Hold Tight: A Novel [Mass Market Paperback]

Christopher Bram (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1995

Hold Tight confirms Christopher Bram's status as one of the outstanding gay novelists of our time. Erotic, romantic, and suspenseful, this wholly original story is a thriller set in a homosexual brothel in 1942 New York City.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The clever premise of this frothy espionage novel by the author of Surprising Myself is that during World War II there was a gay brothel in lower Manhattan that may have been a hangout for Nazi agents (a rumor of its existence sparked the story, Bram notes in his acknowledgements). When he is discovered to be homosexual, seaman second class Hank Fayette faces a dishonorable discharge unless he agrees to go undercover as a prostitute. The ensuing events are very funny, fast-movingBram is able to juggle characters and plot lines without slackening the paceand, ultimately, emotionally stirring. Hank falls for Juke, the black drag queen who is an attendant at the brothel, and later he develops a crush on a straight man. Bram makes the characters believable, and he takes care not to be anachronistic: by keeping the awkward relationships in their pre-gay-liberation context, he captures the tensions between blacks and whites and gays and non-gays in the New York of the period. There is graphic sex here, but Bram uses it adroitly either to further the spy story, or to explain the undercurrents of real feeling he poignantly conveys. 30,000 first printing; first serial to Christopher Street.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Plume; 1 edition (January 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0452262267
• ISBN-13: 978-0452262263
• Product Dimensions: 5.3 x 0.6 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #922,693 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars What a unique book!, February 1, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (Chattanooga, TN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hold Tight: A Novel (Mass Market Paperback)

HOLD TIGHT caught my attention because I thought it satire, but after reading the book I found myself amused, touched and, yes, aroused. Bram's descriptions of NYC during WWII are particularily vivid, and his use of character is just as strong. I defy any hot-blooded homo not to be deeply aroused by the sex, including antiquated cruising on 42nd Street. This book reminded me a bit of Susan Isaac's great novel SHINING THROUGH, providing a unique take on the WWII novel.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A good story with potential but a disappointing end., October 15, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Hold Tight: A Novel (Mass Market Paperback)

This would have been a good story if the climax wasn't so dreadful. The characters in this story were refreshing and colorful and the "gay attitudes" of the minor characters are right on. Hank Fayette truly depicts the gay country boy in the Navy during WWII New York. His relationship with Juke is typical for the times but you see that he does truly care for Juke. If this was to be made into a movie(an independent movie)Matthew McConaughey would make a terrific Fayette. I hope this novel will become a movie.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting possibilities, March 31, 2002

By 

John Rice (Milwaukee, WI USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hold Tight: A Novel (Mass Market Paperback)

Hank is a sailor during WW II, who comes from Texas and has had no problem is accepting his homosexuality!!?? While trying out a brotherl in NY, he gets arrested. Tied into this story is a movie projectionist and his daughter who are Nazi spies. A closeted queen who is a wannabe Nazi becomes involved with Hank who now is being turned into an American spy and whose boss is a Navy psychiatrist who intends to send him to a mental hospital after his tour of duty as a spy is over so he can be "happy" because homosexuals are sick and unhappy. Add to this list of characters a Viennese jew who has become an American citizen who has conscious qualms about the way the Navy is handling Hank, Juke an African-American teen queen and an appearance by Monty Whooley, Benny Goodman and Gene Krupa and one has a novel that has some possibilities, but has to finish too fast with an ending that raises more questions than it answers.

The characters are sometimes well drawn and interesting, but Bram does not develop them in a way that satisfies the story. Obviously Hank and Juke are attracted to each other. but Hank's attitude towards African-Americans is not overcome until it is too late. That is good writing, but why Juke's outcome happens is not.

This novel has some good passages, some interesting characters, but a plot that falls apart.