Through a lovely, personal account, Tuller invites the reader to see the West from a Russian point of view. Here, a gay reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle came to Russia to study the so-called gay and lesbian movement there only to fall in love with Ksyusha, a mercurial lesbian. As we too fall in love, Tuller, a sensitive and insightful writer, subtly liberates, allowing human experience to be more mysterious, comic, delicious, and tragic than the acceptance of appearances or the application of trite, political labels permit.

Tuller gives remarkable insights into the modern world of Gay and Lesbian Russia. He takes the reader to a world of transexual lesbians, weekends in the country, and a sexual identity just gestating, waiting to be born. It was very enjoyable reading, and even for the heterosexual reader, it gives excellent insights into the dramatic changes that occured in Russia after 1991 -- all of it explained on a personal level.

We just finished Frank Browning's Apple and Country Ham Risotto. Improbable as it seems, the flavors blend beautifully. My husband declared it the best risotto he's ever had--and risotto is his favorite food.

as a student in russia and eastern european studies, Tuller's book casts much needed light on the stuggles of gays and lesbians in Russia. it has helped me to more fully understand the russian mind and soul. thank you

Dominique Browning, editor of HOUSE & GARDEN magazine, has a triumph on her hands with "House & Garden Book of Style." HOUSE & GARDEN has long been the sophisticated cousin to the more accessible HOUSE BEAUTIFUL, and that chicness is in evidence here. The HOUSE & GARDEN cool austerity--sometimes sacrificing warmth for hard-edged style, but many times not--is amply displayed throughout.

The book covers a panoply of styles, from "Country Luxe" to "New International" to "Mid-Century Modern" and beyond. The shabby warmth of English-inspired rooms is covered, as is the prissier French look--but as HOUSE & GARDEN so often does, there is almost always a visual wrench thrown into the works to get your attention and make you rethink your assumptions about a particular genre. Perfectly making the point is the photograph on p. 25, which shows an 18th-century settee decorously covered in a taupe damask, above which hangs what appears to be a piece of Spirograph art made with screamingly bright primary oil paints. The effect is jarring--but it works.

The thinking which goes into the decoration of these rooms is explored just as deeply as the looks themselves. Although photographs take up most of the room--as they should, since this is a case when a picture telling a thousand words is not only desirable, but necessary for instructing the reader--the text is informative and enlightening. The end result is that these profoundly individual rooms make their own cases, and what beautiful cases they make.

This book is very enlightening in lots of issues concerning Sociology. From the new theories to the criticism of the classical. From the classical problems in sociology to new ones, such as the Web, the body or the individualism in our society. It is also a good handbook. It can be used almost as a reference book. A very good book to everyone concerned with the new ways for sociology, whether they are teachers or students.

Browning's journeys through the world of apples are exhaustive, lyric and compelling. If you like NPR, or the old New Yorker, you'll love this book on the fruit of English Yeoman, Thomas Jefferson, French Nobelmen and Johnny Appleseed. You will never look at a grocery store Red Delicious the same again.

Frank Browning perpetuates my belief that journalists are writing the best gardening and plant books. Gardeners are not typically interesting writers and there is such a proliferation of mediocre gardening books on the market. "Apples" is a delightful book. Anyone who wants to grow apples or simply go to the grocery store and buy apples would be enlightened by Frank Browning's book.

Luckily i found this book just in time.It really helped Tina and me to understand our rights better and know what is exactly good or bad according to the law.You will not regret owning this book ,it will always be of immense help in legal issues and even for everyday living.I'm glad i've read this book.

It rambles. It's vague. I found it incoherent.

Frank Browning's The Culture of Desire (Paradox and Perversity in Gay Lives Today) is a series of essays exploring aspects of gay men lives (no longer quite "today" as this book is bordering on a decade ago). These essays are hit and miss but there are enough little bits of interest to keep most of the readers happy and lead them successfully through the collection. It is very anecdotal and no conclusions can be truly be drawn from this book but it is successful in showing the diversity that existed in gay America and has only continued to grow since this book. It is not an important read but can be, at times, an interesting one.

Smart, sexy, and as cutting edge now as when it was published six years ago, "Culture of Desire" is required reading for anyone who likes to think of themselves as informed about the state of American/Western European gay male culture (if "culture" is the right word). I have yet to meet anyone who hates this book who didn't buy it for the cover.

Same-sex desire can cohere into many different identities -- we've known that since Foucault. Same-sex behavior often does not cohere into an identity at all -- we've known that at least since "Tea Room Trade." So why does Browning present it as a remarkable revelation that he has just now thought of, and that will come to the reader as a shocking revelation? This is a well written book, but interesting accounts of pansexual Arcadias are unfortunately interspliced with annoyingly self-absorbed tales of his tricks -- Browning believes that he is hot enough to attract every guy in the world, straight, gay, or whatever, and that the reader is desperately interested in hearing the details. I can buy better porn elsewhere -- but my problem with this book is not that there are many ways to express same-sex desire, not that there is gay life beyond the Castro Street clones with gym memberships and charge accounts at Ikea -- who'd want a world where everybody is the same? But Browning continuously states that those clones have no right to exist, that they are inauthentic, self-absorbed, sex-obsessed closet bisexuals. Gay life should should not ever include muscles, circuit parties, and political activism. In fact, there should be no gay people, anywhere, ever, just promiscuous pansexuals going with the flow. In a less enlightened age, we would call such rantings homophobic.

I found it very abstract and rhetorical. I wanted to like it and learn something. I found it unhelpful for my life as a gay man.

This book should insult any gay man who considers himself to be an intellectual. Full of faulty logic, purple prose, gross generalizations, and accounts of Browning's crusing experiences, the textoffers a disturbing, degrading picture of homosexuality. Despite a section on the works of Michel Foucault, the text demonstrates no knowledge of political ontology; also, the text avoids mentioning the works of Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick and David Halperin, but it posits Camille Paglia as an intellectual diety--look out! The correlation between coming out and becoming "born again" just doesn't work: the former is an outward, social/public event, and the latter is an inward, spiritual one. Nonetheless, the cover of the book reproduces a beautifu, homoeroticl print by Paul Cadmus.

found this collection of fotos so boring I actually returned the book for a refund. Perhaps inclusion of color fotos would have helped, but considering the gay subject matter, the images came across as flat and extremely uninteresting.