this book attempts to be too many things — it’s pretending to address queer history and make social commentary on the importance of gay bars while also providing personal context.  Atherton Lin does not succeed in pulling this off, and I don’t think he actually wanted to. The whole memoir is mostly disjointed vignettes where he brags about all the men he’s fucked in a handful of gay bars in SF and London. It’s allllll anecdotes, baby! He comes off as the very self-important guy who just HAS to tell you an irrelevant anecdote from when he was younger.  It’s incredibly pretentious and littered with random Proust references and fake-deep pronouncements that lead to nothing. 

Mostly, though, this was boring because it was devoid of emotion. I felt no connection to the author or “Famous” or any of the other random people mentioned. There was very little in the way of connection, belonging, or friendship discussed — just emotionless hookups with no reflection. There was no sociological analysis. The bars included were all very monolithic — all very white/cis/male, mostly located in major queer cities. He only very briefly touches on his Asian-American identity while mostly ignoring race. He bemoans the younger generation’s desire for safe spaces.  He wants to feel violated!