Description
Jared Cahill and Wynn Kang seem like the perfect couple. Even the woman at the airline counter, where they check-in for their flight to Cambodia to pick up their future daughter who is being carried by a surrogate, seems to recognize it: “I’m so happy that marriage is legal for you guys,” she says. But while Jared is already planning for their second child—half white like him, and half Korean like Wynn—Wynn isn’t ready to give up his dreams of becoming a hip hop dancer to become “the hostage of a crying, pooping terrorist.” So, he does what anyone in his position would do. He leaves Jared at the airport. Told in alternating points of view, Wynn and Jared take readers on their messy tragi-comic journey, confronting the unresolved issues of race, identity, and privilege that haunt them, pulling at the loose threads of their fantasies, and facing the question of whether they will ever, finally, face themselves and grow up.
“Tom Pyun’s Something Close to Nothing is a candid, funny, and shocking dissection of the relationship between one of those gay couples that look perfect in their social media posts. You know them and somehow you don’t know them because they don’t truly know themselves. I just couldn’t put this book down once I started it. Something Close to Nothing delivers such an intimate portrait of a couple in crisis that I was pleading with the characters as I turned the pages. This is a mesmerizing debut novel. Pyun is writing about contemporary queer life with an honesty and depth that is astounding and welcomed. He cuts through the surface-level expectations and reaches the insecure core of his characters. With biting prose and tender precision, Pyun exposes the unspoken assumptions and the swallowed resentments that initially draw Wynn and Jared to one another. He examines how race, upbringing, and internalized homophobia can intertwine and shape relationships in ways we hardly ever want to acknowledge or discuss. Something Close to Nothing manages to be insightful without being pretentious. Pyun has a talent for hitting us with gut punches that turn into belly laughs.” —Rasheed Newson, author of My Government Means to Kill Me
