Reading Rainbow Connection: when work writing is also fun.

After a recent rainstorm here in the Bay Area, many people shared photos of a double rainbow across the San Francisco skyline. And also, in rainbow news, the classic kids' Reading Rainbow show is getting some attention. Of course it was a classic on public television with actor LeVar Burton as the host, but the new host, Mychal Threets, is also engaging.

And of course, the rainbow connection will make you think of the Muppets, particularly Kermit the frog. Frogs have been in the headlines with anti-ICE protests. Armed thugs are being confronted by the witty and hilarious inflatable costumes of frogs and other creatures in Portland, and those protests are spreading the other cities. It's a truly unique way to confront fascism.

But I'm not here to talk about that. I'm here to share the reason why I haven't been writing fiction or even blogging here for several months. It's because I've been writing so much for work with the Bay Area Reporter. Here are several of the stories that I recently self-assigned.

A toast!
This year is the 50th anniversary of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, the classic film about sexual liberties. If you read my blog or stories, you know that I've included fictional versions of my time briefly is part of a shadow cast for Rocky Horror at Kent State University in 1979, in one of my novels as well as a short story. 

So I decided to do several stories, including a feature interview with the Strange Journey film director Linus O'Brien. He is the son of Richard O'Brien, the creator of The Rocky Horror Show, which became the basis for the subsequent film that became a cult classic.

In our interview, Linus talked about the fans, the shadow casts, and how he managed to snag interviews with pretty much every living actor and several of the creative & production crew for the film version of Rocky Horror.

I also did a roundup of upcoming Rocky Horror events, including Nell Campbell, who's coming to San Francisco for a screening of the film with a shadow cast and Q&A.

Tim Curry, in a case of good timing, released his memoir Vagabond and I did a short review of that. It doesn't "tell all," but what he shares about his career in film, theater, and of course Rocky Horror, is fascinating.

Another treat for Rocky Horror fans is the posthumously published book of photos by Mick Rock, who had the great idea to hang around on the set back in 1974 and document the behind the scenes looks of the actors and crew. 

Also in books, I devoured the new oral history Q&A with painter Don Bachardy, who was of course the decades-long partner of author Christopher Isherwood. A lot of fascinating celebrity stories are documented and transcribed by Michael Schreiber.

And two older favorites include a review of the Lady Gaga concert in July at the Chase Center. It was an absolutely fantastic concert. If you missed it, there are several bootleg videos of her complete concerts on YouTube.

Gail Ann Dorsey

Music marvels 
June included two very enjoyable interviews with two music greats. Gail Ann Dorsey, known for her solo music, but also being the bassist for David Bowie for several years, was a gracious and fascinating interview subject. I got to see her as part of the Blackstar concert at Davies Symphony Hall, and afterward got to hang out with her and the brilliant John Cameron Mitchell, whom I interviewed a few years back.

And since he was performing an array of Queen covers at Feinstein's at the Nikko, I simply had to interview Reeve Carney. He's been in multiple Broadway shows, including debuting the lead role in Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. His TV roles include Penny Dreadful. But his concert of Queen covers was pretty amazing. He played multiple instruments at the same time while singing brilliantly. 

Laura Benanti

Also Feinstein's at the Nikko, in May, formal local favorite and now turned international superstar Justin Vivian Bond had a concert and our little advanced interview was cute. The show was hilarious and sweet.

In September, I got to interview the very funny and sweet Laura Benanti for the second time. She had a show at Berkeley Repertory that she's touring in a few cities. It's a very deft examination of her life and the travails of motherhood and show business.

It's the arts!
I also wrote some expansive fall arts preview features on art galleries and museums as well as live music events throughout the season in the Bay Area. 

Luigi the Musical

Speaking of art, while he’s only been in San Francisco for almost five years, painter Luis Felipe Chávez has already exhibited at several local galleries with his impressive array of work, ranging from personal portraits to architectural symbolism. His recent exhibit, “INTERmedio,” opened at Jonathan Carver Moore Studios in August. We had a nice chat.

One of my most controversial articles was a review and short advance on Luigi the Musical. The satirical extended one-act includes songs lightly parodizing the jailing of alleged CEO killer Luigi Mangione. I even ended up being a guest on a CBC podcast to discuss it. 

Bob Mizer Foundation

And while Luigi got the clicks, my extensively researched feature on the Bob Mizer Foundation is a favorite. Here in San Francisco in the Tenderloin, at the former home of The Magazine, the archives hold thousands upon thousands of prints, negatives, films and even props from Mizer's physique fims and photo shoots. I was invited on a tour to see how the volunteer staff is preserving Mizer's archives. It's a pretty amazing project. I hope you'll read that in particular cause I spent a lot of time on it.

And last but not least, on Oct. 16, I will moderate a panel at Manny's with Hugh Nini and Neal Treadwell, the co-authors of Loving II: More Photographic History of Men in Love, 1850s-1950s.” It's a beautiful book with hundreds of photos of men being affectionate. If you're looking for a perfect gift for a friend or loved one, this is it.

Okay, that's my roundup. I hope you buy my books and read these articles and have a good autumn. It will probably be several months before I do another blog.

Meta & LibGen pirated millions of books for AI, including mine.

If you are an author, a publisher or even just a book fan, you may have heard about the controversy of digital piracy from no less than Meta a.k.a. Threads a.k.a. Facebook. Mark Zuckerberg seems to be happy to let robots all dig into pirated e-book copies of millions of books.

The whole process started with a scholarly aspect where professors and universities could share their papers. But The Atlantic recently exposed the fact that even fiction and nonfiction, memoir biography, books have all been called into the artificial intelligence brains that show them how to write in the style of other writers. I'm on that list.

This is just yet another evil tactic that Zuckerberg and the Meta tech bros have done and apparently gotten away with for now.

Many authors are talking about lawsuits and some suggest joining the Authors Guild. I was a member for several years and it was very helpful in several aspects of publishing. Sign up to protest here.

Unfortunately, with the class action lawsuits, one going back to 2023, there are so many authors involved that a payout would be minimal. But that's not exactly the point.

Update from Wired:

"Meta just lost a major fight in its ongoing legal battle with a group of authors suing the company for copyright infringement over how it trained its artificial intelligence models. Against the company’s wishes, a court unredacted information alleging that Meta used Library Genesis (LibGen), a notorious so-called shadow library of pirated books that originated in Russia, to help train its generative AI language models.

The case, Kadrey et al. v. Meta Platforms, was one of the earliest copyright lawsuits filed against a tech company over its AI training practices. Its outcome, along with those of dozens of similar cases working their way through courts in the United States, will determine whether technology companies can legally use creative works to train AI moving forward and could either entrench AI’s most powerful players or derail them."

You could also join the Copyright Alliance. I get their newsletters. They'll be probably doing some action or try to support authors in  some way.

Author Lawrence Nault shares an expansive write-up on the situation, and what you can do.

This is part of my own ongoing hunt for pirated versions of my books. Readers have downloaded a PDF or a zip file and casually go through the book without reviewing it or giving anything back to the authors they stole from.

Check out my post from 2020 about the strange YouTube account that had hundreds of audiobooks, including  one of mine, completely uploaded as videos. I still don't understand why this person or bot did it because there was no monetary value in doing it, but I single-handedly got it all shut down.

I'm certainly not gonna be able to take on the AI bots from Zuckerberg's Meta, I'm pretty disgusted to even post on Threads or Facebook these days. 

I will try to keep up on it, and if you're an author, join the fight.

Remembering Felice Picano; author, publisher, mentor and mensch

Prolific author, editor and publisher Felice Picano died March 12, at his home in Los Angeles. He was 81. The accolades and remembrances from people in the publishing industry we have poured in and are all across social media.

It's amazing how many lives Felice touched with his generosity by promoting and helping out other fledgling authors, including myself. My first ever blurb was from Felice for my 1999 debut novel PINS, which he called "a presently written novel of athletics and small town America."

He even helped me get my first agent who, despite failing to land me a publishing deal, spurred me on to continue and publish PINS myself.

Dozens of other authors, editors and poets have shared remembrances of his generosity and friendship. He was always interested, adventurous, and willing to help out others. He could also tell a story in person like few others (Warren Beatty at a gay circuit party?).

The late Ron Williams with Felice 

Several of his books became major best sellers, including Like People in History, The Lure and many other books, as well as short stories, plays, and screenplays (He shared a few funny tales of script-doctoring gladiator movies).

When is best-selling books went out of print, he industriously found alternatives to republish them and gain back the rights of his books. Two of his books will soon be published posthumously as well.

As a founding member of the Violet Quill, Picano, Edmund White, Andrew Holleran, Robert Ferro and several other gay male authors formed writing circle in the 1970s and helped each other establish gay fiction as a valid genre of literature, mostly from a New York setting and perspective.

I first met Felice in New York City around 1989. We eventually shared an odd reading night at the now-closed Crowbar in the East Village. Felice read a short story and I read an overly long roman a clef story about working on a pumpkin farm. 

2012 Philadelphia author gathering   

Almost 30 years later, that story was woven into my novel Now I'm Here. By the time I finished my reading, however, Felice was the only person still awake. A lesson learned, and one of many that he taught; be brief and get to the point.

In the past decade or so, he would visit San Francisco from his new home in Los Angeles. I had the honor of sharing readings with him, introducing him at literary events, and generally just hanging out.

One particularly joyful gathering was in Philadelphia in advance of the 2012 Lambda Literary Awards in New York City. I was in town to attend the awards (my fourth novel, Every Time I Think of You would win a Lammy), and do research for my mostly Philly-set sequel, Message of Love.

After Felice is reading at Giovanni's Room, friends gathered for dinner in Philly's Little Italy, and it was perfect late afternoon of dining, sipping wine, talking shop and spending time with much more accomplished writers, including Tom Mendicino, the late Mark Merlis, and poet Jim Cory, who died last year.

Felice and me at The Broad Museum         

When I booked a reading at Book Soup in West Hollywood for Now I'm Here in 2018, I was thrilled to have musician Dudley Saunders collaborate with me on that event. Not only did Felice show up, he also brought a few of his writing students from a class he was teaching at the nearby public library.

In 2019, when I visited my brother in Los Angeles for Christmas, we toured the Broad Museum and Chinatown with Felice, who also taught me that one could get around LA on the train system, which was a fun adventure.

Felice with author Wayne Hoffman 2012 

Even up to his last years, although ailing, he was still cooking dinners for his friends and visitors in Los Angeles. I'm assuming that he has an executor who will keep his books alive and in print for as long as possible, at least as ebooks. I don't know what kind of memorials are going to be planned, but with so many friends and fans in multiple cities, it'll have to be more than one event.

In the meantime, below is my 2020 online chat with Felice about our two Hollywood-theme novels Finding Tulsa and Justify My Sins, hosted by the Bureau of General Services Queer Division in New York City. Felice also blurbed that novel, my seventh:

"Finding Tulsa" is sexy, romantic, witty, engaging both cleverly current yet sweetly retrospective. It's Jim Provenzano's most complex and accomplished novel. He gets so much right and so evocatively about show business, from those school plays we all remember to Hollywood made-for-television movies, with delicious stops at boyhood Super8 movies and out-of-town gay porn shoots."

You can find other talks with Felice on YouTube as well. And check out his 2019 chat with Wayne Goodman on the Queer Words blog.

But of course, the best thing you can do is read his books. If you haven't already, there are some classics with intense human interaction, and no two books are alike because he was quite a masterful genre-hopper from memoir fiction to essays.

Farewell, Felice, you will be missed.

(Official website: www.felicepicano.net)

Author-narrator collaboration chat on House of Mystery

 

 

Chat show podcast fun:

 

Listen to 'Now I'm Here' audiobook narrator Tim Curran and me discussing author-narrator collaboration, on House of Mystery Radio on NBC with cohosts Al Warren and Joe Goldberg. 

 

That's it. That's the blog post.

 

 

 

'Now I'm Here' is now an audiobook! My sixth novel is narrated by Tim Curran.

 
Good news, everyone! (I love saying that. Dr. Farnsworth is so silly.) 

Anyway, to get to the point, my sixth novel is now an audiobook, and you can listen to it on Audible. Veteran journalist Tim Curran is the narrator and I had a terrific time going through the book and making slight changes and sharing thoughts on understanding the characters to bring their voices to life. It's really been a great experience and Tim is an audiobook narrator whom I highly recommend. 

 On to the story, which you may know about by now, but I think I'll just share some of the press release below.

 about Now I'm Here

 A passionate story of the love between a Queen-inspired piano prodigy and a pumpkin farmer, author Jim Provenzano’s sixth novel, Now I’m Here has been adapted as an audiobook narrated by Tim Curran, with a November 15 release on Audible.

Now I’m Here is set in the small fictional town of Serene, Ohio, in the 1970s and ’80s. Two boys from different families – Joshua, with his stable middle-class home in town, and David, raised by his alcoholic and abusive father on their isolated farm – discover, then lose, then find each other again. Thirty years later, as the town’s history is slowly erased by fading memories and encroaching suburbia, their childhood friend, Eric Gottlund, tells the tale of their quiet heroism with poignancy and a sharp eye for detail.

Narrator Tim Curran

Combining literature and music, the author blends historic and contemporary topics. In Now I’m Here, two Southern Ohio teenage boys, Joshua Evans (a piano prodigy) and David Koenig (a pumpkin farmer’s son) attend a Queen concert in 1978 on their first date. Their passionate affair grows into a life together full of farming and concerts in their barn.

Joshua’s brief fame as a musician includes an invitation to perform in a Los Angeles talent show. He also gains a bit of notoriety by performing unusual solo versions of pop songs at West Hollywood New Wave nightclubs of the early 1980s.

Fighting religious intolerance, “rehabilitation therapy,” the lure of fame, and the heartbreak of AIDS, the two boys grow into men before our eyes. Through their love of each other and of rock’n’roll, the English rock band Queen in particular, Joshua and David breathe life back into their home town, if only for a while.

Published review excerpts for Now I’m Here:

San Francisco Examiner
The British rock group Queen ­–a touchstone of Provenzano’s adolescence– serves as muse, role model and escape hatch for the rural Ohio teenagers at the center of Now I’m Here, a wrenching love story that delves deep into the experience of growing up gay in heartland America during the late 1970s.

The book and each of its chapters share titles, and themes, with Queen songs. The lyrical prose and fine-grained detail of his novel are a far cry from the jubilant bombast in the film’s trailer. Now I’m Here offers flipside of a biopic, focusing not on celebrities’ lives, but on the faraway lives of people they touched.

 

 San Francisco Review of Books
“California author Jim Provenzano joins the great novelists who have written important and lasting novels about men in love, and while he has won prizes for his work it is now, with his publication of Now I’m Here that he joins the ranks of the major authors who have had a lasting imprint on our society and the LGBTIQ community.

 “Words of admiration and appreciation fail the task of honoring this fine novel. Provenzano knows this period, the highs and lows of two men in love living in a world that simply could not or refused to understand their love. The only entry point into the glow of this novel is by reading it at least once – and probably more. It is a masterwork of the highest order.”

Edge Media Network
“Joshua and David, the brave couple brought to life in Jim Provenzano’s captivating, unforgettable novel, Now I’m Here, manage to experience a quintessential epic romance albeit in just a few short years. Were it not for the admiring (and admittedly jealous) eye of their friend, Eric Gottlund, who meticulously narrates this heartbreaking, breathtaking story, the saga of Joshua and David could have easily gone unnoticed.

“This storytelling method effectively and passionately conveys the lengthy, turbulent evolution of their compelling, inspiring and uplifting relationship. The love story of Joshua and David reminds the reader how to appreciate the extraordinary in the ordinary. Professionally speaking, neither of these men achieves fame or accomplishes anything especially newsworthy, but what they share emotionally is nothing short of remarkable. Some books you read for laughter, intrigue, debate or information. Now I’m Here makes you feel.”

Out in Print
“I’ve always marveled at the contradiction of hundreds of thousands of mostly straight sports fans stomping their feet and clapping to ‘We Will Rock You’ as done by Queen, probably the gayest rock band in history with the gayest front man ever. But whatever chord Queen struck, it resonates to this day with both fans and authors. In his newest novel, Now I’m Here, Jim Provenzano uses his knowledge as a fan and his skill as an author to tell the story of two small-town Ohio boys.

“Joshua Lee Evans had a musical gift from the beginning, and was fortunate enough to have parents who encouraged him to use those talents. David Koenig lived on a pumpkin farm and had a hateful, alcoholic father whose wife left him because of his temper and bad habits. It was love at first fight. But the maturation of those feelings was a long road, punctuated by music lessons and farm work. When it finally came together, however, the boys knew what magic it was. A stupid school streaking stunt (popular during the late ’70s and ’80s, when this takes place) puts David in a ‘rehabilitation’ camp for wayward youth courtesy of his father as Joshua leaves town for the big time after graduation, a cover version of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ in his back pocket. They will come together again, rest assured, but even reunions are fraught with frailty in this sweeping, epic romance.

“This story will confound your expectations. If you’re looking for a Happy Ever After, however, forget it. And that’s fine with me. Life does not always have happy endings, and sometimes we have to work to find meaning when our characters are given a less-than-optimal finish.

“All this would mean nothing in the hands of a lesser writer, but Provenzano has honed his craft and takes you on this dizzying ride with the able assurance of a pro. His rendering of the mid-‘70s is deadly accurate, and will bring a smile of remembrance to your face if you were coming of age then. He never missteps or falls short of the mark emotionally, either. The characters are all organic, built and embroidered on with well-chosen detail.

“So, even if you’re not exactly a Queen fan (and why not, I wonder?), you’ll enjoy this supremely well-plotted and populated romance. Highly recommended.”

25th anniversary of PINS: San Francisco Public Library event Oct. 15

 

25th anniversary of PINS

Author Jim Provenzano in conversation with Mark Abramson

at Eureka Valley San Francisco Public Library, Oct. 15, 6pm.

 

(posting my press release)

 

In celebration of the 25th anniversary of the debut novel by local author Jim Provenzano, he will be joined by popular local author Mark Abramson in a one-hour conversation about their early publishing successes with independent presses and self-publishing. Provenzano will also sign and give away free copies of PINS.

 

In 1997, having completed an early version of his Masters thesis novel about gay high school wrestlers, Jim Provenzano succeeded in getting the attention of two high-profile literary agencies. But after both failed to snag a deal, he continued writing and improving the work, changed the title, and decided to self-publish it on October 1, 1999. 

 

With the guidance of the late Richard Labonté and other colleagues, he succeeded in getting reviews and booked multiple reading events in Ohio, New York, California, and even Sydney, Australia. Part of his success, along with being a first-time author, was the fact that at the time Provenzano was an accomplished masters-level wrestler himself.

 

After the first 1000 print run sold well, he decided to print 5000 more copies. In 2000, PINS was the #1 gay fiction title on Amazon.com for several weeks. A commissioned stage adaptation followed in 2002 and premiered at San Francisco’s New Conservatory Theater Center. Since then, Provenzano’s books have been mostly self-published in print, e-books, and audiobooks. 

https://www.jimprovenzano.com/

 

With a legendary local history as a bartender, and as a benefit revue and dance party coproducer, Mark Abramson’s life in San Francisco is documented in his fiction and memoir books. He also recounts his youthful days in Minnesota living on a farm in his other memoirs. His earlier Beach Reading series follows the life of Castro Street waiter Tim Snow and the intriguing stories set in the Castro district and around San Francisco.

https://markabramson.net/

 

The two authors discuss their early books, their inspiration, and their successes in small press and self-publishing in the gay fiction genre. Provenzano will also sign free copies of his debut novel, PINS. Other books will be available for sale.

 

San Francisco Public Library/Harvey Milk Memorial Branch, 1 Jose Sarria Court

October 15, 6pm. (415) 355-5616 Free

https://sfpl.org/locations/eureka-valley

 

 (RSVP on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/874431874224738 )

Book-banned, or more accurately, book-dumped in Florida.

Well, I got book-banned, or book-dumped. 

“When I Knew,” an anthology that includes my short essay, is among the hundreds of books that were dumped by rightwing anti-gay minions at New College of Florida.

The Herald Tribune and The Guardian have the story:

“Sarasota’s New College, the once liberal arts school subjected to a “hostile takeover” by well-rewarded, ultra-conservative DeSantis allies, was exposed by the city’s Herald-Tribune for dumping thousands of library books, including a clear-out of its gender and diversity center.

Democratic politicians likened it to Nazi-era book burning, and a preview of the extremist Project 2025 agenda linked to the Republican former president Donald Trump’s campaign to win back the White House in November.

“These messages are coming from DeSantis’s appointed and approved leaders, and the governor should just go ahead and admit he wants to be the dictator that Trump wants to be, because that’s what this is,” said the Democratic state congresswoman Yvonne Hayes Hinson.

“This shameful book dump is just the latest chapter in this Republican regime’s war on books and ideas. How insecure do you have to be to ban books on gender and women’s studies. They’re just plain weird.”

This is what happens when rightwing idiots think they’re going to take over and suppress books and ideas that they think are “woke.” Of course the opposite of being woke is being stupidly asleep at the wheel while the world continues to evolve.

The idiocy of all this is that these books still exist. You can’t make a book disappear. They can be republished in new editions, or be found in other libraries or sold at used bookstores.

Here’s my contribution to “When I Knew,” edited by Robert Trachtenberg, with a sweet –and accurate– illustration by Tom Bachtell. Contributions include short essays by B. D. Wong, Arthur Laurents, Simon Doonan, Stephen Fry, Marc Shaiman, Michael Musto and many others. Imagine trying to censor the voices of these accomplished people.

You can buy a copy on BookShop, and, if you’re inspired, donate it to your local library. 

The quiet understated heroism of baseball player Billy Bean

Billy Bean and Jim Provenzano. photo: Rick Gerharter

Only the second major league baseball player to come out after retirement, Billy Bean was a pioneer in a subtle way. He played for different teams, had ups and downs and a pivotal later success. Bean died of Leukemia on August 6, and is survived by his husband, Greg Baker.

What he's known for most recently is bringing Major League Baseball into the 21st century as an ambassador for diversity and inclusion in the league. What did Bean accomplish? 

According to The Advocate, 19 baseball players have come out in the past few years. If Bean helped that happen, let's give him credit. And only this week, The Boston Red Sox Jarren Duran was suspended for two games after shouting an antigay epithet to a fan. He later issued an apology.

Life-changing
"Billy Bean was never a star," wrote John Casey for The Advocate. "in fact, his career statistics, spread over six years with four different teams, were what one player would record in just half a season - if he’d last that long. Bean’s career batting average was a paltry .219, so theoretically, anyone hitting .219 for half a season would most likely be benched."

An All-American outfielder twice, Bean led Loyola Marymount to the College World Series in 1986, and retired at age 31. After the coming out news subsided, Bean actually shied away from doing the lecture circuit until he was convinced by Judy Shepherd to take advantage of that his moment.

So, when MLB asked him to become a Senior Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Bean returned to the sport he loved, and developed and implemented initiatives aimed at promoting DEI within the sport.

Billy Bean flying to catch a ball in the outfield

Maura McGurk, writing eloquently for OverTheMonster, recalled that she was at the Mariners game on Tuesday night [August 6] "when they announced Bean's death before the game and paused for a moment of remembrance. They were playing the Tigers, Bean’s first team. With all our recent trade-deadline talk about prospects, here’s one to note: Bean was one of those coveted prospects who couldn’t make it in the big leagues. 

"His résumé and early successes promised great things, and he started to deliver right away. In his first game, he rapped out four hits, tying a record for a player in his first MLB debut. Detroit fell in love with him. But from those attention-getting beginnings, he made only 519 plate appearances in 272 total games, and retired at 31 years old.

A double
debut
After coming out in 1999, Bean made headlines in the media. His cover feature in a late December issue of The Advocate, coincidentally featured –on the last editorial page– the first major review for my debut novel PINS about about high school wrestlers.

At the same time, Sports Complex, my syndicated column for the Bay Area Reporter and other publications and websites included a different sport each week. Although I had already interviewed dozens of major LGBTQ athletes as well as hundreds of team members in amateur leagues, I tried to get an interview with Bean. 

But at the time, when someone comes out big time, there's a kind of hierarchy. The cover story in The Advocate was published, as well as an extensive feature in The New York Times, where Robert Lipsyte told of Bean's multiple struggles in the sports industry while being closeted, even while he was briefly married to a woman. 

In the first rush of publicity, Bean's handlers rejected initial interview requests from smaller newspapers. Snub moi? We were in the same issue of The Advocate. I was a bit put off and should've perhaps requested a later interview. But by the time his memoir came out, I was onto other non-sporty work. 

Life "Lessons" - my interview in Philadelphia Gay News

Publicity is hard to come by even for an award-winning author, apparently. 

Here's my pithy Q&A with Greg Shapiro published in Philadelphia Gay News. 

An excerpt:

Gregg: I’m guessing that you’ve been out of high school for a while. However, you’ve succeeded in giving the setting gravitas and authenticity. What are the rewards and challenges for you when it comes to writing about the 1970s?
 

Me: I feel a kind of responsibility to describe that era because those who experienced that are part of an elder generation that needs to tell their stories. It’s also a very rich time in terms of music, fashion, good or bad, and just the whole era of it was innocent in some ways. And since the 1970s are now 40 years ago, I like to presume that it could be considered historical fiction.

 Read the full interview.

 

 

Pride month production, publishing and procrastinations

@ Fabulosa Books

Happy Pride Month! I know it's a bit late and it's almost over, but it's been a busy month. Who decided to make it a whole month, anyway? Remember when it was just a day or a week? It's kind of exhausting when you think about it.

This month, not only did I publish my novella, Lessons in Teenage Biology, I also arranged a reading at Fabulosa Books in San Francisco with two of my pal authors, Trebor Healey and Gar McVey-Russell. That was June 24.

 

And only days before that, I completed my 40-page portion of the Bay Area Reporter's annual Pride issue. I edited 12 articles and wrote two on my own. I'll get to those in a bit.

But the big news for me was publishing Lessons in Teenage Biology. I had a good time putting it together because it's short and sweet. It's based on a short story I wrote way back in 1986 and cleaned it up and made some artistic changes but basically tried to keep the same adolescent voice going for the story which expanded to 24,000 words. 

That's a bit too much for a short story. So that's why I didn't submit it to any anthologies, because I just wanted to do it myself and experiment with some marketing techniques. 

If you heard about the book, then it may have succeeded, but I actually found that several types of recommended promotions don't exactly work right, specifically the practice of giving away your book as an advance reader copy (ARC). Two different services mostly resulted in people who didn't read it, looked at it, or gave a negative review. So enough with that.

What's really surprising as a success are Ingram's promotions that go directly to libraries and bookstores for only $150. That was the real bargain. It saved me having to buy email lists, purchase them, do a mass mailing etc. 

I had a bit of a flop with MailChimp. I sent out press release to about 200 verified press email addresses and only got about three responses for any kind of coverage.

But moving forward, I set up reading event at the local bookstore Fabulosa Books, which is the location of the late great A Different Light bookstore. In its heyday before the Internet, the staff would hand sell-books by local offers like me. And going to see an author was a big big deal.

This time around we had about 20 people show up, including some known literary authors, which was great. Three people inquired on social media if there would be a live feed. We didn't set that up and that would not have been a hassle, but it's not the point. People have come to expect that kind of convenience since the pandemic and I've done quite a few since 2020 (including one at Fabulosa with Baruch Porras-Hernandez), but not this time around.

 For my day job as the Arts Editor of the Bay Area Reporter, the entire month was full of hundreds of emails. I had to sort articles, assign writers, collect photos to crop and edit, etc. It was a lot of work, and of course our big Pride issue came out today. You can read the PDF version or all the articles on the web of course. In San Francisco, you can get a print copy. It's quite a collectible.

One of those articles that I wrote was a review of the biography of Richard Hunt, the gay Muppet performer of who died of AIDS in 1992. Jessica Max Stein's biography is a very special and touching story about the affable and funny guy who played many characters on The Muppet Show, Sesame Street, and some of Jim Hanson's films. 

You can read my review here. I'll probably post that on Goodreads and Amazon later on.

So, when the actual Pride day comes, I'm so exhausted all the rainbow stuff that I've had to process and produce and publish, that I haven't even gone to Civic Center in a few years, even though it's only a few blocks away from my home. 

It's just a big crowd of young kids, which is great, but it's just not to my taste to be enveloped by clouds of cooked meat, loud music, and drunk people. In fact, most of my friends don't even go anymore. 

We went during the earlier days in the '80s and '90s when it was a radical thing to march in the Pride parade. Specifically, my New York days where I was just coming out were pivotal. 

Well, I had been out, but I was officially out and marching up (or down) Fifth Avenue to/from the West Village and Central Park. It was quite a revolutionary exciting wonderful time. Now it's more about consumerism and an overload of drag brunches.

Not that there's anything wrong with drag brunches! There's just so much going on now in terms of the entire month being full of LGBTQ events. It's hard to keep up. But that's my job.

I hope you're going to have some fun with your friends at Pride in your city, whether watching or marching in a parade; something I did many many times with sports groups and Mikes on Bikes in years past. 

It's always fun to participate and I've done my share to participate, and encourage other people to do so.

Happy June, happy LGBTQIAetc. Happy Pride.