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100 Boyfriends
Winner of the 2022 Lambda Literary Award in Gay Fiction. A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice. Longlisted for the 2022 Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award and the 2021 Brooklyn Public Library Literary Prize. One of Buzzfeed's Best LGBTQ+ Books of 2021, NBC's 10 Most Notable LGBTQ Books of 2021, and Pink News' Best LGBTQ Books of 2021. "This hurricane of delirious, lonely, lewd tales is a taxonomy and grand unified theory of the boyfriend, in every tense." —Parul Sehgal, The New York Times"I loved this book—raunchy, irreverent, deliberate, sexy, angry, and tender, in its own way." —Roxane GayAn irrerverent, sensitive, and inimitable look at gay dysfunction through the eyes of a cult heroTransgressive, foulmouthed, and brutally funny, Brontez Purnell’s 100 Boyfriends is a revelatory spiral into the imperfect lives of queer men desperately fighting the urge to self-sabotage. As they tiptoe through minefields of romantic, substance-fueled misadventure—from dirty warehouses and gentrified bars in Oakland to desolate farm towns in Alabama—Purnell’s characters strive for belonging in a world that dismisses them for being Black, broke, and queer. In spite of it—or perhaps because of it—they shine.Armed with a deadpan wit, Purnell finds humor in even the darkest of nadirs with the peerless zeal, insight, and horniness of a gay punk messiah. Together, the slice-of-life tales that writhe within 100 Boyfriends are an inimitable tour of an unexposed queer underbelly. Holding them together is the vision of an iconoclastic storyteller, as fearless as he is human.
194 pages, Kindle Edition
First published February 2, 2021
441 people are currently reading
17248 people want to read
About the author
Brontez Purnell
11 books316 followersBrontez Purnell is an Oakland-based writer, musician, dancer, and director. He is the author of several books, including Since I Laid My Burden Down, and the zine Fag School; frontman for the punk band The Younger Lovers; and founder of the Brontez Purnell Dance Company.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 898 reviews
June 28, 2021
I loved this book--raunchy, irreverent, deliberate, sexy, angry, and tender, in its own way. There is a matter of factness tone that I really loved. Also, listen. The men in these stories have a lot of sex. Like, logistically, the chafing alone! Bless their hearts. V v v great book. Will definitely be reading this one again.
March 18, 2021
Thank you to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for providing me this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.
What to say about Brontez Purnell’s raw and uncompromisingly shameless depiction of homosexuality and blackness? Well, for starters: it’s a doozy! But a worthy doozy. Like riding a bull on acid. Flitting between dark humor and emotional poignance, we the reader are taken on one hell of a ride through the trials and sexualized tribulations of what it means to be a queer black man via varying vignettes. It never once feels disingenuous. Only glaringly open, critical, and goddamn honest.
The writing here is fluid and clear; I don’t know how else to put it other than Purnell’s prose is a gift. The man has a way with words. I’m fucking jealous as fuck.
This short novel isn’t for the prudes. There’s lots of foul language, emotional ricochets, a plethora of alcohol and drugs (weaving together a rather grim portrait of the devastating—yet, ongoing—opiate/methamphetamine crisis facing the gay community), and lots and lots and lots of sex. It’s a story of stories; of addictions and obsessions, jaded individuals and vulnerabilities, misanthropy and loneliness, horniness, hilarity, and truths.
Purnell examines this all with a candid, unflinching realness.
*Update*
I’ve noticed quite a few reviewers making generalized, surface-level complaints, who can’t seem to recognize satire when they see it.
What to say about Brontez Purnell’s raw and uncompromisingly shameless depiction of homosexuality and blackness? Well, for starters: it’s a doozy! But a worthy doozy. Like riding a bull on acid. Flitting between dark humor and emotional poignance, we the reader are taken on one hell of a ride through the trials and sexualized tribulations of what it means to be a queer black man via varying vignettes. It never once feels disingenuous. Only glaringly open, critical, and goddamn honest.
The writing here is fluid and clear; I don’t know how else to put it other than Purnell’s prose is a gift. The man has a way with words. I’m fucking jealous as fuck.
”Where God closes a door, He opens a window,” but all I can think about is, like, But wait, the window is on the third floor and the house is on fire.”
”I let him charm me more, I let him let me think I was special—I knew at my core that he was waiting to unzip his face.”
”...everybody is left with the ghost of somebody else.”
This short novel isn’t for the prudes. There’s lots of foul language, emotional ricochets, a plethora of alcohol and drugs (weaving together a rather grim portrait of the devastating—yet, ongoing—opiate/methamphetamine crisis facing the gay community), and lots and lots and lots of sex. It’s a story of stories; of addictions and obsessions, jaded individuals and vulnerabilities, misanthropy and loneliness, horniness, hilarity, and truths.
Purnell examines this all with a candid, unflinching realness.
*Update*
I’ve noticed quite a few reviewers making generalized, surface-level complaints, who can’t seem to recognize satire when they see it.
February 22, 2021
100 Boyfriends is a fast-paced, gut-punch take on navigating gay relationships while grounding yourself in the process.
Brontez Purnell's classic punk style is evident from the moment you open his latest book. Each short chapter is an introduction to another sexual escapade, as the narrator meets a man, they have sex, and other things happen. While it's unclear just who the narrator is, this detail is unimportant because the point of the book is to satirize gay men and their sex, while also celebrating the fact that we get to have so much of it.
Purnell's 100 Boyfriends is as hard to describe as it is to pin down. A memoir-fiction-erotica mashup, there isn't another recently published book quite like it. I read it in a day, and I recommend you do the same.
Brontez Purnell's classic punk style is evident from the moment you open his latest book. Each short chapter is an introduction to another sexual escapade, as the narrator meets a man, they have sex, and other things happen. While it's unclear just who the narrator is, this detail is unimportant because the point of the book is to satirize gay men and their sex, while also celebrating the fact that we get to have so much of it.
Purnell's 100 Boyfriends is as hard to describe as it is to pin down. A memoir-fiction-erotica mashup, there isn't another recently published book quite like it. I read it in a day, and I recommend you do the same.
May 1, 2021
Listen to the full review here.
Sex, drugs, and more sex. I was worried that the stories would be too repetitive but there is enough variance, with enough strong writing, to make the collection worthwhile. Characters fuck and look for little pockets of intimacy, even if the encounters are too fleeting, or the characters too self-conscious to allow themselves that intimacy. There is a lot of deflection with jokes about sex and cum and drugs, although some of them seem meant to shock straight Midwesterners and have diminishing returns, like the middle-schooler who screams naughty words at recess.
The stories are at their best when they examine how we enter and exit each other’s lives. The structure of these contained stories is often: two peoples collide and knock each other ajar, leaving us with a hint about where their new path might direct them. It’s a flashbang of a relationship, a power dynamic, and then we hustle out before it gets stale.
I also love the questions it dares to ask about relationship: who will be seen in public with who? What label do they dare use? Who is pleasuring who? Who is getting pleasure in ways they refuse to admit? Who is dictating the timeline and how long this will exist? The countdown is happening, we just don’t see the numbers yet.
Two stories venture out of the young/queer/art/drug world. One is about the narrator’s childhood, which has some beautiful description but confuses the simplicity of language that a child has at their disposal with simplicity of emotion. And the final piece, about a rock tour, tries to show how hedonism will break you, but gets too enamored with describing all the hedonism to truly make a compelling point. Cum in the butthole, too often, is tedious and boring.
It’s worth a read if you’re not squeamish about Rated R material. Like the sex described, the book is quick and dirty, worth your time if you can connect to the characters.
Sex, drugs, and more sex. I was worried that the stories would be too repetitive but there is enough variance, with enough strong writing, to make the collection worthwhile. Characters fuck and look for little pockets of intimacy, even if the encounters are too fleeting, or the characters too self-conscious to allow themselves that intimacy. There is a lot of deflection with jokes about sex and cum and drugs, although some of them seem meant to shock straight Midwesterners and have diminishing returns, like the middle-schooler who screams naughty words at recess.
The stories are at their best when they examine how we enter and exit each other’s lives. The structure of these contained stories is often: two peoples collide and knock each other ajar, leaving us with a hint about where their new path might direct them. It’s a flashbang of a relationship, a power dynamic, and then we hustle out before it gets stale.
I also love the questions it dares to ask about relationship: who will be seen in public with who? What label do they dare use? Who is pleasuring who? Who is getting pleasure in ways they refuse to admit? Who is dictating the timeline and how long this will exist? The countdown is happening, we just don’t see the numbers yet.
Two stories venture out of the young/queer/art/drug world. One is about the narrator’s childhood, which has some beautiful description but confuses the simplicity of language that a child has at their disposal with simplicity of emotion. And the final piece, about a rock tour, tries to show how hedonism will break you, but gets too enamored with describing all the hedonism to truly make a compelling point. Cum in the butthole, too often, is tedious and boring.
It’s worth a read if you’re not squeamish about Rated R material. Like the sex described, the book is quick and dirty, worth your time if you can connect to the characters.
March 15, 2024
by my tally it's about /133/ boyfriends in this book, so great value for sure
August 15, 2021
“Fuck all y’all” reads the opening dedication of 100 Boyfriends. One gets the sense author Brontez Purnell doesn’t mean it as an insult.
What follows are a series of polyphonic sexual encounters on the margins of gay culture’s newfound respectability. 100 Boyfriends is narrated – with little self-awareness - by men not yet consumed by the aggressive gentrification of queer life. Too broke, too black, too poz or too punk, they elevate sluthood as an art while resisting its Grindr-era commodification.
In the footsteps of visceral artists and cruisers like Genet, Wojnarowicz, Haring and Delany, Purnell finds poetry and humour in the horny pursuit of anonymous sex, capturing how the vulnerability of desire and a transgressive fearlessness can cohabit in brazen acts of independence.
These short stories are vulgar, honest, sordid and often darkly funny. Beneath the punk ethos emerges a subtle yearning for intimacy. But there is no blueprint for that connection, at least none that doesn’t mimic failed white heteronormative institutions. As mainstream gay culture formats intimacy into palatable morsels, from bland to stale, its rejection becomes both heroic and heartbreaking.
Perhaps these nocturnal encounters that mean nothing, mean something in their accrual. “Between two men, there can be a hundred ghosts in the room.” The forgotten or faceless guys of our past haunt us, and the sum of the sex we’ve had – as well as the rituals of waiting and wanting that surround it - might end up defining who we are.
100 Boyfriends makes a compelling case that each sexual act – even the rawest, saddest or dirtiest, in anonymity a sort of collective intimacy – is a key building block of queer identity. Decades after Stonewall, it’s an invitation to inhabit and occupy the black negative space in between the stars that shine the brightest, the ones that make-up the guiding constellations of our culture.
Purnell’s project is perhaps too purposefully unfocused – like a punk anthem’s embrace of noise – to offer this reader a truly transformative experience, but echoing long after the final page is a rowdy rallying cry for bringing the homo out of homogeneity.
What follows are a series of polyphonic sexual encounters on the margins of gay culture’s newfound respectability. 100 Boyfriends is narrated – with little self-awareness - by men not yet consumed by the aggressive gentrification of queer life. Too broke, too black, too poz or too punk, they elevate sluthood as an art while resisting its Grindr-era commodification.
In the footsteps of visceral artists and cruisers like Genet, Wojnarowicz, Haring and Delany, Purnell finds poetry and humour in the horny pursuit of anonymous sex, capturing how the vulnerability of desire and a transgressive fearlessness can cohabit in brazen acts of independence.
These short stories are vulgar, honest, sordid and often darkly funny. Beneath the punk ethos emerges a subtle yearning for intimacy. But there is no blueprint for that connection, at least none that doesn’t mimic failed white heteronormative institutions. As mainstream gay culture formats intimacy into palatable morsels, from bland to stale, its rejection becomes both heroic and heartbreaking.
Perhaps these nocturnal encounters that mean nothing, mean something in their accrual. “Between two men, there can be a hundred ghosts in the room.” The forgotten or faceless guys of our past haunt us, and the sum of the sex we’ve had – as well as the rituals of waiting and wanting that surround it - might end up defining who we are.
100 Boyfriends makes a compelling case that each sexual act – even the rawest, saddest or dirtiest, in anonymity a sort of collective intimacy – is a key building block of queer identity. Decades after Stonewall, it’s an invitation to inhabit and occupy the black negative space in between the stars that shine the brightest, the ones that make-up the guiding constellations of our culture.
Purnell’s project is perhaps too purposefully unfocused – like a punk anthem’s embrace of noise – to offer this reader a truly transformative experience, but echoing long after the final page is a rowdy rallying cry for bringing the homo out of homogeneity.
September 10, 2021
This flat collection of sexual encounters should’ve been a Twitter thread, or a blog entry, instead of a book. There’s nothing “literary” about it. Apparently, the faux praise that it collects has more to do with the fact that the author checks every box in the progressive agenda, instead of being valued for his own writing skills. Sure, there’s enough smart humor for a couple of laughs, but I’d rather see a late night talk-show than reading pretentious autofiction.
July 1, 2021
In one story from Brontez Purnell's collection “100 Boyfriends” a character sits in an STD clinic thinking “I could say I deserve better than this – but do I? Really?” That tragic ambivalence and tottering self-esteem is common to many of the characters in these stories where casual sexual encounters are vigorously pursued without caution or care for the consequences. Some lead to more tender feelings, emotional connections or regular satisfying sex. Others are so fleeting it feels like a routine function. Some encounters are so hot it becomes a “squirting epic semen battle” and others are dissatisfying and all the more shameful because the narrator knows he will go back for more. There's an acknowledgement that the expectation is often better than the sex itself. We learn some of these men's names and others remain anonymous as we follow an enormous amount of gay hookups. Like the experiences themselves, the result is that the reader's memory becomes crowded with a plethora of indistinct vaguely-recalled male faces, bodies and details. It's brilliant how this gives a true sense of what that compulsive pursuit is like for some men who have sex with men.
Read my full review of 100 Boyfriends by Brontez Purnell on LonesomeReader
Read my full review of 100 Boyfriends by Brontez Purnell on LonesomeReader
March 7, 2021
3.5 stars, rounded up.
100 Boyfriends , Brontez Purnell's new short story collection, is raunchy and frank, poignant and powerful. These short stories look at sexuality, race, lust, addiction, inequity, and the need for connection, be it fleeting or permanent.
With this new book, Purnell hits the ground running on page 1 and doesn’t let up the pace until the very last word. His characters are all Black men of various ages and in various states of fitness—physical, emotional, and psychological. In some cases these men are fully aware they’re a mess and continue to self-sabotage; in others they’re totally (and, at times, blissfully) unaware.
“There are periods of my life that roll through me hazily. Not like an apparition, more like that moment a cartoon villain gets hit in the head with, say, an anvil or whatever, and all he sees is stars — my life was all flashbacks that never materialized.”
The characters in these stories are often searching. Sometimes it’s for their next fix or their next hookup, sometimes it’s for something more, something deeper. At times they find fulfillment—temporary or otherwise—but at other times, they’re still searching.
These stories are often explicit, so they’re not for those who are uncomfortable with graphic language or sexual content. But even when he shocks you, there’s an underlying note of poignancy or emotion in many of the stories, which only increases their power.
100 Boyfriends is definitely not a collection for everyone, but Purnell’s storytelling is a talent to behold.
Check out my list of the best books I read in 2020 at https://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com/2021/01/the-best-books-i-read-in-2020.html.
Check out my list of the best books of the last decade at https://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com/2020/01/my-favorite-books-of-decade.html.
See all of my reviews at itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com.
Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/the.bookishworld.of.yrralh/.
100 Boyfriends , Brontez Purnell's new short story collection, is raunchy and frank, poignant and powerful. These short stories look at sexuality, race, lust, addiction, inequity, and the need for connection, be it fleeting or permanent.
With this new book, Purnell hits the ground running on page 1 and doesn’t let up the pace until the very last word. His characters are all Black men of various ages and in various states of fitness—physical, emotional, and psychological. In some cases these men are fully aware they’re a mess and continue to self-sabotage; in others they’re totally (and, at times, blissfully) unaware.
“There are periods of my life that roll through me hazily. Not like an apparition, more like that moment a cartoon villain gets hit in the head with, say, an anvil or whatever, and all he sees is stars — my life was all flashbacks that never materialized.”
The characters in these stories are often searching. Sometimes it’s for their next fix or their next hookup, sometimes it’s for something more, something deeper. At times they find fulfillment—temporary or otherwise—but at other times, they’re still searching.
These stories are often explicit, so they’re not for those who are uncomfortable with graphic language or sexual content. But even when he shocks you, there’s an underlying note of poignancy or emotion in many of the stories, which only increases their power.
100 Boyfriends is definitely not a collection for everyone, but Purnell’s storytelling is a talent to behold.
Check out my list of the best books I read in 2020 at https://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com/2021/01/the-best-books-i-read-in-2020.html.
Check out my list of the best books of the last decade at https://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com/2020/01/my-favorite-books-of-decade.html.
See all of my reviews at itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blogspot.com.
Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/the.bookishworld.of.yrralh/.
January 12, 2021
🤘🤘🤘 (three stars, as rated in rock and roll hands because of the ending. 🙊)
I was given an advanced reader copy of this book by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review
My, oh my. How to go about reviewing this. My words here are going to be a bit of a stumbly mess that I’ll likely end up revising later. Please don’t hold it against me. I’m reeling from the emotional journey.
First, I’m not entirely sure if this book was meant to all be consumed as if told from a single character or like a collection of short stories? I’m going to assume being vague on that point was strategic and intentional in that the narrator seemed to actually dissociate from their own story at times while they were telling it which I actually really dug and empathized with. Given that there was also a great deal of trauma detailed in this book, I can only imagine as to the author’s reasoning for so much of the switching around. Soooo, I am going to assume that these encounters were all told from POV of one character despite the occasional name changes and even though the narration style shifts rather frequently between third and first person; sometimes within a single paragraph. If I‘m wrong in doing that, I apologize.
ALSO, do not take this criticism or reflection to mean that I didn’t enjoy the book. While I was very often confused by it, I rather loved the thing. A lot. It was intriguing, illuminating, entertaining and even heart-wrenching at times to read of this man (these men’s? Ugh I can’t decide!) dating exploits. Life and love from the perspective of a gay black man is something I need more of in my life. And my lack of context with which to understand this book can not be held against it. The more that I sit with these adventures in sex and dating, the more that I can relate to and am even inspired by them? So that’s… unexpected but appreciated. I want more from this author, for sure. And would recommend this book to anyone looking for a raw, unfiltered perspective on casual dating. Do not read this book if you do poorly with cringe-worthy moments and laughing when you probably shouldn’t. This book is not for the faint of heart. And oh how I love it for that.
Content Warnings for this book: sexual assault, casual sex, bdsm, roleplaying, HIV and AIDS, homophobia, racism, racist imagery, infidelity, sex work, child abuse, absent parent, drug use
May 16, 2021
can only assume this has less than a 4-star average from squares who hate sodomy bc this is so funny and, moreover, good.
February 14, 2021
100 Boyfriends is very much sex, drugs, rock and roll. the writing is fluid and clear, it's raw and clearly not for prudes.
Currently reading
April 22, 2021I know this sound sketch if you're familiar with the contents of the book, but reading this is totally a blast of nostalgia for the San Francisco of my childhood!
November 23, 2021
Another read from the 2022 Tournament of Books longlist, as captured at the dentist. I've had this author's last book on my TBR for so long, I'm just happy to have finally read something by them.
Front to back the very short stories are about hookups, boyfriends, ongoing flings, etc. But somehow the author plays with tiny details to switch expected words or thoughts around, making it a delight to read, beyond the delight of stories that are told without apology.
Front to back the very short stories are about hookups, boyfriends, ongoing flings, etc. But somehow the author plays with tiny details to switch expected words or thoughts around, making it a delight to read, beyond the delight of stories that are told without apology.
February 7, 2021
5+ out of 5.
A gutshot kind of collection, full of humor and sadness and melancholy and life and sex and the world-as-we-know-it. Hard to think about the promiscuity under COVID, but maybe that's also part of the book's charm: the way it forces us to grapple with the lives of queer men in the 21st Century, something many people are still unwilling to do (or only willing to do under more sanitized conditions).
Anyway, I fucking loved this. Broke my heart a couple of times and made me put the book down from uncontrollable laughter a few times too.
A gutshot kind of collection, full of humor and sadness and melancholy and life and sex and the world-as-we-know-it. Hard to think about the promiscuity under COVID, but maybe that's also part of the book's charm: the way it forces us to grapple with the lives of queer men in the 21st Century, something many people are still unwilling to do (or only willing to do under more sanitized conditions).
Anyway, I fucking loved this. Broke my heart a couple of times and made me put the book down from uncontrollable laughter a few times too.
January 5, 2022
I am so sorry to say this, especially because this was recommended to me and I hate disliking stuff that someone recommended to me, but I was so……BORED!!
At first I was like am I just turning into a puritan? Then I thought back to half the media I have been consuming lately and was like no, I’m just bored. I think the repetitiveness and monotony was intentional, which I’ll get to later. I really cannot imagine sustaining this level of interest in sex, I would be exhausted. Respect for having this kind of stamina.
This book consists of monotone vignettes about sexual encounters. It’s unclear if you are supposed to interpret them as slices of various people’s lives or read them as adventures from one person’s life. As I have been reading so much autofiction I assumed this was the same thing, based on the author’s bio, but who’s to say! I mostly did interpret them as being all about the same character because of little personal details revealed throughout.
Much of the media I’ve been consuming lately focuses on a character’s/ a groups descent into perversion. Aku No Hana of course, and I’m also listening to this audiobook that’s like a shitty version of the Secret History. There was this scene in the audiobook where a professor describes the cult ritual Bacchanals that happened in ancient Greece, and has a whole lecture about giving into ecstatic pleasure. Many of these stories focus on the liminal space between recognizing you have these feelings and then actually acting on them, and how that recognition and/or action changes your view of yourself.
I am also reading this silly little comic about a frog that doesnt fit in and through a series of unfortunate events (he kills some ladybugs but realizes he is a murderer bc it’s AnimalWorld so he tries to bury the bodies under the floorboards but they turn into a magic beanstalk and it grows so high he is lifted up to another planet). The frog ends up in a paradise where he has everything he didn’t have in his home world. But very soon after, he gets bored!! All the characters in 100 boyfriends have fully given themselves over to hedonism, but they also don’t seem very satisfied or at least the narrator doesn’t. This book just got me thinking that, in all these books that focus on “getting to the other side” especially when it comes to sex drugs rock and roll, end up numb. Basically, I’m fascinated by the descent, but when everyone’s already there I am bored!
Obviously I’m not the first person to think of the hedonistic treadmill. The numbness and repetitiveness in 100 boyfriends seemed very intentional:
[the boyfriends] were like pieces of bubblegum you chew hours after the flavor leaves (128).
“His dick did not feel great, it felt like I was a patient about to undergo surgery, and all I wanted was for it to be over so that I could say I did it” (143, this sentence is during a scene in which he fucks a sex worker who he asks to treat him like they are bfs)
“We had fucked eachother so much that sex at times felt like we were scraping the last bit of toothpaste out of a tube that shot its last load two paychecks ago” (114)
Page 158-159 where he is at a clinic and a nurse asks him why he doesn’t just get a bf and he begins sobbing in her arms and then later fixates on the warmth and tenderness of being cared for in the hug.
These lines lead me to wonder if the main character was going to eventually find love and that the story would “resolve”, but then I admonished myself because just because I am personally happy with monogamy doesn’t mean that’s the answer for everyone and I respect that different people find satisfaction/happiness in different ways. Idk , I don’t want to sound like some huge loser homebody (which let’s be honest, I am that) but this wasn’t for me! I was slogging thru and it’s under 200 pages. A bummer because I really wanted to like it but I simply did not.
At first I was like am I just turning into a puritan? Then I thought back to half the media I have been consuming lately and was like no, I’m just bored. I think the repetitiveness and monotony was intentional, which I’ll get to later. I really cannot imagine sustaining this level of interest in sex, I would be exhausted. Respect for having this kind of stamina.
This book consists of monotone vignettes about sexual encounters. It’s unclear if you are supposed to interpret them as slices of various people’s lives or read them as adventures from one person’s life. As I have been reading so much autofiction I assumed this was the same thing, based on the author’s bio, but who’s to say! I mostly did interpret them as being all about the same character because of little personal details revealed throughout.
Much of the media I’ve been consuming lately focuses on a character’s/ a groups descent into perversion. Aku No Hana of course, and I’m also listening to this audiobook that’s like a shitty version of the Secret History. There was this scene in the audiobook where a professor describes the cult ritual Bacchanals that happened in ancient Greece, and has a whole lecture about giving into ecstatic pleasure. Many of these stories focus on the liminal space between recognizing you have these feelings and then actually acting on them, and how that recognition and/or action changes your view of yourself.
I am also reading this silly little comic about a frog that doesnt fit in and through a series of unfortunate events (he kills some ladybugs but realizes he is a murderer bc it’s AnimalWorld so he tries to bury the bodies under the floorboards but they turn into a magic beanstalk and it grows so high he is lifted up to another planet). The frog ends up in a paradise where he has everything he didn’t have in his home world. But very soon after, he gets bored!! All the characters in 100 boyfriends have fully given themselves over to hedonism, but they also don’t seem very satisfied or at least the narrator doesn’t. This book just got me thinking that, in all these books that focus on “getting to the other side” especially when it comes to sex drugs rock and roll, end up numb. Basically, I’m fascinated by the descent, but when everyone’s already there I am bored!
Obviously I’m not the first person to think of the hedonistic treadmill. The numbness and repetitiveness in 100 boyfriends seemed very intentional:
[the boyfriends] were like pieces of bubblegum you chew hours after the flavor leaves (128).
“His dick did not feel great, it felt like I was a patient about to undergo surgery, and all I wanted was for it to be over so that I could say I did it” (143, this sentence is during a scene in which he fucks a sex worker who he asks to treat him like they are bfs)
“We had fucked eachother so much that sex at times felt like we were scraping the last bit of toothpaste out of a tube that shot its last load two paychecks ago” (114)
Page 158-159 where he is at a clinic and a nurse asks him why he doesn’t just get a bf and he begins sobbing in her arms and then later fixates on the warmth and tenderness of being cared for in the hug.
These lines lead me to wonder if the main character was going to eventually find love and that the story would “resolve”, but then I admonished myself because just because I am personally happy with monogamy doesn’t mean that’s the answer for everyone and I respect that different people find satisfaction/happiness in different ways. Idk , I don’t want to sound like some huge loser homebody (which let’s be honest, I am that) but this wasn’t for me! I was slogging thru and it’s under 200 pages. A bummer because I really wanted to like it but I simply did not.
February 26, 2022
I almost hate to review Brontez Pernell's 100 Boyfriends, because I'm not familiar with the author, and I don't think this book is aimed at me at all. Regardless, I'd hoped that the story would win me over, but it didn't.
Obviously trying hard to be very funny, but sadly I just didn't get it?
No doubt, others would love it.
thank you to Farrar, Straus and Giroux, MCD x FSG Originals through NetGalley for the opportunity to review Brontez Purnell's 100 Boyfriends for my honest review, all opinions are my own
Obviously trying hard to be very funny, but sadly I just didn't get it?
No doubt, others would love it.
thank you to Farrar, Straus and Giroux, MCD x FSG Originals through NetGalley for the opportunity to review Brontez Purnell's 100 Boyfriends for my honest review, all opinions are my own
dnf
November 6, 2021DNF @ 62%
Gossipy and scandalous, the tone here gets old quickly. The stories are so short - sometimes only a page or two - but they're all the same. The characters abuse drugs, drink too much, sleep with too many people, think about how they should change and be better, then regress and repeat. There's only so many times you can read the same story before you have to give up.
Gossipy and scandalous, the tone here gets old quickly. The stories are so short - sometimes only a page or two - but they're all the same. The characters abuse drugs, drink too much, sleep with too many people, think about how they should change and be better, then regress and repeat. There's only so many times you can read the same story before you have to give up.
February 21, 2021
One of those rare collections that gets better and better as it goes on. Unapologetic queer filth that's much deeper than it first appears. But, more importantly than that, it is unapologetic queer filth.
October 21, 2020
Brontez Purnell fearlessly approaches what would be considered raw and subversive by typical literary standards and runs so far past, into the darkness, that you may not believe what's on the page. It's spectacularly vulnerable and brave albeit quite shocking. Purnell writes so shamelessly, humanity just...shoots forth (...yup)
Through a series of nonlinear stories told mostly in first person, and occasionally in third, we piece together a portrait of sex, addiction, and otherness. Purnell is unrelenting in his portrayal of sexual transactions; his narrator repeatedly falling weak to horniness to then left feeling deep emptiness. It's that string of common themes that makes the often disparate stories feel singular.
Through a series of nonlinear stories told mostly in first person, and occasionally in third, we piece together a portrait of sex, addiction, and otherness. Purnell is unrelenting in his portrayal of sexual transactions; his narrator repeatedly falling weak to horniness to then left feeling deep emptiness. It's that string of common themes that makes the often disparate stories feel singular.
March 27, 2021
this is a hard one to rate but between 3.5 and 4 (ish)
September 14, 2022
3.5 - aufgerundet, weil es in Original sicher noch mehr Spaß gemacht hätte.
September 11, 2022
This short story collection was unapologetically gay, messy & poignant - I loved every second of it!
Each of the stories found within Brontez Purnell's 100 Boyfriends offers a glimpse into the sexual escapades of a number of Black, queer men. I loved that he touched upon so many aspects of modern queer life here - sex, love, monogamy, racism, body shaming, kinks, drugs, even rock 'n' roll, just to name a few. I honestly enjoyed every story, whether they were ten pages or a single paragraph. These are real men going through real life struggles & facing these struggles in real & relatable ways - this is one of the most honest fictionalized depictions of queer life I've come across in a long time. A little warning for those who are a bit more reserved going in - this is very sexually graphic at times, so if that's not for you then I'd say stay away. I, on the other hand, am not reserved, & I loved seeing sex for queer men depicted honestly & openly throughout these stories.
I thoroughly enjoyed this cover to cover & I highly recommend it to everyone, particularly to those looking to hear from voices who aren't represented nearly enough in queer fiction!
Each of the stories found within Brontez Purnell's 100 Boyfriends offers a glimpse into the sexual escapades of a number of Black, queer men. I loved that he touched upon so many aspects of modern queer life here - sex, love, monogamy, racism, body shaming, kinks, drugs, even rock 'n' roll, just to name a few. I honestly enjoyed every story, whether they were ten pages or a single paragraph. These are real men going through real life struggles & facing these struggles in real & relatable ways - this is one of the most honest fictionalized depictions of queer life I've come across in a long time. A little warning for those who are a bit more reserved going in - this is very sexually graphic at times, so if that's not for you then I'd say stay away. I, on the other hand, am not reserved, & I loved seeing sex for queer men depicted honestly & openly throughout these stories.
I thoroughly enjoyed this cover to cover & I highly recommend it to everyone, particularly to those looking to hear from voices who aren't represented nearly enough in queer fiction!
November 6, 2021
100 ʙᴏʏғʀɪᴇɴᴅs by Brontez Purnell
Before I start, I want to set the tone by quoting the back cover of the book: I love this slut of a book! And by golly, it sure is! Slutty, sleazy, dirty, honest… in other words: gay AF!
Brontez collects queer tales in this little book, contemporary but old as mankind! The smell of sex, seamen, alcohol, drugs and sweat is mingled with that feeling of desperation, heartbreak, ignorance and indifference!
With the right dose of humour or sadness, we read about hookers, sex addicts, drug induced sex parties and a European tour filled with more of those shenanigans!
A laugh and a tear, is best how I can describe it! It is a fast read, confronting in times and I’m sure for a lit of queer people, recognisable!
Now let those rays of midday sunshine wake you up after the night you just had, get out of bed and drink your first (of many) cup of coffee! ☕️🥃
#100boyfriends #brontezpurnell #looneybooks79 #bookstagram #bookstagrammer #booksbooksbooks #gayreader #lgbtqiaplus #queerread #menreadtoo #belgianreader #bookblogger #bookblog #bookreview #booklover #boekenlezer #california #europeantour
Before I start, I want to set the tone by quoting the back cover of the book: I love this slut of a book! And by golly, it sure is! Slutty, sleazy, dirty, honest… in other words: gay AF!
Brontez collects queer tales in this little book, contemporary but old as mankind! The smell of sex, seamen, alcohol, drugs and sweat is mingled with that feeling of desperation, heartbreak, ignorance and indifference!
With the right dose of humour or sadness, we read about hookers, sex addicts, drug induced sex parties and a European tour filled with more of those shenanigans!
A laugh and a tear, is best how I can describe it! It is a fast read, confronting in times and I’m sure for a lit of queer people, recognisable!
Now let those rays of midday sunshine wake you up after the night you just had, get out of bed and drink your first (of many) cup of coffee! ☕️🥃
#100boyfriends #brontezpurnell #looneybooks79 #bookstagram #bookstagrammer #booksbooksbooks #gayreader #lgbtqiaplus #queerread #menreadtoo #belgianreader #bookblogger #bookblog #bookreview #booklover #boekenlezer #california #europeantour
June 17, 2022
A volte sono i libri che non ti piacciono, quelli che ti annoiano a morte e ti fanno alzare gli occhi al cielo, a spingerti a riflettere. Non per loro merito, ma nel distaccarti da loro, nel porre tra te e quell’ammasso di parole la più grande muraglia che il tuo intelletto può erigere.
100 Boyfriends vuole essere una sprezzante e divertente critica alla vita dei maschi omosessuali delle grandi città. Per quanto mi riguarda, può credere di essere ciò che vuole: rimarrà comunque nei miei annali personali come un testo superfluo ed evitabile, uno spreco di carta, inchiostro, tempo e risorse.
Ci vuole talento anche nel riuscire a rendere noiose 190 paginette piene spesso solo a metà. Purnell ci è riuscito alla perfezione con la decisione di raccogliere questi “racconti” - le virgolette sono d’obbligo, poiché in alcuni casi si tratta di mazzolini mal legati di paragrafi inconsistenti – tutti interscambiabili di uomini gay vuoti in cerca di qualcuno che gli riempia di cazzo e di droga. Vorrei poterlo dire in modo meno volgare, ma questo è: omosessuali privi di profondità intellettuale, tutti presi da questi irrazionali pruriti intimi, che cercano bulimicamente qualcuno con cui scopare per passare il tempo e la noia. Tutto ciò, che di certo non è cosa nuova nella narrativa gay, è stato sopportabile forse per i primi dieci episodi, poi m’è parso solo voluttuario. Avrebbe avuto senso se ci fosse stato un solo protagonista, approfondito anche nei suoi momenti di non-intimità [intimità è un termine erroneo, in questo caso, poiché gli incontri raccontati si puntellano su mera vicinanza corporea, ma lo uso lo stesso] sessuale, raccontato nel suo sfilacciarsi nei ritmi e nelle spinte disgreganti della vita metropolitana. Così, non è niente. Di certo non critica sociale, tutt’al più una fotografia che si fa fatica a guardare nel suo essere voyeristica e macabra. Il corrispondente erotico del ritratto di un cadavere in decomposizione.
Ciò che mi ha spinto a riflettere, portando il mio sguardo all’insieme, è il fatto che questo volume abbia vinto un Lambda per la categoria Gay Fiction. E che, leggendo le quarte di copertina dei vincitori per Gay Romance, LGBTQ Erotica e Gay Memoir, tolta la patina commerciale di questi testi scritti da terzi per una loro più efficace targetizzazione, tutti questi libri trattino sempre e solo di uomini gay ipersessualizzati nelle loro disavventure erotiche.
Non c’è altro, buon Merlino, nella narrativa gay? Certo, il sesso, pure nella sua più estrema scabrosità, è sempre stato presente in quasi tutte le opere degli autori omosessuali del passato, ma era una componente (una rivendicazione sentita e necessaria, è indubbio, contro la morale eteronormativa) non la totale sostanza. Come ci siamo finiti, qui? Dopo decenni in cui gli scrittori gay hanno lottato affinché le loro opere venissero valutate nella loro complessità, al di là del genere biologico dei partner sessuali, come si è verificato questo appiattimento tematico che, in un certo senso, ha confermato le premesse segreganti da cui si cercava di scappare? Mi sembra un tema su cui ci si dovrebbe interrogare e per il quale sarebbe utile un po’ di documentazione e ricerca.
Poi, ovvio, molto probabilmente il problema sono io, ben lontano da questa ipersessualizzazione asfissiante (che a me pare pure un po’ machista e tossica). Ma è un crimine chiedere che un autore gay, con la sensibilità tipica di chi ha vissuto nella costrizione di questa specifica minoranza, scriva qualcosa in cui il sesso sia secondario, lasciando spazio ad altri temi?
100 Boyfriends vuole essere una sprezzante e divertente critica alla vita dei maschi omosessuali delle grandi città. Per quanto mi riguarda, può credere di essere ciò che vuole: rimarrà comunque nei miei annali personali come un testo superfluo ed evitabile, uno spreco di carta, inchiostro, tempo e risorse.
Ci vuole talento anche nel riuscire a rendere noiose 190 paginette piene spesso solo a metà. Purnell ci è riuscito alla perfezione con la decisione di raccogliere questi “racconti” - le virgolette sono d’obbligo, poiché in alcuni casi si tratta di mazzolini mal legati di paragrafi inconsistenti – tutti interscambiabili di uomini gay vuoti in cerca di qualcuno che gli riempia di cazzo e di droga. Vorrei poterlo dire in modo meno volgare, ma questo è: omosessuali privi di profondità intellettuale, tutti presi da questi irrazionali pruriti intimi, che cercano bulimicamente qualcuno con cui scopare per passare il tempo e la noia. Tutto ciò, che di certo non è cosa nuova nella narrativa gay, è stato sopportabile forse per i primi dieci episodi, poi m’è parso solo voluttuario. Avrebbe avuto senso se ci fosse stato un solo protagonista, approfondito anche nei suoi momenti di non-intimità [intimità è un termine erroneo, in questo caso, poiché gli incontri raccontati si puntellano su mera vicinanza corporea, ma lo uso lo stesso] sessuale, raccontato nel suo sfilacciarsi nei ritmi e nelle spinte disgreganti della vita metropolitana. Così, non è niente. Di certo non critica sociale, tutt’al più una fotografia che si fa fatica a guardare nel suo essere voyeristica e macabra. Il corrispondente erotico del ritratto di un cadavere in decomposizione.
Ciò che mi ha spinto a riflettere, portando il mio sguardo all’insieme, è il fatto che questo volume abbia vinto un Lambda per la categoria Gay Fiction. E che, leggendo le quarte di copertina dei vincitori per Gay Romance, LGBTQ Erotica e Gay Memoir, tolta la patina commerciale di questi testi scritti da terzi per una loro più efficace targetizzazione, tutti questi libri trattino sempre e solo di uomini gay ipersessualizzati nelle loro disavventure erotiche.
Non c’è altro, buon Merlino, nella narrativa gay? Certo, il sesso, pure nella sua più estrema scabrosità, è sempre stato presente in quasi tutte le opere degli autori omosessuali del passato, ma era una componente (una rivendicazione sentita e necessaria, è indubbio, contro la morale eteronormativa) non la totale sostanza. Come ci siamo finiti, qui? Dopo decenni in cui gli scrittori gay hanno lottato affinché le loro opere venissero valutate nella loro complessità, al di là del genere biologico dei partner sessuali, come si è verificato questo appiattimento tematico che, in un certo senso, ha confermato le premesse segreganti da cui si cercava di scappare? Mi sembra un tema su cui ci si dovrebbe interrogare e per il quale sarebbe utile un po’ di documentazione e ricerca.
Poi, ovvio, molto probabilmente il problema sono io, ben lontano da questa ipersessualizzazione asfissiante (che a me pare pure un po’ machista e tossica). Ma è un crimine chiedere che un autore gay, con la sensibilità tipica di chi ha vissuto nella costrizione di questa specifica minoranza, scriva qualcosa in cui il sesso sia secondario, lasciando spazio ad altri temi?
December 9, 2021
A little black book both outside and in. A Queer & Black East Bay smut memoir as vulnerable as it gets. Written with such matter of factness that “Boyfriends” position between non-fiction and short story is unique without being unfamiliar. Faggy, Tender, Porny, and Tough. A quick read with no lack of depth or humor. Finished this book dreaming of buying Brontez a drink at a shitty Oakland gay bar. The corniest part abt this review? This book was recommended to me by an Ex.
January 23, 2025
(4.5/5, rounded up)
Ok fine Brontez Purnell, I'll go read your entire backlist and never shut up about any of them.
Also, recommended this to my friend before I'd even finished. She just trusted me and blindly bought a copy. Will report back but there's a 99.99% chance she loves it too.
So raw, hilarious, at times "cringe" (as the youth say lolol) but never to the point you're made to feel uncomfortable for uncomfortability's sake. The only times I felt genuinely weird, 5 seconds later I had to face my own shittiness that caused said uncomfortability.
Side note this was way too short I would have eaten up 98462 more boyfriends.
Ok fine Brontez Purnell, I'll go read your entire backlist and never shut up about any of them.
Also, recommended this to my friend before I'd even finished. She just trusted me and blindly bought a copy. Will report back but there's a 99.99% chance she loves it too.
So raw, hilarious, at times "cringe" (as the youth say lolol) but never to the point you're made to feel uncomfortable for uncomfortability's sake. The only times I felt genuinely weird, 5 seconds later I had to face my own shittiness that caused said uncomfortability.
Side note this was way too short I would have eaten up 98462 more boyfriends.
Read
June 30, 2021This book should come with a warning: NO SLUT SHAMING ALLOWED! 100 Boyfriends is either memoir, fiction, or autofiction. It might be a novel, a short story collection, or a collection of linked stories. Call it whatever you like. Brontez Purnell, the literary lovechild of Samantha Irby and Samuel Delany, doesn't give a damn how you categorize this book or if you think he and the roster of horny men who populate its pages are reckless, hedonistic sluts or truly damaged men. The I in this book, like Purnell himself, is unapologetically Black, gay, fat, and a slut, and the actions, musings, and remembrances in this book--some poignant, some heartbreaking, some risible--communicate a lot about gay culture, racism, bodies, sex, and acceptance. There's more to this book than a litany of graphic sex acts.
100 Boyfriends owes a lot to such books as Tropic of Cancer, The Mad Man, and I'm Open to Anything. Those who consider pornography a legitimate artform know that the key to elevating porn is to be intentional about it, to let the readers know that the book in their hand or the film on their screen is trying to do more than get them off. Circling the collection of sex acts in 100 Boyfriends are questions about the use of sex as a substitute for other needs, unfulfilled desires, and the way gay culture renders entire populations of men invisible. This book functions as both an homage to deviance and a rebellion against the status quo among gay men.
Purnell is not out to seduce readers with lovely baroque sentences or stories about gay men with big bank accounts and movie star good looks. Brontez Purnell is the complete opposite of Garth Greenwell, excellent as his writing is. I'm glad for the difference because readers need to read and experience gay male desire from multiple perspectives. Purnell's writing is blunt, raunchy, and raucous. Reading it was a joyful experience, and I laughed out loud at some passages. I found affirmation on each page and, to be honest, I was a little bit jealous. Purnell makes being a gay slut seem like the best thing in the world, but he's realistic about the cost. Trips to the free clinic, encounters with creepy dudes, and struggles with mental health are brutally depicted in this book, lest anyone think there are no consequences for licentiousness. Nevertheless, 100 Boyfriends is about gay men, what we value, and the myriad ways sex functions within our community. When everything else is stripped away there's universality in that.
100 Boyfriends owes a lot to such books as Tropic of Cancer, The Mad Man, and I'm Open to Anything. Those who consider pornography a legitimate artform know that the key to elevating porn is to be intentional about it, to let the readers know that the book in their hand or the film on their screen is trying to do more than get them off. Circling the collection of sex acts in 100 Boyfriends are questions about the use of sex as a substitute for other needs, unfulfilled desires, and the way gay culture renders entire populations of men invisible. This book functions as both an homage to deviance and a rebellion against the status quo among gay men.
Purnell is not out to seduce readers with lovely baroque sentences or stories about gay men with big bank accounts and movie star good looks. Brontez Purnell is the complete opposite of Garth Greenwell, excellent as his writing is. I'm glad for the difference because readers need to read and experience gay male desire from multiple perspectives. Purnell's writing is blunt, raunchy, and raucous. Reading it was a joyful experience, and I laughed out loud at some passages. I found affirmation on each page and, to be honest, I was a little bit jealous. Purnell makes being a gay slut seem like the best thing in the world, but he's realistic about the cost. Trips to the free clinic, encounters with creepy dudes, and struggles with mental health are brutally depicted in this book, lest anyone think there are no consequences for licentiousness. Nevertheless, 100 Boyfriends is about gay men, what we value, and the myriad ways sex functions within our community. When everything else is stripped away there's universality in that.
May 30, 2021
"Some friends had died and some were disappearing, having babies and going away, getting old and weary and going away, or simply going crazy in secret and going away..."
"The boy who I actually missed is long, long gone. But I cannot sever myself from what remains. What was once a big beautiful star has collapsed in on its own weight and turned into a black hole."
This book had me at that one review that called it a "transgressive look at queer dysfunction". It very much is that but it is also more. These are episodes, short and long, in the lives of queer black men. Some seem complete, some seem fleeting, some seem to be cut short suddenly. All in all these stories depict life in all its ugliness and beauty.
This book is chaotic and messy. Sometimes chaotic in a humorous way, sometimes in a way that makes you go "wow, this made me feel or think something I wanted to escape from!" It's often unexpected. While you are getting ready to laugh, you will end up instead getting a sharp emotional twist in the stomach or a punch in the gut; sometimes you are preparing yourself to be sad, when there will be a sudden moment of clarity and hope and redemption.
The people depicted here are oh so real. They are hurt, angry, lonely, vulnerable, consider themselves failures... ready to self-sabotage when things are gong well, so hung up on self-destruction that you end up feeling helpless. They are unhappy in relationships, unhappy in jobs, unhappy with friends and roommates, unhappy because life sucks and unhappy because people can be assholes.
There is truth in every episode. The writing is uncomfortable and poetic in turns. There are moments of such startling revelations. I am in awe!
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Literarianism
"The boy who I actually missed is long, long gone. But I cannot sever myself from what remains. What was once a big beautiful star has collapsed in on its own weight and turned into a black hole."
This book had me at that one review that called it a "transgressive look at queer dysfunction". It very much is that but it is also more. These are episodes, short and long, in the lives of queer black men. Some seem complete, some seem fleeting, some seem to be cut short suddenly. All in all these stories depict life in all its ugliness and beauty.
This book is chaotic and messy. Sometimes chaotic in a humorous way, sometimes in a way that makes you go "wow, this made me feel or think something I wanted to escape from!" It's often unexpected. While you are getting ready to laugh, you will end up instead getting a sharp emotional twist in the stomach or a punch in the gut; sometimes you are preparing yourself to be sad, when there will be a sudden moment of clarity and hope and redemption.
The people depicted here are oh so real. They are hurt, angry, lonely, vulnerable, consider themselves failures... ready to self-sabotage when things are gong well, so hung up on self-destruction that you end up feeling helpless. They are unhappy in relationships, unhappy in jobs, unhappy with friends and roommates, unhappy because life sucks and unhappy because people can be assholes.
There is truth in every episode. The writing is uncomfortable and poetic in turns. There are moments of such startling revelations. I am in awe!
Visit my Bookstagram for more book reviews:
Literarianism
February 19, 2021
Brontez Purnell unabashedly tells of the sexual experiences of queer men. The kinky. The random. The questionable. The less-than-enjoyable. The good-that-end-in-bad. And everything in between. But the sex is more than that. It is a reflection of how queer men navigate this world. Some married to women. Some in monogamous relationships with men. Some lurking in bathhouses, and cruising parks. Some having orgies with friends. And some settling for self-pleasure at their work desks. The stories feel as quick as a hookup. They don't necessarily last in detail, but you still feel something lingering after the encounter. I enjoyed these short stories. They were entertaining for the most part, and didn't feel entirely raunchy. There were moments of self-reflection, regret, sadness—times when these characters moved out of the cloud of lust, and I could identity with many of them in part. These are the stories you only tell your closest friend. The tales that had been tucked away but suddenly were brought to the forefront of your mind during drunk convos on the phone at 2 a.m. I do think that at times the collection lost my attention. A few of the stories were hard to follow at points, like the one about the ex-actor tending to a weed farm on a mountain? But overall, it felt like the goal of 100 Boyfriends was accomplished. For that I would give this collection a 3.5/5.
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