Gay Book Club

Arvo Otterman showcases some recently released, LGBT-related books from a number of different genres.

Like to curl up with a good book? This month we’ll check out some recently released LGBT-related books from a number of different genres.

Call Me By Your Name: A Novel
By André Aciman, 273 pages, $14
If you enjoyed the film by Director Luca Guadagnino, you’ll want to be sure to read the book upon which the film was based. This New York Times Bestseller is an instant classic and one of the best love stories of the decade. Call Me by Your Name is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents’ cliffside mansion on the Italian Riviera. Each is unprepared for the consequences of their attraction, when, during the restless summer weeks, unrelenting currents of obsession, fascination, and desire intensify their passion and test the charged ground between them. 

Less: A Novel
By Andrew Sean Greer, 256 pages, $18
In this hilarious Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, a struggling novelist travels the world to avoid an awkward wedding. The New York Times Book Review described it as being filled with, “arresting lyricism and beauty.” As the novel begins, a fifty-year-old novelist receives an invitation to a wedding of the man who was his boyfriend for nine years. He can’t bear to attend, but he can’t say no either, so he decides to hatch a plan of epic avoidance that involves accepting all of the invitations to literary events that he has received from around the world.

The One
By John Marrs, 416 pages, $18
This sci-fi thriller explores what might go wrong if scientists were one day to discover a way to match people up with their ideal soulmates based on the information contained in their DNA. How far would you be willing to go to find “The One?” As the novel begins, it has been a decade since the company announced the discovery of a gene that pairs each of us to a specific soul mate. In the interim, millions of people around the world have been matched. But the discovery has its downsides: test results have led to the breakup of countless relationships and traditional ideas of dating, romance, and love have fallen into disfavor. Five very different people recently received notifications that they had been “matched.” They’re each about to meet their one true love, but “happily ever after” isn’t guaranteed. Because even soul mates can have dark secrets, and some are more shocking than others… Endless twists, turns, and surprises make The One a compelling read from cover to cover.

Open Love: The Complete Guide to Open Relationships, Polyamory, and More
By Axel Neustadter, 176 pages, $19.99
In his new book Open Love, Axel Neustadter addresses the promise and the problems of gay non-monogamy. He takes an in-depth look at how love can be sustained and nurtured outside the monogamy mould. An essential guide for the post-monogamy generation. Writer Axel Neustädter is a freelance writer living in Berlin. He was the editor of the gay erotic series, Loverboys, to which he contributed three volumes as author. After his adventurous guidebooks, Gayma Sutra and Play with Me!, he authored the highly acclaimed The Bigger Bang and The Better Blow Job. With Open Love he brings his knowledge and expertise to bear in this informative and engrossing exploration of the possibilities offered by open and alternative relationships.

Something Like Summer
By Jay Bell, 293 pages, $14
Love, like everything in the universe, cannot be destroyed. But over time it can change. The hot Texas nights were lonely for Ben before his heart began beating to the rhythm of two words; Tim Wyman. By all appearances, Tim had the perfect body and ideal life, but when a not-so-accidental collision brings them together, Ben discovers that the truth is rarely so simple. If winning Tim’s heart was an impossible quest, keeping it would prove even harder as family, society, and emotion threaten to tear them apart. Something Like Summer is a love story spanning a decade and beyond as two boys discover what it means to be friends, lovers, and sometimes even enemies.