Matthew Rettenmund

It's always an hard task to write a good novel from a very good movie, and I think that most of the time you like one of them, the novel or the movie, but not both. So I was hesitant to read 'Boy Culture' since I think the movie is one of the most wonderful gay romance movie out there. But the book is even better! Maybe since it's not an adaptation, but it was a novel way before it was made into a movie?

I think that the novel is better since the main hero, 'X', has an innocence that was lost in the movie; the movie was also more 'Hollywood' style, in the break and following declaration of forever love (wonderful scene with the two actors making out on the stairs), that X and Andrew actually don't have: their love story is more intimate, and it evolves nicely, there is no dramatic event that pushes X to take his decision to retire from being an hustler, he does it since he loves Andrew and I prefer this reason, for me it's a real proof that his love his sincere, he doesn't change who he is to 'please' Andrew, he changes since he wants to be a better man 'for' Andrew.

A thing I didn't like of the book is the output of X's relationship with Gregory, the octogenarian trick who tells X stories, and who helps him to realize he is in love with Andrew. Like in the movie, Gregory lies to X, but in the novel X is not able to forgive him... I feel sad for Gregory, I think it's not his fault if he was like that, it was a generation gap. But probably X has to break with Gregory since of all his tricks, he is the only one with whom X really betrays Andrew.

For being an hustler, X has a strange concept of betrayal and fidelity, something I'm not sure it came out from the movie. X's first love was a cousin of him, the boy who took his virginity when he was 13 years old and who broke his heart soon after. From this very bad first experience X learned two things: to associate true love with being a bottom, it's like you give yourself totally to another person, it's a so intimate act that it's scaring, and second that having sex without love is simple and better if done with an older man, less chance to fall in love. So X as an hustler tops only, and in a way, he remains pure and innocent, he is not selling love, he is selling something (being a bottom) that he will not share with his real lover, so it's not important. When X starts to think that it would be nice to have a boyfriend, to find Mr Right, he falls for his roommate Andrew, a man that in the book is stronger than X, both in body that in morality. It's so tender to hear X's thoughts when he said that he is no longer a virgin, he did everything with his body, but he is still virgin in one thing, no one ever really loved him. Only for this thoughts I think he is a lot stronger than what he thinks.

The book closes in a nice way, in a way that makes me think if there is not something of the author himself in X... All in all, thinking that this is a novel published in the '90, I'm surprise of how much a romance it's (there is even a reference to Fabio, the romance cover model...): I'm used to find gay romance good like this one now, but I didn't expect it in this one.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/031237271X/?tag=elimyrevandra-20… (plus d'informations)

'Jongensliefde' is het debuut van de Amerikaan Matthew Rettenmund (1968) van wie inmiddels ook de 'Encyclopedia Madonnica' verscheen. In 25 hoofdstukken legt de hoofdpersoon van deze roman (X genaamd) een biecht af. Hij verdient de kost als hoerejongen, is verliefd op een huisgenoot die aanvankelijk hem niet wil en wordt begeerd door een derde huisgenoot, waar hij niks in ziet. X doet verslag van zijn leven en zijn zogenaamde tekortkomingen. Seks speelt daarbij een voorname rol, maar ook het verlangen naar echte liefde, de onbetrouwbaarheid van het bestaan en de behoefte een rol te spelen. Deze roman is soms geestig, soms ontroerend, maar permanent boeiend. Waar of niet waar is niet van belang. Goed observeren, puntig beschrijven en psychologisch inzicht doen er wel toe. Het boek is uitermate homoseksueel, mild confronterend, maar nergens schokkend of banaal expliciet. De vertaling is zeer adequaat en getuigt van kennis van zaken omtrent het leven van homoseksuele mannen in de jaren negentig.

… (plus d'informations)