London Mayoral Elections 2012.

Tim Bennett-Goodman looks at the forthcoming London Mayoral and Assembly elections from the LGBT perspective, with a not-entirely impartial eye …

“Of course, most of us cast our vote based on a much wider spectrum of issues than just sexuality (which is doubtless as it should be) but we surely want to support a candidate who will do us the most good, or possibly the least harm. “

[rating=4]
121 pages • Profile Books • May 3, 2012 [PB]

Tim Bennett-Goodman does not see a knighthood in the offing for the author of this delightfully wicked book.

“Bennett imagines the Palace as peopled by a cast of eccentrics and grotesques, from the prissy private secretary, Sir Kevin Scatchard, to the niffy nonagenarian, Sir Claude Pollington. It is also rife with politicking and camp bitchery.”

[rating=4]
233 pages • Serpent’s Tail • April 5, 2012 [HB]

Tim Bennett-Goodman is moved by this multi-layered family saga.

“A Stone’s Throw is a work of two distinct halves, deftly stitched together by Shaw into a satisfying whole.”

Key Dates in the Queer Calendar

As LGBT History Month 2012 ends Tim Bennett-Goodman takes a sideways look at queer history.

“To my mind, modern queer history, in the British Isles and Ireland at least, begins in 1885 with the Criminal Law Amendment Act, and most particularly the pernicious Section 11 or Labouchere Amendment (named after the MP who introduced it) designed to prosecute male homosexuals for acts of ‘gross indecency’.”

Coronation Street 2011 – Nowt so Queer as Folk

Coronation Street played it gay in 2011, but, asks Tim Bennett-Goodman, was that a good or a bad thing?

Needless to say, a cringe-making class conflict plays itself out over the dinner (or is that lunch?) table – Eileen: “dinner’s ready” Jools: “It’s a bit early for dinner isn’t it?” Todd: “She means lunch” – you get the picture.

Permalink

[rating=4]
391 pages • Headpress • October, 2011 [PB]

Tim Bennett-Goodman learns more than he ever wanted to know about the underworld of adult vintage paperbacks.

If this book sends you racing straight down to your local secondhand bookshop in search of cheap, lurid treasures from the past, then I’ll feel as if I’ve done my job..

[rating=4]
260 pages • Quartet • June 01, 2011 [PB]

Tim Bennett-Goodman takes pleasure in Death in Bordeaux, which charts the working and personal life of a police detective from the fall of France through the establishment and early days of the Vichy Republic.

Massie doesn’t shrink from the casual homophobia of the times. Even the most sympathetic of his characters find homosexuality impossible to comprehend, if not actually repellant.

[rating=4]
287 pages • Headpress • June 23, 2011 [PB]

Tim Bennett-Goodman finds The Hellhound Sample, a family saga that spans the years 1932-2004, to be an energetic and touching read.

The story of young Calvin’s struggle to overcome the handicap of being a closet bi-sexual in an aggressively (indeed, murderously) homophobic rap world is both fascinating and touching.

[rating=4]
608 pages • Bloomsbury • April 4, 2011 [HB]

In his Epistle to the Reader, AC Grayling sums up his work as “…a text made from all times for all times, its aspiration and aim the good for humanity and the good of the world.” A modest undertaking, then, says, Tim Bennett-Goodman.

The Good Book is a work which, it seems to me, will reward dipping into from time to time – for consolation, meditation or stimulation – just as one would (or would have) the Bible itself, rather than necessarily being read cover-to-cover.

[rating=4]
261 pages • Fourth Estate • July 23rd, 2009 [PB]

A captivating novel about the nature of truth and identity set in the aftermath of the Second World War.

Hamilton exhibits a genuine warmth and sympathy for his characters, for all their flaws and failings, which is very life-affirming. He understands how difficult it is for adults ever to be truly ‘grown-up’; however capable and stable they may appear on the surface, a lost, frightened child cowers not far beneath.