Synopses & Reviews
If You've Got It, Flaunt ItSome men like to watch, and some men like to be watched. Some men are real Show-Offs. Award-winning editor Richard Labonté has gathered a set of stories sure to fire up every fantasy of seeing and being seen: the desired body savored voyeuristically through a window, through a crack in the closet door, through a camera lens. Sometimes he's right across the room, reclining in a bathhouse hot tub or wearing a leave-nothing-to-the-imagination thong around the locker room.
Michael Bracken's burglar hides "In the Closet" while listening to the man of the house entertain a guestall the way. A voyeur's dreams come true in "Naked Summer Blues" when two gorgeous beach studs perform for him and finally invite him in as the middle man. The coy narrator in "Vacancy" spends a long, hot summer tempting a watchful neighbor. The tantalizing, teasing tales in Show-Offs remind us of just how arousing looking can bethe eyes have it!
Review
"The tantalizing, teasing tales in
Show-Offs remind us of just how arousing looking can bethe eyes have it!"
Llellsee
"Reading these stories is like actually being there and I cannot think of anything that is sexier. You know when you get a book from Cleis you are really getting some high quality smutit seems to be one of their trademarks."
-Amos Lassen
Review
"
Show-offs surprised me in the sense of completeness I felt once I was done. The writing is sexy, and varied, and everything I knew to expect from Labontes work, but somehow this collection had more weight to it. The reality is that I cant help but be wowed when I open a collection of erotica and discover pieces that are thoughtful and inspire revisiting notions Id allowed myself to cement in my own mind. Voyeurism and exhibitionism as hopeful, as love-notes to a partner, as a rich fantasy that fulfills a place we cannot usually go were all things I hadnt really considered. Now I can watch differently."
Erotica Revealed
"The tantalizing, teasing tales in Show-Offs remind us of just how arousing looking can bethe eyes have it!"
Llellsee
"Reading these stories is like actually being there and I cannot think of anything that is sexier. You know when you get a book from Cleis you are really getting some high quality smutit seems to be one of their trademarks."
-Amos Lassen
Synopsis
Some men like to watch, and some men like to be watched. Some men are real
Show Offs.The universe has a way of balancing things out, doesnt it? Were not talking sidewalk cruising here, that natural inclination for one man to appreciate another mans body in passing, perhaps leading to full-on sex, perhaps fueling, once hes alone, a climactic fantasy. No, the stories in this collection are more furtive: the desired body savored voyeuristically through a window, through a crack in the closet door, through a camera lens, sometimes from right across the room; the body desired flaunting manly wares while bathing in a river, playing in a bathhouse, wearing a leaving-nothing-to-the-imagination thong.
Forget like”: some men need to be watched; some men need to watch. These are their stories.
About the Author
Richard Labonté edits books, walks dogs and works as a chef's assistant at an addiction recovery center on Bowen Island, off the coast of British Columbia, Canada, after living in Los Angeles and San Francisco from 1979 to 2001. One of the founders of A Different Light Bookstore, he has coordinated the judging for the Lambda Literary Award since 2009. He reviews 100 queer books a year for Q Syndicate, which distributes "Book Marks," his fortnightly column and has edited the
Best Gay Erotica series since 1996 (along with a couple of dozen other books for Cleis). Eight of his books, including five editions of
Best Gay Erotica, have been Lammy finalists, and three of them have won the award.