Review by Win Wiacek

Over millennia, a large proportion of mankind decided (or just didn’t care) that it was okay for men to love men, women to love women – and in fact every flavour of person to enjoy the brief or sustained company of any other person or persons, as long as it was mutually consenting and age appropriate.

It’s long been an aphorism – if not outright cliché – that “gay” comics stories are the only place in the graphic narrative game where true romance still thrives. Californian Patrick Atangan is a multitalented Filipino-American creator with many strings to his creative bow. Here, to his printed canon for youngsters, he’s added a wry, charming yet deeply moving collection of short intimate musings and recollections on his “romantic gaffes and failures” with the results enough to make the toughest cookie crumble.

Pitched as if Sex and the City had been created by a gay Charlie Brown, these utterly compelling, seditiously humorous slices of a life lived a little too much inside one’s own head kick off with chronological logic as still-closeted Patrick attends his Prom. The problem is that he is escort to obsessive beard Mildred, whose attention to detail and fierce determination to make the event “absolutely perfect” cannot help but fail. At least the string of disasters the fervent Promzilla endures take the spotlight off his own failings, petty jealousies and perceived inadequacies.

‘Secrets’ skips ahead to the emotional and intellectual liberation of college, as our introvert resolves to reinvent himself. It begins an ongoing process of coming out gradually encompassing friends, family and everybody new in his life.

Another character-building debacle involves ‘Gary’, judged far too lovely for a dweeb like our author, so therefore something of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Eponymous vignette ‘The Fires Above Hyperion’ turns the screws even tighter as Patrick coolly contemplates LA’s now-annual forest fires threatening his stable existence whilst he foolishly attempts to rekindle or reinvent a just ended three-year relationship.

Our narrator then attends a big party and suffers inebriation, gastric trauma and the humiliation of mistakenly putting the moves on a chain-smoking straight guy before ‘APE Shit’ reveals the sorry fallout of a trip to San Francisco to attend his first Alternative Press Expo in a decade. It’s a concatenation of domestic disasters comprising old friends with new children, commuter congestion and a total change in the way comics are sold. At least he connects with gorgeous, seemingly ideal Bryan – before fate and Patrick’s own conscience spoil what might have been a perfect moment.

More self-inflicted trauma comes from ignoring the custom of a lifetime and attending a wedding as a ‘Plus One’. Naturally, he didn’t mind his “date” Julia going off with a guy, but when Patrick zeroes in on wonderful, apparently available Peter, events and the author’s own treacherous tuxedo (not a euphemism) conspire to make the soirée memorable for all the wrong reasons.

A heartbreakingly harsh assessment of Patrick’s failings leads to the awful conclusion that he is ‘Nobody’s Type’ before the excoriating romantic recriminations conclude with one more ill-fated, self-sabotaged first date that founders from too much introspection and accumulation of ‘Baggage’.

Atangan is insightful, penetrating, winningly self-deprecating, guardedly hopeful and never afraid to be mistaken for morose when occasion demands. This collection of misjudged trysts and missed chances offers a charming glimpse at the eternally hopeful way most folks of every persuasion live their love lives. The result is magical and unforgettable, making this a must-have item for anyone graced with heart and soul.