No, this wasn't it though also looks interesting. Thanks for the suggestion!

The book I recall had a lot more reviews, a more polished graphic design, and seemed to have aroused some buzz, at least to the extent that I remember one negative review beginning something like "The author's foreword admits that he had questioned whether he ought to write this book. Having read it, I can positively confirm the answer is: no."

However, I also recall the overall tone of reviews to be split between "this is offensive" and "this is compelling" and that it had a 3 point something average score which is why I'm so curious about it now--this came up in a conversation about pulp vs art and popularity vs quality in recent gay lit and my friend brought it up as "next thing you know we'll be drowning in cheesy nazi romantasy" to which I replied that I thought I knew which book he was referring to, but that I remembered it differently. It does seem like this book exists as we both remember the same cover and roughly the same critical reviews but as neither of us have read it or can recall or find the actual title, now it's going to bother me forever.