Mongrel: Essays, Diatribes, + Pranks

Mongrel is an appropriate title for this collection, which covers a melange of topics and does not fit comfortably within one category. It is not humor, cultural analysis, Asian-American memoir or a queer political tome, but contans elements of all of these. In fact the blurring of categories seems deliberate, since most of the essays touch on uncomfortable questions of who fits into what category and how well they fit. The best essays in the book return again and again to this theme, exploring the intersection between ethnicity and orientation, class and gender. Chin's style ranges from family memoir to straightforward reporting, from parody to mediation, and his topics include everything from poetry slams to more than you EVER wanted to know about anal fissures. While the humorous pieces can be very funny, the best pieces in the book are straightforward reporting and analysis. "Saved" is an indepth look at the "ex-gay" movement. In "Smile" Chin writes about the sex industry and sex tourism in Thailan. He provides a compelling mix of detail on how the gay sex clubs operate, and analysis of the complicated blend of economics, politics and personal choices that fuels the sex industry. While this collection is somewhat dated now (the book came out in 1999 and collected pieces written for several years before that), much of what he has to say still rings true, and the rest still provides a good time capsule of 90s-era queer writing and concerns.

I found that this "best of" collection lacked some connecting tissue as evidenced by the weaker pieces embedded among more memorable and noteworthy essays. Yet the book delivered what it promised: the insightful, humorous perspective of a class and race conscious social commentator. A young writer (in both age and publication track record), Chin is a talent to watch. Once he begins to move away from sexuality-centered writing, I think he will discover a wealth of ingenuity and thought in his own work.

Mongrel is a wondrous, devious little book, full of itself, yes, but also full of innovative insights about being a diasporic Chinese in white America and a contrarian gay in a politically correct Bay Area in love with it self too much. I especially like his wry take on Singapore as a homey mall (his first home), and on his trip through the whitey south on a shoestring poet's budget. Justin Chin is a legend in Hawai'i, where I write and teach, and now I see why; and he should send Morgan Blair an inscribed copy of his book so she (one of his teachers)can see that he remembers her amid the postmodern muck of it all.