Hell’s Kitchen Sink
Also by Brandon Cloud
What if your second chance came with a busted boiler, cartel surveillance, and a drag queen crying behind the bar at 2am?
That’s where the story begins in Hell’s Kitchen Sink—a gritty, sharp-witted, deeply human novel about queer survival, found family, and the kind of loyalty that sometimes slides sideways into crime. When a chosen family of misfits flees Texas for a second shot at life in New York, they don’t land in a dream—they inherit a brownstone with busted plumbing, flickering neon, and cartel surveillance just outside the door.
They’re not chasing fame. They’re not looking for love. They’re just trying not to drown.
And what starts as a scrappy attempt to open a drag bar, a tattoo shop, and a tamale joint turns into a high-stakes hustle of fake IDs, laundered brunch receipts, and unshakable bonds held together by sarcasm, survival instinct, and trauma-soaked love.
“And you don’t get to moralize while living off laundered tamale receipts.”
Why I Wrote It
I wrote Hell’s Kitchen Sink because I was tired of queer fiction being polished to death. Tired of clean arcs and tidy coming outs and stories that treat queerness like it’s something fragile or pure. I wanted to write something messier. Grungier. Truer.
And I wanted to write about my people.
Most of the characters in this book started out as real. Real friends. Real chosen family. Real heartbreaks, bad tattoos, coke-fueled spiral texts, tearful brunches, and desperate, late-night how-are-we-gonna-pay-rent scheming. Of course I exaggerated them. Of course I fictionalized the plot. But the emotional glue? That’s mine.
I made them louder, funnier, more criminal. But their hearts? They’re exactly the same.
Because I don’t write “gay stories.” I write stories where queer people exist without explanation—where our chaos is the default and our identities don’t need to be justified, monologued, or turned into teaching moments. In this world, queerness is wallpaper, not furniture. It’s how these characters breathe, not what they debate.
“I was just… I was just hustling, Mama. Like you.”
The Threadline of the Book
At its heart, Hell’s Kitchen Sink is about the survival mechanisms we call love.
Brandon, our reluctant glue-stick of a protagonist, inherits a brownstone from his dead friend and uses it to escape a dead-end life in Texas. But he’s not running toward a dream—he’s running with people. His boyfriend Matthew, slipping into anxiety and pills. Melissa, his ride-or-die best friend with a cynical edge and an edible empire. Shelby, the chaos engine. Tasi, the deadpan moral compass. Mariah, the addict. And Alyssandra—the drag queen matriarch who’s still mourning the only person who ever made her feel safe.
They build something together. It’s illegal, it’s unstable, it’s under surveillance—but it’s theirs. And when it starts to unravel, they don’t leave. They double down.
“Matt, we’re not running a goddamn brunch spot for influencers,”
Because the truth is, every character in this book is desperate to hold on to something: their sanity, their family, their old self, their new self, their grief, their sense of control. And in trying to survive, they start to blur the line between love and obligation. Between protection and complicity. Between loyalty and crime.
The Characters (and the People Behind Them)
- Brandon is the cracked heart of the crew. A caregiver who’s spent so long being everyone’s savior he forgets how to save himself. That part’s me.
- Matthew is based on my partner—smart, grounded, anxious, loyal, a man who’s both anchor and chaos when pushed too far.
- Melissa is the real-life friend who once pulled me out of homelessness and still calls me out when I’m spiraling. I made her more stoned, but the sharpness? All her.
- Shelby is the best friend who could talk a cop out of a ticket and then steal their pen. ADHD tornado. Fire and loyalty. She drives me crazy and keeps me alive.
- Tasi is our sex goblin Eeyore—deadpan, secretly soft, emotionally evasive. Based on the one person who sees through everything I try to hide.
- Mariah? Pure chaos. Addicted, rageful, brilliant, loyal. She’s based on the girl who’s punched for me and cried on my floor.
- Alyssandra is part drag queen, part ghost—an echo of grief and glamor. She’s the piece of me still mourning every version of who I could’ve been.
“For us? There is no ‘us,’ Shelby. Not anymore.”
These characters hurt each other. They lie. They self-destruct. But they also show up, again and again, because that’s what found family actually looks like: codependent, traumatized, funny, furious, and still there.
What It Feels Like
Hell’s Kitchen Sink is what happens when Shameless moves in above a drag bar and invites Pose over for tamales. It’s gritty, queer, emotionally devastating, and laugh-out-loud funny at the exact wrong moment.
It’s Sunday dinner with people who know all your trauma and still make you do the dishes. It’s crying in a freezer while your ex tattoos your new boyfriend’s name on someone else. It’s a drag queen threatening a health inspector with a rhinestone-covered crowbar.
“MOBSTER MOM MIX IS MY NEW OBSESSION!”
It’s not redemption. It’s not romance. It’s real.
Why You Should Read It
Because this isn’t just a story—it’s a house built from real people, real pain, and real love. And even though it might be falling apart, it’s still standing.
If you’ve ever chosen a family that wasn’t blood…
If you’ve ever had to hustle to survive…
If you’ve ever made a terrible decision for the right reason…
Then you’ll see yourself somewhere in these pages.
Hell’s Kitchen Sink is not a pretty book. It’s a true one. And that, in the end, is what makes it beautiful.
Read it now on Kindle Unlimited or grab your copy at Amazon.com.
Explore more books by Brandon Cloud.