Tag: spiralling

Spiralling is a novel about a gay man living in Manchester whose life falls apart after his boyfriend cheats on him, so he has to spend the next year trying to pull himself back together, with the help of his friends. Gabriel has just broken up with his boyfriend and then he’s fired from his job, so he’s ready to start spiralling. His best friends Tasha and Evie are there to help him, but they have relationship ups and downs of their own. As Gabriel tries to deal with his problems and not forget to care about his friends’ problems too, everything gets messy.

This is a fun book that manages to cover a lot of aspects of modern day life for gay men through Gabriel and other people he knows, delving into some serious topics but always keeping things pretty light-hearted. The story is told through a combination of first person narration, messages between people, and occasional other, more creative forms of writing, seemingly to reflect Gabriel’s desire to be a writer (even if he hardly ever writes, a highly relatable trait). There’s also occasional footnotes to explain things, which were meant to be humorous but sometimes read like the book was entirely aimed at straight people with no awareness of modern queer culture or any slang. Generally, the style of telling the story worked well to keep the book light and funny even as things went wrong, in the same way Gabriel tended to make jokes about things even when they were bad.

The Manchester setting was great, with a lot of recognisable details, and generally it is packed full of British culture and things like exactly which pair of Dr Martens Gabriel is wearing. It was refreshing to see this kind of book—someone down on their luck in terms of love and work who has a messy time with their friends—being about a gay man, and I liked how the book had space to explore some of Gabriel’s feelings about what it is like to be a gay man in the modern world. As you’d expect from the genre and vibe of the book, things are wrapped up pretty neatly with some potential big drama averted at least for Gabriel. Overall, this is a funny, messy read that reminded me of the sitcom Big Boys in its approach to both serious topics and showing modern gay life.