Bay Area Reporter fundraising campaign

The Bay Area Reporter has been a vital news source to the LGBTQ community for almost 50 years. It’s also been my employer for more than 25 years. 

For book fans, the B.A.R.’s reviews have supported hundreds of LGBTQ authors as well. 

Like most small businesses, we’re facing financial hardship for staff, full-time and freelancers. 

So I’m helping out by offering sets of four of my acclaimed novels for $100, personally inscribed and mailed to you. If you can only donate a few dollars instead, that’s still appreciated.
 
Can’t donate? Then please share with your friends and social media followers. Thank you!

Please donate to the B.A.R. fundraiser and share the link:
 
https://igg.me/at/save-the-BAR

Here's the video I made that explains our situation, and showcases the vivid history of the B.A.R.'s decades of coverage in news, arts and nightlife.

March into the Midwest: Now I'm Here at Prologue Bookshop

Touring bookstores to promote one's books can be very expensive and time-consuming, which is why I'm happy to announce that I'll be reading from and discussing my sixth novel, Now I'm Here, at Prologue Bookshop in Columbus on March 12. That the novel is set in a small fictional town near Columbus, and that I spent a few years at Ohio State University, makes this event particularly poignant. The store will also have a few copies of my first novel, PINS for sale.

GPC coverage of PINS in 1999

The last time I visited Columbus was in December 1999. I read from my first novel, PINS, to an appreciative audience at the now-closed An Open Book (749 N. High St.), and stopped by Cat's Impetuous Books in Stow, where I studied theatre for two years in nearby Kent.

It's hard to believe it's been twenty years since my last visit to Ohio. But with my family gone and few high school and college friends still there, traveling back there isn't as much of an option.

But when a representative from the Columbus Tourism  invited me on a press trip to write about the city's Short North district and growing LGBT community, of course I offered an enthusiastic 'Yes!' and contacted Prologue Bookshop next, because I saw that they host a monthly LGBT book club.

Book Loft, another great store in the area, ordered a few copies of Now I'm Here, which I'll sign on Friday March 13, at around 2pm.

While it's difficult to not feel a bit envious of authors who get national book tours arranged for them by their big publishers, I do feel a sense of pride that I not only arranged those long-ago events myself, but garnered a few reviews and interviews in several regional Ohio publications, including the now-gone Gay People's Chronicle, which gave my event a generous and knowledgeable two-page spread!

This time, I did get a few bites from local media, including this Q&A in City Scene:

"Being openly gay has never been easy, but some eras were more challenging than others. The AIDS crisis and rampant homophobia of the '80s certainly didn’t help the fight for gay rights. Author Jim Provenzano captures a story of love in this tumultuous time in his 2018 book Now I’m Here.

Prologue Bookshop has scheduled Provenzano to read and sign his book on March 12 at 7 p.m. It will be the first time in 20 years that this OSU alumnus will return to Columbus. Using his experience growing up in Ohio, Provenzano creates incredibly realistic characters in his sixth novel."

Prologue Bookshop

Prizm News, the new statewide LGBT publication, also granted me some coverage, with this Q&A:

"The story is saturated with subtle pieces of Provenzano’s past, including a love for Queen music and a unique experience on a pumpkin farm. The narrative also touches on topics of religious intolerance, abuse, and the heartbreak of AIDS."

For directions, visit Prologue's website. You should also follow their Instagram page for fun book recommendations.

If you're on Facebook, RSVP on the event page. If you can't attend, but are nearby, please order a copy of Now I'm Here from the store.

Remembering Robert Conrad, our Wild Wild Crush

The death of actor Robert Conrad on February 8 brought on a slew of remembrances from fans online, most notably those who recalled him shirtless, in tight pants, and often tied up, in the unusual hit TV series The Wild Wild West. 

That the show's barely disguised erotic aspects aroused many gay men (mostly teenagers at the time) is self-evident in any of the show's episodes. It also brought forth several memories of my first published short story, and how my own meager PR skills at the time seem fairly quaint.

In The Wild Wild West, which premiered in 1965, Conrad played James T. West, a James Bond-like agent who used innovative tactics and futuristic gadgets (steampunk before there was such a thing, and futuristic for the 1800s) to battle bizarre villains. 

As a youngster in grade school, the homoerotic aspects perhaps eluded me. I do recall owning a denim vest that made me feel cool like James West, and, imitating one of West's many gadgets, I even tried to insert a penknife in one of my shoes. That didn't turn out well.

What did turn out well, in my vague memory, was a Show and Tell grade school morning where, after possibly hours of rehearsal, I enlisted several other boys to reenact almost an entire episode of the show. Had we audiotaped it? Written down a script? I don't recall, other than constructing a large cardboard wall for one of the boys to crash through.

Some claim that the show may have even had an influence in the rise of gay BDSM culture. As Jack Fritscher, editor of Drummer magazine wrote in my query: 

"Robert Conrad was an archetype of the classic American physique, leather-and-western clothing fetish, and bondage action considered basic by the founders of Drummer. Publisher John Embry wrote about his personal passion for 'Bob' Conrad.  Drummer was built on a continuing series of pictures of hunky movie stars in S&M situations that began in Drummer #1, June 1975, with Paul Newman, Burt Reynolds, Steve McQueen, and Robert Conrad. 

"We featured the peerless Conrad in Drummer issue #1 to set a certain 'tone' by offering his shirtless poster for sale in Drummer mail-order. A torso cover drawing by Bud of LA referenced Conrad's famous stripped torso on display in bondage in nearly every episode of Wild Wild West, the series that brought thousands of young gays out and led them to Drummer and Folsom Street."

While SM gay culture was thriving elsewhere, my own introduction to the show was in syndication in the 1970s. Our family had moved our older television to the basement, and a northern Ohio TV station, WUAB, broadcast a set of shows, including Gilligan's Island, Bewitched, I Dream of Jeannie and others. 

But The Wild Wild West remained my favorite, as my teenage libido was struck by Conrad's feisty antics, frequent shirtless scenes, and his very tight pants. Never before, or since, had a male actor's body been so blatantly put on display, along with his dashing outfits.

Jump ahead to the early 1990s, as my years of (mostly hand-written or manually-typed) scribblings developed into a few novel beginnings and a few short stories. I had begun to befriend authors and editors, mostly through my fledgling journalism efforts at Outweek, and somehow managed to be invited to contribute to a new anthology of fiction edited by prolific author and editor Ethan Mordden.

Having just learned the basics of word processing, I found that my story about being bitten by a dog, and receiving my first G.I. Joe doll as a boy, grew into a long list of TV and pop culture crushes. As a play on scholarly writing, I added footnotes to various actors and cartoon characters.

"Forty Wild Crushes (or Whenever I See a Dachshund I Think of G.I. Joe)" became part of Waves: An Anthology of New Gay Fiction.  Contributors included John Weir, Brad Gooch, Scott Heim, Michael Cunningham and several others.

Hindsight in 2020; a decade of writing

Since I haven't blogged in weeks, what better time than on the last day of a year, and a decade, full of ups and down, books and breaks. The 2010s were pretty good for me, book-wise. I self-published two novels, Every Time I Think of You, and its sequel, Message of Love, which won a Lambda Literary Award, and was a Finalist, respectively.

I also self-published my short story collection, Forty Wild Crushes in 2016, and in 2018, Beautiful Dreamer Press published my sixth novel, Now I'm Here. I still love typing that, "my sixth novel." So many frustrated writers never finish one, let alone get it published.

In work writing, I got to interview dozens of performing artists for the Bay Area Reporter, my pleasant, fun and challenging day job.  Features ranged talents like Cazwell, Carol Cook, Peaches Christ, Debbie Harry, to Ross Mathews and Sister Roma.

For the past three decades, aside from a few wacky and tedious temp and freelance jobs, I've been rather lucky to make a living as a writer. Again, a rare thing, and one that I cherish.

Like you, I've lost a few friends, but gained some as well. I've burned a few bridges, but built a few others, and you know, I can swim.