dee Williams the author of the incredibly funny 'Toilet Training (the ABCs)' would produce the wonderful novel 'After Nirvana' (as simply Dee Williams).
There are prose pieces from poets like Justin Chin and Reginald Shepherd which makes me, who rarely reads poetry, want to seek out their work. Their work, like that of all the authors mentioned, stands out because it doesn't only speak to or have relevance to gays, it speaks everyone, even if everyone isn't listening.
I believe that this universal quality is what eventually doomed anthologies like Men on Men to redundancy. I don't say they were no longer needed, just that in publishing first literary fiction they ceased to be parish magazines of the gay community reflecting its particular concerns. There are gay stories and gay themes but it is interesting that most prescriptive 'gay' fiction (love stories, falling in love with the secretly closeted high school jock - surely you know what I mean?) is not written by gay people, but hetersexual writers reducing 'gays' to a heteronormative niche cliche.
The final area should comment on is the AIDS stories within Men on Men 5 and any 'gay' anthology in 1994 or for the next twenty years. I have mentioned those stories because I am unable to either read or critique them at the moment because although I am sure some of them are good and will last an awful lot of them won't, possibly the majority. I can't separate myself, yet, from the knowledge of the times that gave them birth. But passion, cause, or immediate relevance, doesn't create great literature, it creates campaign literature. Outside of Daniel Defoe's 'Journal of a Plague Year' the millennial old history of plagues, the great of Justinian, the Black Death, the innumerable Cholera and flu epidemics down the Spanish flu after WWI have produced now great or significant writing. I am pretty sure that novels set during the COVID epidemic are already being forgotten. The literary fiction on AIDS is huge but I fear there will be a brutal winnowing and I am sure the more immediate a response to the AIDS crisis the more likely a work is to vanish. AIDS was horrendous, but what is in the end most significant is that life went on. With a few years of it HIV/AIDS becoming the nightmare of gay men who came of age before it, there was an unending succession of young gay men coming along for whom there was no before time, only a present to negotiated and lived with.
My final judgement on Men on Men 5 is that it is a first rate anthology of brilliant writing, some of the authors like Paul Bonin-Rodriquez (a particularly good piece) used their talents in performance, others like Chin and Shepherd in poetry, others disappeared like the wonderful Joshua David or like 'Boys on Fire' by Raphael Kadushin, remain his only fiction, though he subsequently had a career as editor. It provides evidence of the skills of writers like Gary Glickman (though I am sure I will never read his novel 'Years from Now') and Clifford Chase whose novel 'Leaving the Beach' may be one of the novels dealing with AIDS which survives and which I intend, one day, to read.
Footnote: I have deleted my first review because everything I said in it worth saying has been said in the above review. If I had changed my opinions I would have left the review as a record of my changed opinion.
July 16, 2020
This one didn't have the pull that previous editions of this book did.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews