The House of Impossible Beauties

By: Joseph Cassara

Narrated by: Christian Barillas

A gritty and gorgeous debut that follows a cast of gay and transgender club kids navigating the Harlem ball scene of the 1980s and '90s, inspired by the real House of Xtravaganza made famous by the seminal documentary Paris Is Burning

It's 1980 in New York City, and nowhere is the city's glamour and energy better reflected than in the burgeoning Harlem ball scene, where 17-year-old Angel first comes into her own. Burned by her traumatic past, Angel is new to the drag world, new to ball culture, and has a yearning inside of her to help create family for those without. When she falls in love with Hector, a beautiful young man who dreams of becoming a professional dancer, the two decide to form the House of Xtravaganza, the first-ever all-Latino house in the Harlem ball circuit. But when Hector dies of AIDS-related complications, Angel must bear the responsibility of tending to their house alone.

As mother of the house, Angel recruits Venus, a whip-fast trans girl who dreams of finding a rich man to take care of her; Juanito, a quiet boy who loves fabrics and design; and Daniel, a butch queen who accidentally saves Venus's life. The Xtravaganzas must learn to navigate sex work, addiction, and persistent abuse, leaning on each other as bulwarks against a world that resists them. All are ambitious, resilient, and determined to control their own fates, even as they hurtle toward devastating consequences.

Told in a voice that brims with wit, rage, tenderness, and fierce yearning, The House of Impossible Beauties is a tragic story of love, family, and the dynamism of the human spirit.

©2018 Joseph Cassara (P)2009 HarperCollins Publishers

An OK book, that could be better

I was really excited about this book. As a gay guy, and as a fan of the ball scene you don't get to find something many books with characters you can relate to. This audiobook however did not live up to my expectations.
The story has many good moments that are entertaining and worth listening to. Nevertheless, I think the book could have a lot more about the ball scene, about vogging, about transitioning into trans and about other queens from the xtravaganza house as well as others.
The main thing that I would change about the story is that it was awfully, and unnecessarily harsh. I know the real characters must have had struggles, but the fictional version could have balanced the difficult parts with the happy ones. Specially the ending could have been a bit more optimistic.
About the interpretation of the audiobook I would complain that sometimes it felt a bit flat. Also, there were many unnecessary repetition of a monotonous "he said" "she said". This may not be a problem in the written version of the book, but are extremely repetitive in the audiobook.

Beautiful, tragic and engaging

The story is beautifully written - Cassara has some sentences that are truly heart breaking and exquisitely crafted.
I started this book without knowing much about the NYC ballroom culture of the 80s, and as a consequence of reading, spent a lot of time learning about houses etc. It is worth point out that the book gets some aspects of history incorrectly- namely the availability of tests to determine HIV status, but it, at least to me, captures the emotional spirit of the time, of the fear, the heartbreak.
The book is heavy, and shows some glimpses of the violence is done to trans women of color. But it balances some of this with the slice of life, with the joys, dreams and laughs of its main characters.

touching human story

took a while for me to get involved and understand this book but once I did it was a familiar story of human relationships. the aids epidemic, though affecting everyone, seemed to be a background character.

Loved it!

This was a very good production and story which held my interest and surprised me with how good it was! I was actually sorry when it was over because it was the most engaging book I've listened to in quite a while and my attention had waxed and waned on so many previous books. The characters and storyline were very realistic and the narration made me really care about what happened.

Wonderful character studies

The performance was spot on, and a lot of the book was very entertaining and an interesting look into a lifestyle I am certainly aware of, but know little about. Very poignant. The book was just overly long. There are long sections of the book of interactions and conversations that go nowhere, do nothing to add to the storyline.

Not quite "Pose"...

As a fan of "Pose" I was really expecting this to be like the tv series (or even like Paris is Burning). There are still historical references to places and characters but it's not quite as opulent as I expected. I appreciate this book for bringing narrative attention to the ball scene but I was reading it as I was watching "Pose" which left me a but disappointed. #LGBTQ #Tagsgiving #Sweepstakes

Good❣❣❣

This book was very page turning. It started out slow but started to get better as you continued reading. Overall I would say there was not really much about the ball scenes in this book. It was more about the struggle of a couple people that were in the ball scene and their struggles to survive in New York City. If you like books about what was going on in that era of time you'll probably like this book!!!

Paris is Burning meets Posr

I LOVED this book. I felt like I was experiencing Paris is Burning sprinkled with Pose characters and scenes in a book.

Starts strong, but...

If you could sum up The House of Impossible Beauties in three words, what would they be?

The book starts strong and keeps up it's momentum for almost 2/3rds of it's length, but slowly descends into a bit of a slog of terrible things befalling our characters until it ends up being a bit like misery porn. The era and people it's exploring certainly does not make for happy endings, but it starts to feel like a checklist of the undignified ways LGBTQ people died in the late 80's/early 90's.

That said, there's some beautiful writing along the way, and you'll truly care about the characters, especially if you've seen PARIS IS BURNING. The book is also all brought to vivid life by the MAGNIFICENT Christian Barillas (legitimately one of the Top 3 audiobook performances I've heard). I just wish the ending had been a bit more inspired, even in it's misery.

As real as it gets

The House of Impossible Beauties threw me into a world I knew close to nothing about. The Harlem Ball scene of the 80s and 90s was a culture born of intense, largely unrecognized struggle, and Joseph Cassara’s fictional ode to the time is likewise chock full of character. Pure, undiluted, super-concentrated character. This book is brutal. It is unflinching, and it is as real as it gets.

Like have you ever seen Requiem for a Dream? It’s on the same page of, “Wow, I can’t believe anyone could endure this,” type emotional shock. But where that movie follows a drug addict's bleak downward spiral, Cassara’s characters never fail to demonstrate a life-affirming and indomitable strength that is, simply put, beautiful.

Joseph Cassara clearly vetted narrator Christian Barillas super closely, as this is a book that demands fluidity between languages, genders, and class all at once—I think it would have been an impossible task for nearly anyone else, but Barillas nails it.

**This book is graphic**