Buddy's is a gay bar in Vancouver's West End that opened in the spring of 1982 and closed in the summer of 1988. It was the starting point for this unusually frank and engaging portrait of gay life and gay culture in the late eighties. Shifting effortlessly between autobiography, fiction, and criticism, "Buddy's" is in turn shocking, witty, and moving. In order to write about desire that breaks the rules, Persky has had to invent almost a new kind of book. The result is readable, erotic, and innovative. Although "Buddy's" partakes of a literary tradition that extends from Montaigne to Roland Barthes, it is a work that challenges contemporary writing as much as it defines mainstream mores.