Reviews

Few documents of the treatment of homosexuals under Communist regimes exist, and there is no journalistic survey of gays in Russia in the late 20th century. Tuller, a reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, addresses the gap with a flawed mixture of travelog, social history, and personal journal. His work is most engaging when describing and directly quoting the myriad individuals Tuller met over the course of several trips to Moscow, St. Petersburg, and places farther afield in the early 1990s. Their perspectives hint at how myopic a North American, identity politics-based understanding of homosexuality may be. At other times, unfortunately, Tuller himself falls victim to that very myopia, and his analysis can be condescending. Moreover, the interjection of personal elements‘including a budding ardor for a lesbian guide and disturbing descriptions of dreams‘are more likely to make readers question the narrator's competence than draw them into the story. Patrons of larger gay studies and Slavic studies collections will make use of the more objective portions of the book; general collections would be better served by Reinaldo Arenas's poetic Cuban memoir Before Night Falls (LJ 9/15/93).‘Douglas McClemont, New York