What do you think?
Rate this book
Sparkle: The Queerest Book You'll Ever Love
Often hilarious, sometimes touching, frequently madcap, and irresistibly charming, the stories in each chapter follow two San Francisco gay men from one adventure to the next. Told to you, the reader, as if were actually there, learn how they came out, had their first sexual experiences, got pierced and then tattooed, became drag queens, adopted a nearly full grown son, placed a personal ad, and grew up to become the best of friends. Along the way, find out how many people wanted Sparkle dead and discover how much fun the bars and back streets of San Francisco really are. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, and, in the end, you may just learn a thing or two. Your mamma never told you that being queer could be this much fun.
256 pages, Paperback
First published August 1, 2001
7 people are currently reading
93 people want to read
About the author
Rob Rosen
204 books166 followersMulti-award-winning and best-selling author/editor/anthologist Rob Rosen is the author of Sparkle: The Queerest Book You'll Ever Love, Divas Las Vegas, Hot Lava, Southern Fried, Queerwolf, Vamp, Queens of the Apocalypse, Creature Comfort, Fate, Midlife Crisis, Fierce, And God Belched, Mary, Queen of Scotch, Ted of the d'Urbervilles, Sort of Dead, Genie in a Vodka Bottle, Bobby Ray Breaks the Universe, and D.B. and Me. His short stories have appeared in more than 200 anthologies. You can read some of his best ones in Short Spurts, Short Spurts 2, and Short Spurts 3. He is also the editor of Lust in Time: Erotic Romance Through the Ages, Men of the Manor, Best Gay Erotica 2015 and Best Gay Erotica of the Year, Volumes 1, 2, 3 and 4.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
April 15, 2022
This book has until today sixteen 5-stars ratings; four of them are from its author: it is not an opinion, it's a fact.
Read
April 11, 2018DNF at 21%
It is a book about gay men for gay men. Exactly-The Queerest Book EVER.
The blurb and reviews say it's funny. Sorry, but I didn't get it.
Maybe because I'm a WOMAN? Who enjoys gay fiction?
I'd like to try another book of the author to form my opinion about his works.
My next choice will be the Lambda Literary Award Nominated Divas Las Vegas.
I hope that I'll like it much more than this one.
It is a book about gay men for gay men. Exactly-The Queerest Book EVER.
The blurb and reviews say it's funny. Sorry, but I didn't get it.
Maybe because I'm a WOMAN? Who enjoys gay fiction?
I'd like to try another book of the author to form my opinion about his works.
My next choice will be the Lambda Literary Award Nominated Divas Las Vegas.
I hope that I'll like it much more than this one.
November 19, 2019
Sparkle: The Queerest Book You’ll Ever Love
By Rob Rosen
Fierce Publishing, 2011
Five Stars
This is a comic – yet poignant – saga of gay life in the 1990s. This is Rob Rosen at his cleverest, giddiest, and most vivid. Although there are typical lapses in grammar (me, I, PLEASE!) and consistent choices of wrong words (sachet for sashay, e.g.), I loved every page of this book and was sorry to see it end.
Bruce Miller is our narrator, and he is at the hospital bedside of his friend Sparkle (aka William Astan), who has been shot and lies in a coma. Bruce – known by Sparkle as Secret – tells us all how we got to this point, as if we’re a friend who dropped by. Sparkle, he tells us, had lots of enemies, so finding out who might have shot him will be no easy task. Then Bruce/Secret launches into the whole story, from the moment he met William Astan in 1991, eight years earlier, and they became friends.
What is revealed, in slightly hysterical increments over the many brief, camply-titled chapters, is that Sparkle is more than the arrogant, selfish, mean queen he seems to be. There is a reason he and Bruce become friends and stay friends in spite of everything that happens. With the telling of the adventures of Sparkle and Secret, both men in their very early twenties, we learn a great deal about gay life in San Francisco (and in America) in the 1990s. It is a far cry from my own gay life in the suburban East at the same time, but captures the essence of truth, good and bad. I admit to being puzzled by the fact that AIDS is not mentioned even once – although people were still dying and longterm survival of the virus was still far from typical. This stems from the real-life fact that Rosen himself didn’t move to San Francisco until later on and is probably fifteen years my junior. His experience of AIDS would be entirely different from mine. So, I had to put that qualm aside and just roll with the narrative, which moves quickly and kept me chortling until the very last page.
This is a funny, engaging and heartfelt book. Rosen is an uneven author, but when he’s at his best he…sparkles.
By Rob Rosen
Fierce Publishing, 2011
Five Stars
This is a comic – yet poignant – saga of gay life in the 1990s. This is Rob Rosen at his cleverest, giddiest, and most vivid. Although there are typical lapses in grammar (me, I, PLEASE!) and consistent choices of wrong words (sachet for sashay, e.g.), I loved every page of this book and was sorry to see it end.
Bruce Miller is our narrator, and he is at the hospital bedside of his friend Sparkle (aka William Astan), who has been shot and lies in a coma. Bruce – known by Sparkle as Secret – tells us all how we got to this point, as if we’re a friend who dropped by. Sparkle, he tells us, had lots of enemies, so finding out who might have shot him will be no easy task. Then Bruce/Secret launches into the whole story, from the moment he met William Astan in 1991, eight years earlier, and they became friends.
What is revealed, in slightly hysterical increments over the many brief, camply-titled chapters, is that Sparkle is more than the arrogant, selfish, mean queen he seems to be. There is a reason he and Bruce become friends and stay friends in spite of everything that happens. With the telling of the adventures of Sparkle and Secret, both men in their very early twenties, we learn a great deal about gay life in San Francisco (and in America) in the 1990s. It is a far cry from my own gay life in the suburban East at the same time, but captures the essence of truth, good and bad. I admit to being puzzled by the fact that AIDS is not mentioned even once – although people were still dying and longterm survival of the virus was still far from typical. This stems from the real-life fact that Rosen himself didn’t move to San Francisco until later on and is probably fifteen years my junior. His experience of AIDS would be entirely different from mine. So, I had to put that qualm aside and just roll with the narrative, which moves quickly and kept me chortling until the very last page.
This is a funny, engaging and heartfelt book. Rosen is an uneven author, but when he’s at his best he…sparkles.
November 9, 2014
Definitely not an m/m romance, this gay fiction story is a campy tale about a stereotypical gay twenty-something living in San Francisco. Loved the author's voice and found him at times hilarious. Fell in love with the characters...well, most of them. One scene in particular moved me to tears.
I wish the story could have contained a romance and HEA, though.
I wish the story could have contained a romance and HEA, though.
July 16, 2011
I think this is probably one of the best stories I've read in some time.
Witty and fun. There is a Kindle addition available if you go to his website.
Witty and fun. There is a Kindle addition available if you go to his website.
July 16, 2012
Probably one of the funniest book that I randomly came across EVER. Total must read.
April 4, 2024
Who shot Sparkle? The story opens with Sparkle in a coma and Secret telling us their life story giving a very, very long list of possible suspects. This is not a fluffy romance. This was gay life in San Francisco for that era. I loved it!
September 26, 2012
The first book I read by Rob Rosen was Divas Las Vegas and love, loved, loved it ! Like Divas Las Vegas, the theme in Sparkle is friendship. That special friendship that can only exist between two gay guys that aren’t into each other sexually (well, maybe just a little bit) or maybe they did go there once but decided they’d be better off as “sisters”.
If you're lucky enough to ever come across this type of friendship in your day to day routine or even experience it yourself, the guys involved will constantly:
... refer to each other as whore, gurl, cum-dumpster, Miss Thang and you-big-ol-bottom.
... rip on each other’s outfits, hair and taste (lack of) in men.
... roll their eyes and bitch about what a drama queen you are to anyone within earshot.
But when it all comes down to it, they’d walk through fire for each other and Lord help you if you fall out of favor with both of them at the same time.
All I say is, “Gurl, you better leave town.”
This is the zany story of Bruce’s (a.k.a. Secret) move from the midwest to San Francisco in the early 90's. We get to see Bruce meet Sparkle and a whole host of really funny, odd characters that make this book oh-so-Frisco. With a nod to Dallas, Sparkle even ends up in a coma from a gunshot wound like JR. Who could have shot Sparkle ? Well honey, who didn’t want to shoot Sparkle is the question we should all be asking.
This delightful gay classic has been around since 2001 (Mr. Rosen, you must have been like two when you wrote it) but luckily was released last year in ebook format making it more readily available to queers (and queer-lovers) everywhere. Get it, gurl.
If you're lucky enough to ever come across this type of friendship in your day to day routine or even experience it yourself, the guys involved will constantly:
... refer to each other as whore, gurl, cum-dumpster, Miss Thang and you-big-ol-bottom.
... rip on each other’s outfits, hair and taste (lack of) in men.
... roll their eyes and bitch about what a drama queen you are to anyone within earshot.
But when it all comes down to it, they’d walk through fire for each other and Lord help you if you fall out of favor with both of them at the same time.
All I say is, “Gurl, you better leave town.”
This is the zany story of Bruce’s (a.k.a. Secret) move from the midwest to San Francisco in the early 90's. We get to see Bruce meet Sparkle and a whole host of really funny, odd characters that make this book oh-so-Frisco. With a nod to Dallas, Sparkle even ends up in a coma from a gunshot wound like JR. Who could have shot Sparkle ? Well honey, who didn’t want to shoot Sparkle is the question we should all be asking.
This delightful gay classic has been around since 2001 (Mr. Rosen, you must have been like two when you wrote it) but luckily was released last year in ebook format making it more readily available to queers (and queer-lovers) everywhere. Get it, gurl.
December 4, 2021
Sparkle is a funny, sexy, and adventurous blend of the timeless and memorable Tales of the City series with the modern and equally fantastic Beach Reading series. Rob Rosen weaves a story that can’t be labeled. He does a great job of giving the reader a big tablespoon taste of everything. The queerest book you’ll ever read has something for everyone from seeing his first manhood, (other than his own), to painful body piercing, discovering the pains of drag, and finishing with a touching and heart felt series of events that will lead a stronger and prouder Secret home to visit his family.
The books starts with, who shot Sparkle? The suspects are many, and the list grows longer as the story goes along. Sparkle teaches, (or manipulates, however you see it), Secret not only how to be out, but also how to live life to its fullest. With each of their escapades, the Gay Rules add up, and so do Secret’s dates as his search for Mister Right continues. Secret is easy to fall in love with, (for me, he’s Mouse from Tales of the City), not just because his best friend is a mean and rude jerk that those who have ever had the misfortune to have met Sparkle keep far, far away and avoid him at all costs, but because he wants a relationship with someone to share a house, with a dog, and a life with and not just a life full of one night stands.
I’m not sure about the warning beginning the book, that had me laughing out loud and sharing the book with my straight friends, but wouldn’t it be funny if reading it did turn them from straight to gay.
The books starts with, who shot Sparkle? The suspects are many, and the list grows longer as the story goes along. Sparkle teaches, (or manipulates, however you see it), Secret not only how to be out, but also how to live life to its fullest. With each of their escapades, the Gay Rules add up, and so do Secret’s dates as his search for Mister Right continues. Secret is easy to fall in love with, (for me, he’s Mouse from Tales of the City), not just because his best friend is a mean and rude jerk that those who have ever had the misfortune to have met Sparkle keep far, far away and avoid him at all costs, but because he wants a relationship with someone to share a house, with a dog, and a life with and not just a life full of one night stands.
I’m not sure about the warning beginning the book, that had me laughing out loud and sharing the book with my straight friends, but wouldn’t it be funny if reading it did turn them from straight to gay.
February 27, 2016
Sparkle is a funny, sexy, and adventurous blend of the timeless and memorable Tales of the City series with the modern and equally fantastic Beach Reading series. Rob Rosen weaves a story that can’t be labeled. He does a great job of giving the reader a big tablespoon taste of everything. The queerest book you’ll ever read has something for everyone from seeing his first manhood, (other than his own), to painful body piercing, discovering the pains of drag, and finishing with a touching and heart felt series of events that will lead a stronger and prouder Secret home to visit his family.
The books starts with, who shot Sparkle? The suspects are many, and the list grows longer as the story goes along. Sparkle teaches, (or manipulates, however you see it), Secret not only how to be out, but also how to live life to its fullest. With each of their escapades, the Gay Rules add up, and so do Secret’s dates as his search for Mister Right continues. Secret is easy to fall in love with, (for me, he’s Mouse from Tales of the City), not just because his best friend is a mean and rude jerk that those who have ever had the misfortune to have met Sparkle keep far, far away and avoid him at all costs, but because he wants a relationship with someone to share a house, with a dog, and a life with and not just a life full of one night stands.
I’m not sure about the warning beginning the book, that had me laughing out loud and sharing the book with my straight friends, but wouldn’t it be funny if reading it did turn them from straight to gay.
The books starts with, who shot Sparkle? The suspects are many, and the list grows longer as the story goes along. Sparkle teaches, (or manipulates, however you see it), Secret not only how to be out, but also how to live life to its fullest. With each of their escapades, the Gay Rules add up, and so do Secret’s dates as his search for Mister Right continues. Secret is easy to fall in love with, (for me, he’s Mouse from Tales of the City), not just because his best friend is a mean and rude jerk that those who have ever had the misfortune to have met Sparkle keep far, far away and avoid him at all costs, but because he wants a relationship with someone to share a house, with a dog, and a life with and not just a life full of one night stands.
I’m not sure about the warning beginning the book, that had me laughing out loud and sharing the book with my straight friends, but wouldn’t it be funny if reading it did turn them from straight to gay.
September 7, 2012
It was good, and most definately the gayest book I ever read. Not much else to say. It was a campy, cute, and fun read.
December 10, 2012
This was a good book for just wanting fluff. The story line was interesting and well written.
October 26, 2015
2011 Rainbow Awards Honorable Mention (5* from at least 1 judge)
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews