O Beautiful — Jesse Green

Martin takes the day off from work to make an elaborate meal for his friend Stella and the blind date who could be Martin's match. Matt certainly is charming and good-looking, but -- as both Martin and Stella discover before the entree is served -- he is also straight. Yet by evening's end, Martin is irrevocably drawn to this magnetic, spirited, and unattainable man.
So Martin obliges when Matt finds hiimself needing a place to stay, and the two embark upon an oddly comfortable relationship that involves every shade of intimacy but sex. The closer Martin gets to Matt, however, the more he realizes that his enigmatic roommate may not be all that he seems.
"Wonderful, memorable . . . A novel about my favorite kind of love -- obsessive, unrequited and impossible . . . Jesse Green writes with precision and intelligence." -- Stephen McCauley