An intellectually ambitious, politically engaged, ideologically sensitive memoir.
The multifaceted memoir of a 20-something gay Filipino American male’s conflicted relationship with affluent white America.
Catapult managing editor Ortile combines traditional anecdote with quasi-academic cultural critique and an investigation of sexual and racial identity politics. The author’s family immigrated to America when he was 12, and he was taught from a young age that his Asian identity had to be played down to access all the trappings of white American society. At least on a superficial level, this approach got results. Ortile studied hard (lots of Barthes) and was admitted to the Vassar College, a school he romanticizes—but also criticizes—for its reputation as a bastion of white privilege and a direct pipeline to a prestigious career in the liberal arts. At the same time, he constantly wondered if he had lost his real self and his Filipino identity by playing such an assimilationist role. Regarding sexual identity, he has always been more sure of himself, as evidenced by his recounting of his sexual escapades in New York City as a young, exoticized Filipino man. “I inhabit a fetishized body,” he writes, “one marked as other, even by men who desire it.” While working as a magazine intern, he was also constantly trawling for wealthy men on Grindr. Ortile’s fascination with Barthes leads him on extended musings about not only Western marriage myths, but also the fallacy of American masculinity as expressed through men’s underwear ads. Looking back on his experiences, he writes, “I took up the role of a Filipino Carrie Bradshaw who read Barthes and trolled Grindr.” This is revelatory stuff, of course, for a self-analytical youngster still learning the ropes in the big city. More affecting, however, are Ortile’s partially successful attempts to come to terms with his own “Filipinoness” and finally reconcile his Asian identity with the nascent American in him.
An intellectually ambitious, politically engaged, ideologically sensitive memoir.Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5417-6279-4
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Bold Type Books
Review Posted Online: April 11, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2020
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.
A noted actor turns to verse: “Poems are a Saturday in the middle of the week.”
McConaughey, author of the gracefully written memoir Greenlights, has been writing poems since his teens, closing with one “written in an Australian bathtub” that reads just as a poem by an 18-year-old (Rimbaud excepted) should read: “Ignorant minds of the fortunate man / Blind of the fate shaping every land.” McConaughey is fearless in his commitment to the rhyme, no matter how slight the result (“Oops, took a quick peek at the sky before I got my glasses, / now I can’t see shit, sure hope this passes”). And, sad to say, the slight is what is most on display throughout, punctuated by some odd koanlike aperçus: “Eating all we can / at the all-we-can-eat buffet, / gives us a 3.8 education / and a 4.2 GPA.” “Never give up your right to do the next right thing. This is how we find our way home.” “Memory never forgets. Even though we do.” The prayer portion of the program is deeply felt, but it’s just as sentimental; only when he writes of life-changing events—a court appearance to file a restraining order against a stalker, his decision to quit smoking weed—do we catch a glimpse of the effortlessly fluent, effortlessly charming McConaughey as exemplified by the David Wooderson (“alright, alright, alright”) of Dazed and Confused. The rest is mostly a soufflé in verse. McConaughey’s heart is very clearly in the right place, but on the whole the book suggests an old saw: Don’t give up your day job.
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781984862105
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
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