Michael [Paperback]

Henry Flesh (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2000

Fiction. Gay and Lesbian Studies. What if, on a blisteringly hot Sunday morning in a New York City tenement building, as sirens scream outside and whirring helicopters dot the sky, the End Time begins? In Henry Flesh's bold, startling new novel, Stephen is an ill and unemployed proofreader to whom three initiates of a strange religious cult appear announcing that the archangel Michael is coming. Critical praise for Henry Flesh's Lambda Literary Award-nominated novel MASSAGE also applies here: Funny, tightly plotted, and just two shades darker than burnt coffee. Henry Flesh has crafted a fine and disturbing novel -- David Sedaris.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Henry's the king. He writes with incessant crispness. Sex is reluctantly juicy, life is reluctant...." -- Eileen Myles, author of Chelsea Girls and Cool for You

Michael, a work stamped with Flesh's febrile narrative touch, is a novel of explosions." -- Ellen Miller, author of Like Being Killed

About the Author

HENRY FLESH dropped out of Yale in the sixties and spent many of the ensuing years abroad, in London, Crete, and Morocco. His first novel, Massage, won a 1999 Lambda Literary Award. He currently lives in New York City, and works as an editor at People magazine.

Illustrator JOHN GREER grew up in southern Virginia, and studied art at Virginia Commonwealth University and Hunter College. He belonged to a right-wing Christian cult for five years, but has since become enlightened and is now an artist living in Manhattan's Lower East Side.

Product Details

• Paperback: 150 pages
• Publisher: Akashic Books (October 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1888451122
• ISBN-13: 978-1888451122
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.2 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.3 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,970,706 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars initial promise, but in the end not a lot to grab attention here, September 3, 2006

By 

Mr. Richard K. Weems "emperor_weems" (Fair Lawn, NJ USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Michael (Paperback)

The ideas brewing behind the words of Flesh's novel show promise: an unemployed, AIDS-infected man wakes on the morning of the third anniversary of his lover's death and is visited by devotees of the cult of Michael. Religious atonement becomes a homoerotic embrace as the cultists mix religious dogma with unadulterated love (physical as well as forgiving), and our protagonist Stephen is suddenly faced with the very real possibility that End Time is near, and with it the promise of seeing his dead lover, Robert, again. As the novel continues, war in Russia becomes more and more probable, a war that might take the world down with it. Stephen sees this world as corrupt and not worth saving - his neighborhood dominated by drug dealers and the bars littered with gay sluts who would rather suck off a ring of willing participants than take an aging gay man home and show him some love.

But Michael as a whole is diluted and lacking vision. It's a novel that wants to say a lot but manages little more than a peep. Stephen is a dreary character who mainly stares at the wall and thinks. We learn all too soon (and far too much of) the biography of our protagonist, whose depth of insight about the world can be summed up by the statement, "Everything was f*cked." As a child, Stephen discovers a brief sense of belonging in the Bible, but his laughably stereotypical parents soon destroy any happiness in his life with their banal self-involvement and predictable shame of Stephen's sexuality. As an adult, Stephen pines for his dead Robert, but not for any discernibly convincing reason. In fact, all we ever really know of Robert is that he once tried to strangle Stephen. Is Stephen a masochistic character intended to spark our interest through his horrid weaknesses, a study in how a man can be thoroughly unlikable yet prove to be an interesting character worth redemption regardless?

Not in the least. Instead, Stephen is trying to prove he is someone deserving sympathy. His parents have rejected him for his homosexuality, friends have died of AIDS, his neighborhood is criminal-infested and he is out of work. But despite these sad circumstances, I found little sympathy for Stephen. Lack of character development is the central failing behind _Michael_. Stephen's problems are all exterior, his parents are drab stereotypes not worth hating, his criminal neighborhood exaggerated and unrealistic. His biography merely shows how forces beyond his character (or lack thereof) have continually beat him down, but there is nothing but bad luck in such a tale, and bad luck is nothing worth investing our sorrow in. Stephen's plight is unfortunate but in no way tragic. Tragedy requires participation; Stephen is merely a spectator. Even his motivation for letting the cultists into his apartment at the beginning of the book is vague and unknown even to Stephen. He is a protagonist who reacts dully to the world around him, a Mersault with not even the capability of shooting an Arab because he lacks direction to take such action. Perhaps this book's message lies in Stephen's frequent comparisons of the present with the past (the 1970s). His neighborhood was better, as was the gay night life. But this is a societal issue, not one of character.

Stephen's entire purpose in this book seems to be drinking, smoking pot and thinking about how bad his life is. With this pale center of a book, what chance does the end of the world have? Even nuclear devastation would yield little more than a fizzle when there is no interesting foreground of which to mourn the loss. Ultimately, Michael may attempt to be a powerful story of sorrow and redemption, but neither of these ever emerge in a noteworthy manner.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not So Great, January 16, 2003

By 

Michael J. Armijo (Marina Del Rey, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Michael (Paperback)

This author won a Lambda Literary Award for another book called MASSAGE in 1999 (perhaps I should have read that one). This book called MICHAEL wasn't a big HIT for me (I was hopeful since my name is Michael). It's more like a short story about a middle-aged gay man who is trying to find meaning in his life as he is about to 'follow the Light' to his death and be reunited to those he loves in the Heavens. There are some incidents that are brushed upon that clearly make him feel guilty about the way he (Stephen, the main character) lives his life. It got into a Christian religious tangent mixed with some homoerotic parts that weren't really necessary. Then, there's this whole 'end of the world' scenario with a nuclear bombing in Russia and planes disappearing & crashing in NY & elsewhere (a bit sinister since this was published in 2000--prior to 9-11-01). It's almost like the author is writing a story for himself about how he hopes the circumstances will be when he dies. When I think of this it makes it a bit more interesting.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Intriguing and sensual, December 16, 2000

By 

"blissengine" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Michael (Paperback)

Flesh's new book concerns Stephen, a man who may or may not be dying of AIDS, who is mourning the loss of his lover Robert who died 3 years ago. Stephen is visited by a group of cultists, where he experiences a sort of awakening. The end of the world is coming and he is not prepared. Stephen then begins an inner journey in the world where he finds God's true nature as well as his own. Flesh's style is potent and beautiful, and I found the book quite mesmerizing, and yet certain sections seemed to need more fleshing out. As perfectly as I could visualize this story as a movie, I never entirely connected to Stephen as a person.