Poor Mimi, she just can’t catch a break, y’all. She’s the star of this here comic novel, a goofy, brilliant, sleazy romp of a book: if John Waters ever put pen to paper (wait, has he?), it would probably be something like this here. A pollyanna from the suburbs of New York with a snobbish sense of her own superior decorating taste (& a keen eye for description), our narrator Mimi opens the tale by throwing a party for her local Westchester Arts Council, & who should show up but the crown jewel of society, Mrs. John D. Rockefeller III. The party is a bust, since the arts crowd leans a little wilder than Mimi expected (a party where the artists show up is a very different party than one where the collectors show up, which is the kind our sweet Mimi is hoping for). Needless to say, things go delightfully awry, & Mimi’s well-I-never pearl clutching never gets old: her bright-eyed naïveté is what propels the narrative & creates joke upon joke upon joke. There are parts of the book where almost every sentence is laugh-out-loud funny, & frankly with today’s mores & the levels of blue the comedy here ventures into, you may find yourself clutching at your own pearls.
The book is a reissue from New Directions & was originally published in 1996 — a quote from a reviewer on the back jacket describes it as “gleefully tasteless,” a true product of le gay 90s: sleaze, but with heart. Mimi is a lot like a drag queen version of womanhood that the author, Robert Plunket, puts through all kinds of hell, & you can’t help but root for her. When she falls in with Tom Potts, an arts administrator & opera obsessive who takes Mimi under his wing in the city, & not to mention a flaming homosexual (her dawning revelation that Tom is in fact gay is one of the great comic moments of the book — she just can’t seem to figure out the nature of his relationship with his friend Floyd, until she does), she is swept up in his knowledge of the city, culture, & his biting sense of humor. Her delightful takedowns of gay culture are as true today as they were in the 90s, & when she ends up stumbling around in the middle of the night on Fire Island, the pain of her plight to be accepted in this community is very real: poor Mimi, she’s just a middle-aged white woman trying to fit in with a whole group of people who are entirely uninterested in her — until she meets Joel.
He goes by Joe, he’s a porn star, & his inherent animal magnetism has Mimi hook, line & sinker right off the bat. Her offer of a car ride from Fire Island turns into helping him manage his mail-order worn-underwear business (he’s way behind), & Mimi’s eventual funding of a pie-in-the-sky film project of Joel’s that more or less consumes all her resources. Poor Mimi, a sucker for beauty (who hasn’t been there?) made a fool of by show business & show biz people: still, you imagine her feeling that no matter what ol’ Plunket puts her through, she’ll come out with her head held high. Not so for the gay characters, unfortunately, who must endure the harsh reality of “gay cancer” that was at its most rampant in the 90s: it is with the lightest touch that Mimi encounters AIDS, & it would be impossible not to include it, but the sheer force of the comedy to keep rolling in the face of such enormous tragedy is a triumph in & of itself. Perhaps a tribute to not only the value but the absolute necessity of comedy in hard times (ahem).
If you’re looking for a good laugh with a side of titillation, look no further, friends. Plus, the pink jacket design will add a splash of color to any drab winter subway look — oh jeez, Mimi’s rubbing off on me, y’all!
—Cowboy Books