Review: Holiday Outing, by Astrid Amara

Welcome to the first night of Ham/mukah!

Holiday Outing is the story of Jonah, a successful gay fiction writer in Seattle who returns to his parents’ home in Connecticut for Hanukkah. Jonah is closeted to his family, which requires that he keep his writing success a secret, too. Already nervous about the trip home, Jonah is shocked to be picked up at the airport by his mother’s best friend’s son, the gorgeous Ethan, a wealthy gastroenterologist whose homophobic treatment of Jonah in high school remains one of his worst memories.

To Jonah’s utter amazement, Ethan begins to come on to him almost immediately. Jonah is pleased to realize that while Ethan may be prince charming in every other aspect of his perfect life, he actually stinks at the suave come on. Despite this, Ethan is attracted to him. Jonah has mixed feelings when he discovers that Ethan, whose mother had passed away and whose father is in a local nursing home, will be sharing his bedroom for the holiday.

While I was a bit puzzled at Ethan’s full blown attraction for Jonah (when did that develop? Had he been harboring a crush since high school?), and while I think the working through of the high school issue was slightly shortchanged, I did enjoy Jonah’s fall. Jonah’s smug cataloguing of the little flaws in Ethan the Perfect — needed for Jonah to feel he could be Ethan’s partner — were especially fun.

As Jonah greets his family — including aunts, uncles, cousins — the reader is introduced to an unhappy dynamic: he is the family disappointment. Amara portrays very realistically the ways in which people who have changed and flourished while away from home can revert to their old identities, unconsciously fulfilling old expectations.

Early on two things happen: the power goes out, and a pushke, a kind of box for charity coins, which had been a cherished family heirloom, and an item of some contention between members of Jonah’s family, is stolen. I really liked the way the theft of the pushke when the lights went out was used by the author to reveal complex family dynamics, and also to provide a context for Ethan and Jonah to team up to solve the crime. There’s also a lot of humor in Holiday Outing — I laughed out loud at several points. As you might guess, the prospect of an extended family stuck under one roof during a snowstorm for several days provided a lot of funny material.

I felt Jonah was portrayed very compellingly and convincingly. My heart ached for him as he stole outside to smoke his cigarettes (another black mark against him), felt resentment and anger at his parents for shortchanging him, felt guilty for not trusting his family with his sexuality, and yet still let his good heart shine though, by thinking the best of others, and by helping out whenever needed at so many points in the narrative.

As an m/m romance from Loose I.D. Holiday Outing is very explicit. My own feeling is that the intimate scenes were wonderfully done, very tender and erotic. And don’t think for a minute Amara doesn’t utilize to the full extent possible the comedic goldmine presented by having one of her heroes work as a gastroenterologist.

Here’s an example of the humor and the touching nature of the book. Ethan and Jonah are searching Jonah’s parents’ room for the pushke.

Once inside, Ethan found it amusing that I refused to look through my parents’ drawers.

“What are you afraid of?” he asked, smirking.

“Everything,” I said with a shudder. “What if I found something I can’t reconcile with the people who gave birth to me? A cock ring, or a picture of some other woman? I would be scarred for life.”

“Fine, I’ll look in the dresser. You take the bedside table drawers.”

“That’s worse. That’s where ointments could be stored.”

“Be strong, Jonah.”

“And for the record, I’m a little weirded out by the idea of my boyfriend looking through my mother’s underwear drawer.” I pulled open my father’s bedside table drawer with dread. Inside I found a Torah, several cruise pamphlets, a flashlight, and dental floss. Relief flooded me.

I didn’t hear Ethan opening drawers. I turned around and caught my breath, as he was standing right behind me.

“What?” I asked suspiciously.

He looked very pleased with himself. “You called me your boyfriend.”

“Yeah? Well, I didn’t mean it.”

Ethan frowned. “You didn’t?”

I took a deep breath. “Maybe I did. Do you want me to mean it?”

Ethan reached out and touched my shoulder. “Yeah.”

Something fluttered around in my throat. “Great then. That’s settled.” I could barely speak. I moved to my mother’s side of the bedroom, excited and nervous and feeling extremely embarrassed all of a sudden. I could feel Ethan’s eyes gazing over me. I swallowed down my flitting emotions and opened my mother’s bedside table drawer.

This was a terrific little read. Amara releases another Hanukkah title on December 15. I will absolutely be buying it.