Husband Material: grrrr

At least the pic is cute

 

 [Boyfriend Material and Husband Material are written by Alexis Hall]

So i just binged through the Boyfriend Material and then Husband Material books. Boyfriend Material was OK though rather plodding. Oliver in it has almost no character development and frankly his character is boring which was the overall premise for why he was a safe choice for Luc, but we get nothing more. His main attribute is seemingly being able to deal with Luc's neuroses and that's about it. Who is this guy? Yes, he's neurotic too but not in a lovable way. Does he have any passions and things he likes to do outside of work? It's all so robotic and while that's the actuality of a lot of life it's not a good formula for a book character. At least with Red White and Royal Blue Henry's facade is defensive and he's revealed to have a rich inner life when he lets it down. With Oliver? Not much there other that his weird neuroses. Luc seems to love him only because Oliver loves him back -- not a good formula for a relationship.

 

So now to Husband Material. I had heard it was a bad sequel and it didn't disappoint. I've read that the author's name is a pen name which is fine, but the reason he gives is that his writing is not compatible with his day job. Hmm. There may be perfect legit reasons to separate the two, but it could be from a closety point of view too. Given the rest of the book and the hints of internalized homophobia in Boyfriend Material I'm leaning on the more uncharitable take.

 

So anyway, here we find out that not only is Oliver boring, he treads dangerously close to the Unlike the Other Gurls style of internalized homophobia*. It's OK not to care about Drag Race or rainbow flags, etc, etc, but when you feel oppressed by it that's a red flag. They go on and on about a fucking balloon rainbow arch at their wedding. I mean, wtf? Your bf wants it and it freaks you out? Another red flag. That's the hill you'll die on? The proper response is to roll your eyes and let your boyfriend make it his wedding too. Having rainbow whatever at your wedding doesn't define you, after all. After the wedding you can go back to not giving a shit about all of the gay trappings.

 

The entire premise is pretty lame of Luc offhanded musing that they should get married was an actual marriage proposal. I mean, who does that? It's certainly not uncommon for couples to discuss marriage ahead of time before one of them proposes. In fact, I think lack of discussion is pretty much a red flag in and of itself. Marriage does bring responsibilities along with its yummy rights and shouldn't be entered lightly. If nothing else, you'd want to figure out what it means for finances. It's just not believable that an offhand remark should be binding. So the entire premise is flawed.

 

There is also Oliver's switch from vegetarian to vegan now and apparently it's messing with his physique. Previously he went on about Uber and its unsustainability. I certainly agree that Uber is a piece of shit company but that doesn't seem to the entire point. There may be other neuroses that I'm forgetting, but it seems to me that what the author is really doing is making a point: Virtue Signaling bad. Virtual Signaling harmful. The entire bit with rainbowphobia may well be in the same vein: that Luc is virtue signaling his gayness or something weird like that. His internalized homophobia might rationalize his internalize homophobia  into a stand against virtue signaling. I won't say with certainty that's what's going on, but given the rest is sure seems like it is possible.

The book itself is basically a bunch of weddings. There really doesn't seem to be much point to them other than setting up the strawman argument that marriage requires heteronormativity. I couldn't even finish the Alex wedding chapter because it was just so awful in both is glacial pace, and its silly premises. Brig's wedding seems to be about the  Best Day of Her Life  and setting up other heteronormative strawmen. But going to his ex's wedding who shit on him to the tabloids? Why on earth would anybody do that? In my humble opinion weddings are perfect for finding a reason to get out of them, and that is such a trivial Nope. But that's just me, I suppose. But it still remains absurd, and I really don't get what the entire message is supposed to be. That Luc is an abuse bottom? The only part that had any redeeming value was the part where Oliver gave his speech at his father's funeral.  So we're going for Three Weddings and Funeral, but we really aren't because it wasn't romantic and it wasn't funny.

 

The final part is so messed up and contradictory that it makes me want to strangle Oliver. First of all as a barrister if he doesn't understand the vast legal infrastructure that marriage provides he should be disbarred. He has a homophobic mother who would absolutely disinherit Luc were something to happen to Oliver. They both seem to buy into the bs that marriage changes everything and the Special Day and that marriage is special and that marriage is showing love. What twaddle. My husband and I had been together for 14 years before we got legally married and 15 years later You know what's changed? The legal stuff and that's it. It was a great party with friends and not much more. Then the complete idiocy of calling it off because Oliver didn't want to be thought of as wanting white picket fences. Well then fucking don't have them and who cares if people think you do? He doesn't want to be heteronormative when that's literally how he's been the entire time? What the actual fuck? I mean, not wanting to kiss until you like/love somebody is as heteronormative as it gets (and even then most actual heterosexuals find that sort of normativity to be no barrier to, er,  entry). Is this the author saying that gay marriage: bad because it might make you look gay? Or straight? Or something else? We're left to speculate because it's never resolved. I kept getting more and more worried as the number of pages dwindled with absolutely no resolution in sight. And then, nothing. We're left wondering what the fuck just happened. 

Luc's part of not wanting to get married at least makes a little more sense in that it seems to relate to commitment issues. The last little bit about they shouldn't work but do is a commitment issue. But then there is the weird take that the limerence period isn't permanent in a relationship about their date night.Yet that is true regardless if you have a marriage license or not. The only way to feel that way again is to find somebody new. And it's not like you can't have nice romantic date nights just because you're married. But the whole thing is rather silly as they should have had conversations about all of this, so maybe a valid reason to not get married is that they are too immature. Regardless, this is deeply unsatisfying in that we really have to guess why he really doesn't want to get married.

 

This is just infuriating to me who has done my part in the journey for marriage equality including being the face of gay marriage for a time on NBC. Lots of people in the day had a lot of issues with gay marriage and its implications about patriarchy. Fine. But then AIDS happened and showed that those legal protections were really fucking important and that the heteronormativity was optional all along. Nobody is forcing you to get married any more than they are forcing you to like rainbow balloon arches. This is clearly written by somebody who has no fucking clue what marriage is actually about for gay people, or chooses to ignore that vital part. All I have to say is if the supposed premise of the next book is about getting kids and they don't consider the legal implications the answer is: no, don't. That's especially true with homophobic relatives who could make life a living hell. 

If you want to have a conversation about the merits and demerits of marriage, fine. But pulling the rug out at the last possible moment with basically zero discussion? That's one giant NOPE. The only thing that makes any sense to me about the whole thing is that the author has some real issues that he very likely doesn't realize he has. That he's hoping for affirmation for his internalized homophobia which is definitely a thing with disaffected gays, especially men in my experience. But straight acting Oliver not wanting to get gay married? Quelle surprise. Bletch.

 

1/10

 

[*] Unlike the Other Gurls is a manifestation of internalized homophobia where the person tries to claim that they are not like the flamboyant gays and why do they have to be that way? Never mind that actual flamboyant gays are a minority. Typically the reason is that they are afraid that their gay fabulosity will reflect poorly on them somehow. This can range from disgust at drag queens all the way to the most insignificant indicator like a rainbow bracelet or some other thing that might tip another person off that they are either gay or gay friendly.