Hello Stranger: Musings on Modern Intimacies
by Manuel Betancourt
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Witty and winkingly playful, Manuel Betancourt's Hello Stranger explores modern queer romance and the expansive possibilities of ephemeral intimacies
"Hello stranger." As an opening line, you really can't ask for better.
Hello Stranger is a book about chance encounters--at a bar, through social media, in a bathhouse--and what a stranger can reveal about who we are and who we could still yet be. A stranger, after all, is a site of endless possibilities.
As Manuel Betancourt looks back on his past relationships, he turns to characters and narratives that helped him question notions of what monogamy and coupledom (and relationships and marriage) can and should look like. From films like Before Sunrise and Cruising to the poetry of Frank O'Hara and the musicals of Stephen Sondheim, Betancourt uses pop culture to make sense of the alluring prospect of forging intimacies with strangers--even, or especially, the strangers within ourselves.
At once a personal excavation and a broad cultural critique, Betancourt grapples with everything from online sexting and real-life cruising to divorces and throuples. Hello Stranger examines the intimacies we crave, value, and oftentimes destroy with rote familiarity.
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Book Details
ISBN:
9781646222292
EAN:
9781646222292
Binding:
Hardcover
Pages:
240
Authors:
Manuel Betancourt
Publisher:
Catapult
This is one of those books that every gay man should read. It is a discussion on relationships; with one off encounters (Hello Stranger) and looking at "ands" not "ors" in any relationship. I think the best way to describe this intriguing book is to quote from the jacket cover (which I usually would never do but this is important). ""Betancourt beautifully captures the push and pull of intemacy, where love's contradictions can both comfort and confine--a compelling exploration of connection and what's revealed about ourselves in pursuit of it," states Ryan Fitzgibbon, editor of a Great Gay Book. This is one of those books that will keep every gay man thinking about it long after it is finished, and hopefully readers will return to it with frequency. Thank you Manuel for keep us gay men on our toes regarding options!Reasons I enjoyed this book: Informative /Inspirational /Original /Realistic /Unpredictable
Hello Stranger is the kind of book that lingers—thoughtful, sharp, and effortlessly compelling. Manuel Betancourt has a way of distilling complex ideas about intimacy, queer relationships, and the narratives we build around love into something that feels both deeply personal and universally resonant.What struck me most was how seamlessly he weaves together personal reflection with cultural critique, drawing from film, poetry, and pop culture to make sense of the fleeting, transformative nature of connection. His writing is incisive but never heavy-handed, intimate but never indulgent. I found myself pausing, rereading, underlining—recognizing parts of myself in his words. I tore through it in just a few days.This book captures something essential about modern queer life—the push and pull between desire and detachment, familiarity and reinvention. It’s honest, it’s poignant, and it’s the kind of book that stays with you long after the last page. I can’t recommend it highly enough.This book captures something so true about modern queer life—the excitement of fleeting connections, the ache of longing, the constant negotiation of what love and intimacy even mean. I can’t recommend it highly enough.
Thoughtful, provocative, and pleasantly personal, Betancourt’s latest in-depth musings reach across pop culture, philosophy, and scholarship to unravel the possibility-based narratives that emerge from chance or chosen encounters with the unfamiliar other.
