Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #114322 in Books
• Published on: 2006-03-01
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 280 pages

From Publishers Weekly
After a harrowing encounter with a bigot on the PATH train, Max Rabinowitz, drag king and bouncer, quarrels with cross-dressing friend Vickie—who is brutally murdered that night. Soon a transgender friend with AIDS is hospitalized, the East Village club where they work closes and a friendly Muslim neighbor disappears after defending his kids from the cops. Loyal, tender and apt to paint apartment walls with Yiddish poems, Max is appealing yet strikingly isolated and quick to get enraged. At the book's beginning, Feinberg, author of the queer classic Stone Butch Blues (1993), only hints at why Max, now hitting midlife, carries pre-Stonewall armor into a post-Stonewall world of polysexuality and queer television. Though seemingly trapped in a world-weary, self-made transgender noir of tough breaks and lassitude, Max is returning to activism by book's end. Max's first person is charged and poignant, and the appealing group of secondary characters makes Max's world as desperately full as it is bleak. Still, readers who don't define themselves by their political protests are likely to want a lot more dancing to join this revolution. (May)
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Customer Reviews

Worth the purchase price
All in all, Drag King Dreams is an entertaining and inspiring novel. The characters are interesting and not at all cliche. It's compelling.
I must say, however, that it's hard to read this without wanting to compare it to the author's first novel, Stone Butch Blues, which was by far a superior work, in my opinion. If you haven't read Stone Butch Blues, I would recommend to read that one instead, or first. If you have read it already, this is still a well written and interesting story and well worth the time and money.

Masterful... Feinberg triumphs as an author
This book is an outstanding piece of writing. Feinberg's controlled prose leads the reader through the twists and turns of the narrative. The characters are sketched deftly. Exactly as in real life, the details are revealing and concealing in equal measure. We tread lightly because the subject matter can be senstitive, and as the reader, I found myself almost forced to read between the lines. Not even aware that I was doing so, I filled in the blanks, made assumptions.

As the narrative unfolds, a dozen little threads emerge. Sometimes its not always obvious how they will come together. But stick with the story, for Feinberg will lead you to a dazzling climax. In the final scene of the book, (SPOILER WARNING!) as the characters' names are called out, I cringed. In that one instant, Feinberg holds a mirror to the hypocrisy of my politically correct, gender-based assumptions. Feinberg humbles us with honesty. Feinberg's triumph is that ze does not tell the reader anything that we don't want to know, ze makes us realize that identity / a sense of self, transcends social stereotypes. In that climactic moment, Max' journey of self-truth and hope resonate with the reader. The book is a tale of hope, aflame with the complexities of contemporary New York and brought to life through Feinberg's brilliant, compassionate writing.

best fiction ever!
I don't usually read fiction, but this was the best I have ever read. Feinberg wrote a colourful book I just couldn't put down. I recently ordered another book by the same writter, and can't wait for it to arrive!