"What unites us, all of us, surely is brotherhood, a sense that our friendships are historic, designed to hold Stonewall together," muses on character in Ethan Mordden's Buddies. This need for friendship, for nonerotic affection, for buddies, shines forth as an American obsession from Moby-Dick through Of Mice and Men to The Sting. And, American gay life has built upon and cherished these relationships, even as it has dared-perhaps its most startling iconoclasm-to break new ground by combining romance and friendship: one's lover is one's buddy.
This book is about those relationships-mostly gay but some straight and even a few between gays and straights. Here also are fathers and brothers and stories of men in their youth, when rivalry often develops more naturally than alliance. In Buddies Mordden continues to map the unstoried wilderness of gay life today.
"Mordden's rights as an outstanding gay writer, with Manhattan to the Pines as his turf, are undeniable. Here, all in all, a rather endearing look at the guys who play Strip Candyland and collect Alice Faye lobby cards."
Kirkus Reviews
"A finely drawn portrait of a lifestyle that blossomed before AIDS struck terror into the culture."
