Don’t tell me I don’t read! I scan the obits every day to look for apartments. And I regularly devour the less challenging parts of the National Enquirer and some of the lighter profiles on bigmuscle.com. Oh, and also publishers‚ catalogues! They’re much easier than actual books, and if you turn the page you really don’t miss anything.

One interesting new book I found out about in the Kensington catalogue is The Sixth Form by Tom Dolby, the super rich guy (thanks to Dolby sound) who’s SO well off he put an expensive Avedon portrait of Truman Capote way off in a corner of his West Village apartment. (I’ve been there. Swell place.) Not that Dolby hasn’t forked over his dues. Way back in the ‘90s, he was an intern right here at the Voice, and used to chase me and Lynn Yaeger around with moist eyes and his tongue out. I was afraid he’d turn out to be a total Eve Harrington and end up taking over the place and firing me, but instead, he went on to do a service website called citytripping.com and then write a novel, The Trouble Boy, which I must have liked because I’m quoted on the cover calling it a “racy romp of fabulosity, fierceness, scandal, and enlightenment.” Tom’s new book, The Sixth Form? It’s a dark tale about secrets and lies at a Massachusetts prep school. Is it gay? Well, as Dolby explained to me via e-mail, “For years after The Trouble Boy, whenever people heard I was writing a novel set at boarding school, I think they assumed lots of salacious sex and boys romping in gang showers after the lacrosse game. But this is more realistic. (Sadly, I never had any sex while at prep school.) It's still gothic, sexy stuff, boys stealing kisses in graveyards, pot-fueled fantasies—though the main character, a senior in high school, is actually straight. His best friend, though (who—plot spoiler—does turn out to be gay), has a mother who's a big fag hag and has his first sexual experience with a very hot guy 10 years his senior. All in all, I think there should be plenty to keep all my gay fans happy, though the book primarily takes place in the uptight, WASPy world of a New England prep school. Then again, what could be more gay than that?” Sounds like a racy romp of fabulosity, etc. (But no sex at prep school? That’s sick!)

This week's La Dolce Musto: "A New Crisis for Britney's Sister?"

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Michael Musto, Thomas Dolby