Customer Reviews

Looking For It

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Except for his other novel, "Last Summer," Michael Thomas Ford is known primarily for his compilations of his humorous essays, such as "My Big Fat Queer Life" and "That's MR. Faggot to You!" Perhaps looking to distance himself further from his humor essays, his second novel, "Looking for It" comes off as rather dark in spots, though overall realistic and with a positive message.

The novel tells us about a group of gay men in a small upstate NY town. The main character is Mike, bartender at The Engine Room, the only gay bar in about a two hour radius; Mike is kind of a free spirit who has no long term plans or any conscious desire to settle down. On the other end of the spectrum is Stephen, a closeted accountant whose sex life is solely imaginary with online partners, and Thomas, a closeted Episcopal priest dealing with feelings he had thought were successfully repressed. Add in a mature gay couple whose relationship is trying to survive the "seven year itch," and a wise old queen named Simon who has resogned himself to be alone since the death of his longtime partner, and you have most of the characters for the novel's coverage of developments in their lives between Halloween and New Years of a recent year. There are some steps forward, some steps backward, and some tough decisions that could affect their makers for many years to come. The "dark" part of the story comes mostly from the involvement of an additional character, a self-hating "straight" men using violence to deal with his homosexual urges, preying upon the insecurity of gay men he encountered at a porn cinema and via the internet.

I thought the story was somewhat predictable, though the characters were original, portrayed well and put in realistic situations for small town living. The overall message is a positive one, of "community" and entended families, although it also seems to suggest that gay men, at least in small towns such as this, really don't know what they want out of life, even if it is in front of their eyes. I give this one four stars out of five, including extra credit for recognizing all gay men don't live in big cities or gay "meccas" like P-Town and WeHo.

I've enjoyed Michael Thomas Ford's writing in the past, but this story is poorly written, poorly edited and extremely shallow. I couldn't help but think that Ford was just cranking out a story to meet a deadline. There's no depth of character in any of the main figures. The story line seems to serve no purpose other than to connect the over abundant and graphic sex scenes, some of which are extremely brutal. If your looking for a good story with believable characters...keep looking for it.

I really liked this book. I found it an intense and page turning drama. Michael Thomas Ford seems to have a knack for writing drama's that have large casts and mutiple storylines and he blends them together magically. This is the story of John and Russell a couple who decides to split after seven years, Simon an older man dealing with the death of his long term lover and moving on, Thomas a priest dealing with his sexuality and his future in the church, last but definitely not least Mike a bartender who is looking for love and possibly a career change. Throw into the mix Pete a mechanic who has some anger management issues, a man who enjoys sex with men but who is adamently not gay. This book is very dark compared to 'Last Summer' and the authors humorous essays, and that is what I liked about this book. I loved the fact that it was dark and not merely a light fluffy romance, it had romance but it also had a sadistic violent edge that kept me up late into the night reading to discover what is going to happen next. I really liked 'Last Summer' but felt that this book is much better and I am anxiously looking for to Michael Thomas Ford's next fiction effort.

Given that I enjoy Mr. Ford's essay collections and other writings, I was really looking forward to this book. I won't recap the plot here, since other reviewers have done a good job of that.

As other reviewers have pointed out, it's an easy read, a "beach book," as it were. But in the end, I found the story contrived and unrealistic, the characters without much depth, and the writing clunky and mechanical. It wasn't completely unenjoyable, but I would have expected better from such an experienced and prolific writer as Mr. Ford.

He does create a good sense of the story's setting and location, and I rather liked Simon, the eldest member of the cast. The erotic passages are well-written but their explicitness seems very out of place. Overall, Ford has a tendency to use 10 words when half that number would suffice.

I found that Looking for it has a meaning behind it. I mean is Mike the main character was lost and he found what made him happy and you could say this connects with every day life. I really enjoyed the book and how Ford Created the characters its was great and it deals with situations that homosexuals face. For an the way people react seeing the same sex together and this case i felt that you could connect with each character.

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, "Looking For It." I had previously read Mr. Ford's "Last Summer" however, this more recent endeavor was the better of the two books. I loved the story, with its clan of characters. Among my favorites were Mike, the bartender at the Engine Room; Thomas, the Episcopalian priest; and Simon, the older gay gentleman who is the partiarch of this cast. I do hope that Mr. Ford is planning a sequel to this novel that includes the characters I have mentioned above. I finished the book a few days ago and I can honestly say that I am kind of missing the characters, they were very true to life. The book was filled with real life situations, not always pleasant ones to encounter. Additionally, Mr. Ford writes a sexual encounter far better than most authors of this genre. Truly enjoyed this one and I am sure you will too!
Guy De Rosa
Los Angeles, California

By no means a great book, but not mediocre, either. Any book that stimulates this highly unsentimental reader to tear up not just once, but thrice, leaves an indelibly positive imprint. Yes, the saccharine ending is a little incredulous, but still it is invigorating to have "positive" models and outcomes, even if they seem only to occur in fiction. The difference, here, though, is that I saw myself and many others through Ford's perspicuous, variegated prism. Maybe the story is little bit overdrawn, but in another universe, all these facets do indeed occur.

Ford weaves a number of tales about several gay men residing in a rural, upstate New York community. That the characters all "represent" different facets of the gay community, rather than some monolithic homogeneity, is exceptionally refreshing, if at the same time, a little too literarily convenient. Ages, interests, backgrounds, types, are all multifaceted, like the real world, not the world of youthful Los Angeles (which, for some unknown reason, seems to be the epicenter of most gay fiction).

The monolithic, stereotypical, homogeneous "gay" community is a myth, but there are certain patterns of behavior and action that a great many gay men share -- and usually at different stages of life. Without reducing the "gay community" to a stereotypical farce, Ford enchants the reader with beguiling, yet normative, characters. Several are extremely endearing; others are a nightmare, literally. Some are simply caricatures. But the one thing all but one of these characters desire, more than lust, is affection, fellowship, and intimacy. Finally a gay novel that extols something more than lust.

Ford's storytelling talents are excellent. Just enough information to give the reader a "feel" of things, but no over-lording the narrative with supercilious metaphor to distract. I've grown up in a small town, but have no adult experience of one. This book seems to capture that small-town feel authentically. In many ways, I think the experience is not that much different from a metropolis, but I would expect a certain, "closed-in" feeling to be different, and Ford seizes it.

A final word about lust. It is frequent, raw, and intense. It may even startle some shy gay readers, but, hey, that's part of the picture too. It's often prurient, occasionally vile, but most of the time genuinely and sensitively expressed. Indeed, Ford draws the viable distinction between a f**k and making love, and that's part of the scene, too. Maybe I am more of a sentimentalist than I thought; I know I am a romantic. Those readers on the "edge" probably will not enjoy this book. Those who look forward to inclusive marriage definitely will.

Told from the point of view of several different men who all are connected by their visits to a gay bar in a small town, this is a story with humor, tragedy and love. Don't expect tremendous depth, but it is a good "beach read." Or, if you are the soap opera type, you'd like this, because it has varying storylines and reaches dramatic highs and lows.

Mike, the bartender, finds his path crosses with a priest, Thomas, who is just discovering his true nature. Both are looking for love. Stephen, a shy accountant who is too close to his parents (emotionally and geographically), is nearing a point in his life where everyone must know the truth. John and Russell are a committed couple finding their relationship is stale, and maybe not permanent. Simon is the wise "old queen" that younger gays run to for advice. In his 60s, he misses his longtime companion and believes that love is in his past because of his age. Pete Thayer is one of most interesting characters, bringing a dark and dangerous element to the story. He seems to be bi, but has a hatred for gays, especially after he rapes them.

If you like the humor, hunt, and cattiness of bars, this will appeal to you, because a healthy chunk of the book takes place in the bar where Mike works, and has many scenes of the characters sitting, drinking and talking. The storyline with Simon was brave and rare, covering what seems like a very realistic life of a gay senior. I think the John and Russell portion could have been completely left out of the book, but the good thing is you can fast-read through the slower portions and get to the parts you like. And I don't just mean the love scenes. While those scenes seem inserted rather than a natural outflow of the story, they will surely please the readers who like red-hot juiciness in their storyline. Just be aware that some of those scenes are graphically straight/bi (Pete's situation) and horrifyingly violent (again, Pete).

I very much enjoyed Michael Thomas Ford's first attempt at gay fiction, but I really thought this book was superb - much better than the first. The way he develops the characters is excellent - especially Simon and Walter the two older men, and their forty-year relationship. All the characters are very interesting, including the rather pathetic portrayal of the gay-basher. I highly recommend this work for all gay readers.

Last year Michael Thomas Ford shook up the gay literary scene with his charming novel Last Summer. I liked it so much that I even placed it in my top ten best books of 2003. There was a freshness and honesty to Ford's work that was impossible not to like. In his latest novel, Looking For It, Ford again centers on a group of gay men and presents an eclectic tapestry of their often disparate, incongruent lives. Whereas Last Summer had a light, breezy, almost sit-com feel to it, Looking For It, is much darker. This is a powerful, hard-hitting novel that doesn't shy away from savage, violent sexuality. Themes of gay bashing, bar life, gay spirituality, and middle-aged loneliness are all presented in a tight, taught narrative. And while the sex is almost pornographic, it is never gratuitous, as Ford manages to juxtapose these blunt scenes with sections of profound tenderness and humour.

The story centers on a group of gay men living in Cold Falls, a small town in upstate New York. Christmas is on the way, and as the first snow falls, life for these men is about to bring about profound changes as they all look for sex, romance, companionship and spirituality. Mike, a hunky, sensitive barman works at the Engine Room, a small local gay bar, but when he meets and falls in love with Thomas, the local Episcopal priest, he begins to profoundly question his life and job. John and Russell have been together for seven years, but John's steadfast inflexibility has begun to annoy Russell. Acting on impulse, Russell decides to have a break from the relationship and move in temporarily with Simon, an older man who is mourning the loss of his partner of many years.

The shy, reclusive and somewhat closeted Stephen still lives next door to his parents, and haunts late night adult bookstores and online chat rooms looking for anonymous sex. He gets more than he bargained for when Pete, a blue-collar mechanic, who is full of self-hatred about his own homosexuality, savagely beats him. There's an absolutely riveting subplot involving the violent, alcohol fuelled sex obsessed Pete when he almost murders another of the main characters after meeting them though the same local Internet chat room.

At times the narrative tends to become cluttered and some readers may find it hard to keep track of all the characters as Ford seems intent on having each character run the total gamut of gay life from coming out to one's parents to questions of faith and worship. But the central message of the novel remains current as the characters meet to celebrate the holiday season and talk about the importance of family, the relevance of religion, their respective sexual practices, and gay marriage. Although parts of the story are dark and sexuality shadowy, there is always a feeling that true love will conquer all.

It is obvious that Ford's target audience is gay men, but the themes in Looking for It are quite universal and are told from a youthful and romantic viewpoint. This is essentially an idealistic and somewhat quixotic story, with its characters facing dramatic events and, at times, great danger, but Ford's simple, direct, and restrained style help reveal great depths of character and keep the plot moving along briskly. And Like Last Summer, the cover art for Looking For It is absolutely beautiful. Mike Leonard October 04.