Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys: True Tales of Love, Lust, and Friendship Between Straight Women and Gay Men (Hardcover)

by Melissa de la Cruz (Author), Tom Dolby (Author)
Key Phrases: other lifetimes, marriage material, boys who like boys, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
These pages resound with two main sentiments: "If you're lucky, really lucky, you have one friend in this life who feels like a gift" and "Getting a gay boyfriend enriches life immeasurably." This collection of original essays celebrates the fierce bond and special intimacy between straight women and their gay male best friends, as well as the sometimes disheartening realization that the boy you like, likes boys. Many essays soar with strong insights into love, humanity and the nature of friendship. James Lecesne writes a letter to a friend that whimsically deconstructs their 15-year friendship while revealing just how lifesaving it was. Cindy Chupack, on the verge of getting married again, embarks on a bittersweet reunion with her gay ex-husband. And Karen Robinovitz rhapsodizes on the joys of shopping with gay men and why when getting married one should, instead of bridesmaids, opt for "bridesgays." Contributors also include some familiar writers from the worlds of journalism, film, TV, theater and fiction, like Anna David, David Ebershoff, Michael Musto and Andrew Solomon. Though bookstores aren't lacking for lesbian and gay anthologies, this one justifies itself by tapping a less-explored subject with fresh voices and fervent first-person accounts. (May)
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From Booklist
Fueled by feeling that their deep, straight-woman-gay-man friendship "was both unique and universal," editors de la Cruz and Dolby developed this compelling anthology focused on various aspects of such relationships. The pieces in "Gays and Gals" look at group dynamics; those in "Close Confidants," at bedrock one-on-one relations; those in "A Fine Romance," at love and lust, complete with comic, sometimes poignant misunderstandings. "Growing Up, Coming Out" turns to formative and traumatic experiences, and "Father and Daughters, Mothers and Sons" concludes with considerations of the joys and sorrows of lasting ties. Standout essays include Karen Rabinovitz's "Shop Girls," praising style mavens; James Lecesne's "My Best Girlfriend," detailing 14 reasons not to kill yourself (Provincetown, great accessories, etc.); Sarah Kate Levy's "Super Couple"; David Levithan's fond recollection of high-school friends in "The Good Girls"; and Abigail Garner's meditation on her father's coming out to her when she was in kindergarten, "Like Father, Like Daughter." Whitney Scott
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Dutton Adult (May 17, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0525950176
• ISBN-13: 978-0525950172
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #625,766 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bonding, May 23, 2007

By	Amos Lassen (Little Rock, Arkansas) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

De la Cruz, Melissa and Tom Dolby, editors. "Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys: True Tales of Love, Lust, and Friendship Between Straight Women and Gay Men", Dutton, 2007.

Bonding

Amos Lassen and Literary Pride

The new book with the long title has just as much information as the title seems to have in words. "Girls Who Like Boys..." is a wonderful new collection that looks at the bonds between straight women and gay men. It is an anthology made up of personal essays about friendships and relationships.
Starting off with a great foreword by the author of the "Tales of the City" series, Armistead Maupin that explains the nature of the book, we are taken on a careful look at a kind of love that is not sexual in nature. Society has looked at straight women who befriend gays as covers-up, beards and what have you. What we learn here it is that neither gender nor sexuality that "dictates the tenants of our heart".
The editors, Melissa de la Cruz and Tom Dolby looked at themselves and their own relationship and this is what prompted them to book like this together. This is the first personal book ever done on the subject and it includes the writings of 28 authors who explore their special relationships in topics from parenthood to friendship.
Divided into five separate sections, each dealing with different aspects of relationships, the book is just that much more fun to read. Group dynamics are dealt with in the first section under the topic of "Guys and Gals". These group dynamics range from shopping sprees to be there for one another during periods of good times and of need.
"Close Confidants" deals with one-on-one relationships that have people together and the five essays here are moving and funny.
"A Fine Romance" contains stories of love as well as lust based on the either wrong comprehension or misinterpretation and well-meant advice as well as resignation.
As could be expected there is a section on "Growing Up, Coming Out" which is based on friendship during the years that identity is formed and if you remember those years like I do the essays are about the guys who don't fit as well as the girls.
Finally we come to "Fathers and Daughters, Mothers and Sons' which deals with the ties that bind. It is interesting here that there is even one essay about a mother who hopes that one of her sons will be gay so that he will have some of the qualities that she values in her gay friends.
Taken as a whole, we get a unique picture of a straight-gay relationships. Many people do not understand that these kinds of relationships exist, especially in rural Arkansas and it is s good to have a book that explains it and does so in such a beautiful way.