I am not myself these days
by Josh Kilmer-Purcell

Drag queen meets male escort and the rest is history.

Aquadisiac (Japanese for goldfish-tits) is a star of the New York drag scene, always there with a witty remark and an empty glass needing refilling. She becomes beautiful, dazzles the crowds, and then black-outs. In one of those blackouts, she goes home with Jack, an equally beautiful escort, who wants only to hold him. Over breakfast, they read the Sunday Times to each other, and begin the fucked-up tumultuous journey some might call true love.

“I am not myself these days” is a great read. It's set in New York (and if you've read my other reviews, you'll know that gay fiction+New York setting=WIN). It's the story of Josh/Aqua and Jack/Aidan, and the relationship between these two people with four names. They meet, they love, the fuck, they fight.

Peppered with a supporting cast of characters like the bitchy sidekick Laura, escorts like the ripped-from-an-A&F-catalogue Ryan and Grey, escort clients like Mr. Beefeater and Houdini, this story is funny and touching and saddening and real. Like a Coney Island roller coaster, Aqua and Jack's relationship has its highs and lows (and lows when high), and just like on a roller coaster, you get caught up with turning the pages to see what happens next, will it work, will he leave, will he stay, will he sober up, will he stop the crack, and when that moment happens, where Jack is standing over Josh with a knife, do they pick up the pieces, and if they do, do they smoke those pieces?

There are moments so poignant, you choke up. Like a Thanksgiving ripped from a Norman Rockwell rendering of Grandma's house, all drag queens and hookers and cranberry sauce. Like a perfect Christmas ripped from Whoville.

There are moments so painful, you choke up. Especially if you, like me, are no stranger to alcoholic drag queens with bad luck when it comes to men. There's a gritty realism in his depictions of crack use, of K-holing, of vodka-induced blurs called Friday nights.

There are moments of pure gold, and it is there, in the self-deprecating and brilliantly humorous anecdotes, that Kilmer-Purcell shines as brightly as the goldfish in Aqua's tits.

This has been a bobert review.