Candy Everybody Wants
3.5/5
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About this ebook
Armistead Maupin meets Beautiful People in Josh Kilmer-Purcell’s hilarious and yet poignant coming-of-age tale
Jayson Blocher is fifteen years old with a wayward mother, a disabled brother and a neighbour who thinks he’s the spawn of the devil.
For so long he has worshipped at the feet of popular culture, but now he wants to be part of it, and let’s face it, what’s to keep him in Wisconsin? Even his own mother wants him to go.
So Jayson heads off to find fame and fortune, accompanied by an ever-changing cast of quirky extended family members.
From a New York escort agency to the glamour of a Hollywood situation comedy, Jayson searches for his destiny. Only to find that being America’s sweetheart can leave a very sour aftertaste.
Josh Kilmer-Purcell
BRENT RIDGE and JOSH KILMER-PURCELL are the founders of Beekman 1802, the lifestyle company centered around their farm in Sharon Springs, NY, and focused on seasonal living. They were the stars for two seasons of The Fabulous Beekman Boys (Planet Green, Cooking Channel) and have been featured on The Martha Stewart Show,Rachael Ray, Dr. Oz, NPR, ABC World News with David Muir, theNew York Times, theWall Street Journal, Vogue, and Vanity Fair, among others. Together they are the authors of three previous cookooks (The Beekman 1802 Heirloom Cookbook, The Beekman 1802 Heirloom Dessert Cookbook, and The Beekman 1802 Heirloom Vegetable Cookbook) and publish Beekman 1802 Almanac, a quarterly magazine. Their Beekman 1802 products are featured in stores such as Target; Bed, Bath and Beyond; and Bloomingdales.
Read more from Josh Kilmer Purcell
I Am Not Myself These Days: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Candy Everybody Wants Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Beekman 1802: A Seat At The Table: Recipes to Nourish Your Family, Friends, and Community Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
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Reviews for Candy Everybody Wants
39 ratings7 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Picked it up at a conference, read it in a day. It's kind of like reading a lot of People magazines at the hairdresser. Fun, fabulous, fame-addicted, sordid and sentimental.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Jayson, with a Y for effect, declares himself gay at the age of five, while still at school he is filming his own soap, a cross between Dynasty and Dallas, with the next door twins, Tara and Trey, playing the roles Jayson himself is not. Jayson's family can at best be described as disfunctioanl, his neurotic mother has been married so many times he has no idea who his father is. His younger brother suffers with Prader-Willi syndrome, at it is Jayson who maintains some control over his eating.But Jayson has a dream, to be a famous actor, and despite his disadvantaged background it seems he just might make it, but there are many pitfalls on the way. Jayson also has something to learn about his priorities and human relationships.This is without question and immensely funny story peopled with a diverse range of characters from a retired actor running an escort agency with chorus boys as the escorts, to an outspoken and frequently drunk ageing actress; and includes a cute and famous boy actor, a fanatically religious mother and a too butch trainee policewoman. Jayson is an appealing young boy who can be a little too full of himself initially (all part of the desire to be in front of an audience), but he learns a few lessons over the duration of the story and comes out a better person for it. Despite occasional weaknesses in the prose, Candy Everybody Wants is delightful and very entertaining read.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Book Report: The author himself describes this as his childhood and coming-of-age as he'd've liked them to be. I can see no point in adding to that description.My Review: Oh dear.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Candy Everybody Wants is a light-hearted and easy-t0-read book, set nostalgically in the early 1980s. Jayson (with a distinctive "y") Blocher wants to be on T.V. He wants to be really famous. The only problem, he lives in Wisconsin where he films his own soap operas using an old video recorder with a separate tape recorder for sound. Oh, and he's gay, with a somewhat dysfunctional set of family and friends.When events in his home town don't end well, Jayson finds himself in New York, where he sets himself firmly on the path to fame. However, things aren't quite that easy, and Jayson has to learn to come to terms with himself and his family.The book is an easy read and makes a perfect flight or beach read. It is quite funny at times, but has the overall lightweight feel of candyfloss. There's something to watch with this author - he clearly has a flair and wit (well, he was a very famous drag queen).
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Josh Kilmer-Purcell tries to build a tongue-in-cheek novel around the narrative conventions of early-80s television, but his slight story is too frequently drowned in excess of sit-com schmaltz. The high-spirited conflation of high and low culture feels forced, and reeks of bathos -- when characters use a cheesy television catch-phrase to confront real-life pain and heartbreak, the effect is more stomach-turning than amusing. Still, Purcell has managed to create a winning and strangely believable cast of characters, despite their "quirkiness". And it's hard not to root for his endlessly plucky hero, fighting his way toward greatness on pure, indomitable will.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Candy Everybody Wants is a fun, fast read, like a comic book without the pictures. So what if there isn't much character development and the plot is a little (okay, a lot!) implausible? Josh Kilmer-Purcell still delivers a rollicking story that provides easy entertainment.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Fun, a light romp, it was a perfect beach read on my vacation