Stack: October

This month's Stack was an interesting experience: two magazines, one of which I enjoyed more than the other, but in answering the question "would I buy it again" I realised that I'm more likely to pick up the one I liked less in future.

hello mr.
hello mr.'s strapline is "about men who date men". I love a subtitle that explains exactly what you're getting and hello mr. is perfectly encapsulated by its subtitle. It's a collection of writings – personal essays, interviews, poems, etc. – by gay men, and while sexuality is a huge part of the content, it can also be entirely incidental to the experiences being described, for example, "Scarred" and "Libra with Cancer" are both about dealing with serious illness at a young age. The writing styles and topics are hugely varied, (understandably, as the authors' main point of commonality is their sexuality), and it's beautifully designed and well-edited. Overall, it's a lovely product, although I'm keenly aware that I'm not the right demographic for it.

Would I buy it again? I really enjoyed reading hello mr., but ultimately I'm not the intended audience for this magazine and I felt like a tourist reading it. I'm not going to buy it again, but I hope it does well.

Root + Bone
Root + Bone is a free London-based food magazine, the content of which is a mixture of restaurant reviews, recipes and articles about food, cooking and eating. At its best the writing was enthusiastic and genuine, if unpolished, but too often it veered into a laddishness that irritated me. It might have been a problem with this particular issue, which focused on unconventional ingredients and methods of cooking and at times gave me the distinct impression the writers wanted me to know just how "crazy" they were. That said, the restaurant reviews made me want to try a number of new places and some of the recipes look amazing. I really wanted to like this, but overall I found it frustratingly hit and miss.

Would I buy it again? Because it's free I'd probably pick it up again for the restaurant reviews and the recipes despite not particularly enjoying its editorial style.