Scary Kisses

by Brad Gooch

From the lost generation of Andy Warhol's New York to the cocaine-fueled runways of the top fashion houses of Paris and Milan, Scary Kisses captures the tenderness and cruelty of the beautiful people circa 1980, living behind the pages of Vogue . As a portrait of this time and this place, Scary Kisses shares a place with Bright Lights, Big City , Slaves of New York , and The Bonfire of the Vanities as a classic portrait of the seductive pull of Manhattan nightlife. The story of centers on a menage á trois that drifts listlessly into a spiral of cynicism and nihilistic gratification via sex and drugs. With a raw, voyeuristic eye for detail, Brad Gooch zooms the reader in to the downtown New York scene and the decadent nightlife of the modeling world. His precise, snapshot prose re-creates a time unlike any other, and characters that flash with a stark, bright realism.

Genres: Fiction

270 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1988

About the author

Brad Gooch is the author of Flannery: A Life of Flannery O’Connor (Little, Brown, 2009.) His previous books include City Poet: The Life and Times of Frank O’Hara; as well as Godtalk: Travels in Spiritual America; three novels--Scary Kisses, The Golden Age of Promiscuity, Zombie00; a collection of stories, Jailbait and Other Stories, chosen by Donald Barthelme for a Pushcart Foundation Writer’s Choice Award; a collection of poems, The Daily News; and two memoirs, Finding the Boyfriend Within and Dating the Greek Gods.

His work has been featured in numerous magazines including: The New Republic, The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, New York Magazine, Travel and Leisure, Partisan Review, The Paris Review, The Los Angeles Times Book Review, Art Forum, Harper’s Bazaar, The Nation, and regularly on The Daily Beast.

A Guggenheim fellow in Biography, he has received a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship, and a Furthermore grant in publishing from the J.M. Kaplan Fund.

A professor of English at William Paterson University, he earned his PhD at Columbia University, and lives in New York City.

Reviews

[Pete Dematteo · Rating 4 out of 5]

gooch portrays the jungle-like existance of being a model in new york city. he is highly observant-fictionally anthropological, indeed!

[Jf Hudson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting study of male modeling in 80's. Snap shot scenes in light detail kept me from getting too involved. Expected more of gay story than bisexual story.

[Catherine Siemann · Rating 2 out of 5]

Centered on the modeling world of the early 80s, this book is very much of the same vintage as Bright Lights, Big City and Slaves of New York -- perhaps if I'd read it then, it would have seemed more revelatory than it does today. It's an interesting period piece, but it's hard to care about any of the major characters.

This may have something to do with when it was published, but it's also oddly heteronormative for a book by a gay author. The primary male characters flirt with bisexuality and each other, but they mostly triangulate their feelings through their relationships with the primary female character. Certainly the author has the right to make that choice; it just wasn't what I was expecting.

[Misti Rainwater-Lites · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great postmodern pop art glorious love story. The lovers are Todd and Lucy...and Frank. It's a bizarre love triangle, y'all! Set in Manhattan (and other cities) in the Eighties! Warhol makes a cameo! There's a Wasteland reference. Hot sex. You cannot go wrong with all of that, I say.