Funny That Way by Perry, Joel - 2000

New York & Los Angeles U. S. A.: Alyson Books. As New 2000. Softcover. Marfree, NrFine 1stEd out of print; no names, not marked-in, underscored, clearance or discard. Mails from NYC usually within 12 hours. ; 8.5 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches; 288 pages; \nOnline Rev: Don't let the slow opening of Joel Perry's essay collection turn you away from his fruity good humor, proud queer consciousness, and rapid-fire delivery. The sketches in Funny That Way first won fans in the gay rag Frontiers and the magazine Instinct. Perry recounts a trip through the retail rat maze in "Putting It All Together at Ikea. " In the frivolous "Ill-Serviced, " he imagines a helper positioned at the entrance of every store, ready to comfort shoppers, intuit their needs, and guide them expertly to the finest goods: "And when I'm at Neiman's, at their prices, the service should finish with a rinse-and-spit. " In "Athletically Challenged: Confessions of a Try-Athlete, " Perry describes his misguided attempt at water-skiing: I was immediately yanked face forward into the water and dragged a quarter mile, mouth wide open in shock and gathering krill. Nobody had bothered to tell me to let go if that happened, so, terrified, I hung on for dear life forming a six-foot bubble going down the Intracoastal Waterway. This lasted less than a minute but still long enough for me to gulp enough salt water to have me passing sea monkeys for days. His conclusion about water-skiing? "It's a 30 mile an hour enema. " Pretty, witty, and gay, Perry is at his best in urging fellow queers to come out of the closet, spread their fabulousness throughout the culture, and accept the applause of a grateful straight world. --Regina Marler From Publishers Weekly Perry begins this likable collection of his gay humor columns from Frontiers and Instinct magazines by apologizing for the subtitle forced on him by his editor: "Can anyone not named Minnelli live up to that?" he asks. Perry's essays are arranged in topic-specific chapters like "Food and Sex, " "The Arts" and "Politics and God. " A little more sexually explicit than his contemporaries David Sedaris and Michael Thomas Ford, Perry opens the book with a tale of his first inklings of being different from other boys: he spent each Saturday watching cartoons and the neighbor boy wash his car in swim trunks; while reading Hardy Boys mysteries he continually imagined himself the meat in a Frank and Joe sandwich. Lamenting the cost of his newest fetish, his "Leather Boy on a Budget" is a hilarious send-up of compulsive shopping, gay aesthetics and how a cheap pair of leather pants can ruin a "Best Buns" contest. His astute account of Food & Wine magazine as near porno in its decadent descriptions and glossy photos is a sly delight, as is his fear of "unnaturally beautiful" gym-goers: "Where is the gym you go to to get in good enough shape to go to a gym?" Perry may not be a Minnelli, but there's no shortage of fabulous material in this debut collection that should attract attention in the growing gay humor category. Copyright 2000 Reed. .