Nearer My God To Thee

Joshua D. Bloom writes 3/4/06 on Amazon.com:

I honestly was really looking forward to reading Luke Ford's book. A few months ago I stumbled upon his website and found an unusual cross between writing about porn and kink and writing about Jews; mostly about Jews and porn and Jews and kink. From the website I realized I wasn't going to always agree with Luke, but as someone who takes these subjects seriously and the interplay between the two, I was very interested in his personal story.

The beginning of XXX-Communicated: A Rebel Without A Shul starts off with Luke tell about his childhood, adolescence, young adulthood and his departure from his family's Seventh Day Adventist (and then own church) devoutness to his conversion to Orthodox Judaism. Luke comes across as completely unlikable. He seems determined to make everyone hate him, but then doesn't understand why everyone does hate him. Perhaps he is looking for pity, but he comes across as the most unsympathetic character I have ever come across. He is attention seeking, misogynistic, conservative valued, hypocritical, deceitful, and prone to inappropriate behavior. It becomes apparent why no one seems to want him after reading the book: not his one-time friends, not women, not the pornography industry, not synagogues.

I did honestly buy the book excited about the notion of a Jewish rebel who challenged the mainstream and tried to be a good Jew while miring in the banality of porn and kink. I have truly never been more disappointed with a book than this. I was left not liking Luke Ford, not feeling sorry or pity for him, but rather actually despising him and thinking that he was a pathetic attention driven individual. Worst off, he comes across as a lousy reporter and an incredibly bad writer. His book is hard to follow. The array of people who hate him or who are his enemies blur after a while and they become indistinguishable.

The writing degenerates as the reader gets further in. There is no redemption moment at the end of the book. Luke comes across as no better a person and no better of a Jew than he did a decade earlier in the book.

I believe that this is probably the worst book I have ever read. My recommendation would be to avoid this book. Do not buy it; do not read it.

L.A. Times' Manilow misses Mathis moment

The writer describes Manilow's appearance when first arriving on the charts in 1974 as "lanky and almost girlish with his doe eyes and blond tresses."

Then a real tease: Manilow praises Liberace and the writer posits: "Manilow questioning the cultural heft of Liberace might invite thoughts of how much in common they share."

The writer then throws in another hint with a reference to outed American Idol star Clay Aiken: ”How far off could Clay Aiken be from Manilow's musical core?”

Then we get into the backstory of little Barry Pincus. And here, the article goes haywire, jumping from his youth to ad jingle career to his first solo album-- skipping his most creative period, and the time when music aficionados first heard of him—his long and historic stint as Bette Midler’s musical director, arranger, producer-- and onstage pianist, the man who led the band when Bette played gay joints like New York City’s now infamous Continental Baths.

No mention of the Baths. No mention of Bette (even though Manilow recently troubled the charts when he produced her 2003 Rosemary Clooney and 2005 Peggy Lee tribute albums).