Books
Zachary Zane is on a mission to destroy sexual shame
The bisexual influencer, sex columnist, & author of the memoir Boyslut opens up about his career, his anxiety, and his upcoming vasectomy
By Rob Salerno | WEST HOLLYWOOD – Zachary Zane isnāt having fun this weekend in Los Angeles.
While normally the Brooklyn-based sex columnist and bisexual influencer would have a string of sex parties lined up for a trip to his hometown, Zane says heās had to restrain himself because heās freezing his sperm in advance of an upcoming vasectomy.
āThis weekend is particularly boring,ā he says with a broad laugh over coffees in Studio City. āThere are a lot of fun sex clubs and parties here. Itās a lot of house parties that turn into orgies. Thatās one of my favorite things.ā
Itās the sort of frank, guileless admission thatās become the 33-year-oldās trademark through his āSexplain Itā column at Menās Health and substack newsletter, which has made him an icon of the bisexual community and led to his book Boyslut: A Memoir and Manifesto.
Zane says he was motivated to get the snip after the Supreme Courtās Dobbs ruling last year gutted abortion rights in the United States.
āAfter Roe v. Wade got overturned, I kind of wanted to take control, and no longer have it be that the impetus has to be on the woman,ā he says. āI do not want to have kids. I like having unprotected raw sex. I like being able to cum in my partners. Over the years, you have close calls, and the science is here, you donāt have to worry about it.ā
And this too is surprising, given that Zaneās online presence seems to embody the āchaotic bisexualā character type.
āMy editors say Iām cautious and take calculated risks. Iāve never turned in a story late. In many ways Iām a sexually chaotic bisexual, but Iām also very on top of everything,ā Zane says.
Reading Boyslut, Zaneās tendency for over-preparing, cautious planning, and protecting the feelings of others is evident and oddly refreshing, whether heās writing about his struggles with obsessive-compulsive disorder, anxieties about his remaining sexual hangups, juggling polyamorous relationships, or broaching a truly shocking fetish with his partners (Iāll leave that for you to read about in the book).
If you were picking up Boyslut expecting it to be a polemic about sexual libertinism, you might walk come out surprised by the degree to which the book advocates for caution, comfort, and compassion as much as itās an endorsement of reckless, uninhibited sexual pleasure.
Indeed, Zane says an early title for the book was āCautious Slut.ā And, lest you think the actual title is exclusionary, Zane defines a āboyslutā as āa person of any gender or sexual orientation who approaches sex without a lick of judgement or shame.ā
āIām trying to help people live unabashedly in whatever their relationship is with sex. Itās not just about being slutty and having sex with as many people as possible. If you are asexual I want you to own that,ā Zane says.
Zane also makes a compelling argument for the importance of having a community of people you trust to overcome sexual shame.
āOf course, I experience shame. Iām not superhuman. I live in society,ā he says. āWhen I do experience shame, I try to differentiate between feeling shame or feeling guilt. When Iām feeling overwhelmed by it, I think a lot of the answer is having this community and friend group that I can call instead of going home and crying alone.ā
Itās hard to imagine that the guy who regularly writes about his prodigious sexual escapades could suffer from shame, but Zane insists thereās plenty he still holds back.
āIām vaccilating between the things that cause me shame and things I donāt need to share with everyone,ā he says. āI feel very comfortable writing about very raunchy sexual experiences ā me getting DPād and my hairy asshole. But I donāt talk about my breakups online, my relationship with my family. Even when I talk about my OCD and anxiety, itās usually from a humorous place and not like, āoh, this was crippling.āā
Though he insists that heās very sexually open, it was in fact his anxiety over sexual shame that led him to his current career.
āI chose a career where, if my nudes leaked, that would be the best thing that happened to me. I wouldnāt get fired ā I would get great articles from it,ā he says. āI did that purposely because I didnāt want to have that fear and anxiety.ā
So is that the answer? Share everything that causes you anxiety?
āI think all of us have different levels of risk tolerance,ā he says. āEngage with the amount of sharing you want to do. Iām talking about cultivating a friend group or community where you feel loved and embraced by people who really cherish you and know you. Iām not encouraging people to just overshare online and seek validation from headless torsos and strangers. Itās about having these more meaningful connections that matter more.ā
Of course, not everyone has the luxury of a column in a national magazine to exorcise their anxieties into.
But over the three years that Zane has written Sexplain It for Menās Health, he believes heās contributed to a culture shift both at the magazine and in the broader culture.
āMenās Health has always been slightly gay, just by being a menās fitness magazine with half-naked men on the cover,ā he says. āA lot of closeted bi guys whoāve been married for twenty years, they donāt feel comfortable to read Out or Pride.com, but they do feel comfortable to go to Menās Health and if theyāre on the site and they see something, theyāre going to click. So Iām reaching an audience who arguably needs it the most.ā
āI was really part of this new generation at Menās Health. They have a lot of queer men on staff, a lot of women on staff, and theyāre making it more feminist and queer and intersectional.ā
And what even qualifies Zane to be a sex advice columnist anyway?
āFirst and foremost, I was a journalist. In the first Sexplain Its, I always reached out to an expert in the field.ā Zane begins to explain how he reads every relationship book out there and sifts his reader submissions to only answer the questions he feels comfortable with.
Then he gets wistful as he begins to tell a story that led him to believe he could write authoritatively on sex.
āItās a weird thing about being a sex expert. I had a date with this woman when I was 22. She was like 50 and a sex expert/therapist. A funny thing was I was the same age as her kids. So, I was at the beginning of my career, trying to break into this, and I asked, āWhat constitutes a sex expert?ā And she goes, āFor anything, being an expert is when you say youāre an expert and people believe you.āā
Boyslut: A Memoir and Manifesto is available in stores now.
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Rob Salerno is a writer, journalist and actor based in Los Angeles, California, and Toronto, Canada.
Books
āMean Boysā raises questions of life, death, and belonging
āMean Boysā can make you squirm. For sure, itās not a beach read or something youāll breeze through in a weekend
āMean Boys: A Personal Historyā
By Geoffrey Mak
c.2024, Bloomsbury
$28.99/267 pages
Itās how a pleasant conversation is fed, with give and take, back and forth, wandering casually and naturally, a bit of one subject easing into the next with no preamble. Itās communication you can enjoy, like what youāll find inside āMean Boysā by Geoffrey Mak.
Sometimes, a conversation ends up exactly where it started.
Take, for instance, Shakespeareās āKing Lear,ā which leads Mak to think about his life and his inability to ācull the appropriate narratives out of nonsense.ā Part of that problem, he says, was that his living arrangements werenāt consistent. He sometimes ānever really knew where I was living,ā whether it was Berlin or California, in a studio or high-end accommodations. The parties, the jokes, the internet consumption were as varied as the homes and sometimes, āit didnāt really matter.ā Sometimes, you have to accept things and just āmove on.ā
When he was 12 years old, Makās father left his corporate job, saying that he was ācalled by Godā to become a minister. It created a lot of resentment for Mak, for the lack of respect his father got, and because his parents were āpassionately anti-gay.ā He moved as far away from home as he could, and he blocked all communication with his parents for years, until he realized that āBy hating my father, I ended up hating myself, too.ā
And then there was club life which, in Makās descriptions, doesnāt sound much different in Berghain (Germany) as it is in New York. He says he āthrew myself into night life,ā in New York Houses, in places that gave āa skinny Chinese kid from the suburbsā¦ rules I still live by,ā on random dance floors, and in Pornceptual. Eventually this, drugs, work, politics, pandemic, basically everything and life in general led to a mental crisis, and Mak sought help.
āI donāt know why Iām telling you all this,ā Mak says at one point. āSometimes life was bad, and sometimes it wasnāt, and sometimes it just was.ā
Though there are times when this book feels like having a heart-to-heart with an interesting new acquaintance, āMean Boysā can make you squirm. For sure, itās not a beach read or something youāll breeze through in a weekend.
No, author Geoffrey Mak jumps from one random topic to another with enough frequency to make you pay close to attention to his words, lest you miss something. That wonāt leave you whiplashed; instead, youāre pulled into the often-dissipated melee just enough to feel almost involved with it ā but with a distinct sense that youāre being held at armsā length, too. That some stories have no definitive timeline or geographical stamp ā making it hard to find solid ground ā also adds to the slight loss of equilibrium here, like walking on slippery river rocks.
Surprisingly, thatās not entirely unpleasant but readers will want to know that the ending in āMean Boysā could leave their heads swirling with a dozen thoughts on life, belonging, and death. If you like depth in your memoirs, youāll like that ā and this.
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Books
Rob Anderson knows you think heās annoying
The Blade sat down with the Instagram comedian and āGay Scienceā author about viral fame, cringe comedy, and why gay men canāt sit in chairs
By Rob Salerno | WEST HOLLYWOOD – Rob Anderson understands why you mightāve blocked him. Over the last four years, Anderson has attracted more than four million followers across Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and TikTok.
But as he launches his latest book, Gay Science, collecting and expanding on his viral comedy video series that examines gay stereotypes through the ātotally scientific method,ā heās become pretty blasĆ© about the pitfalls of being promoted by the social media algorithms.
Anderson says he understands that despite his enormous success, the various social media platforms often push content at people who arenāt interested.
āI guess it is so annoying,ā he says with a laugh. āSo when people block me, Iām never like, āEw.ā I’m like, āNo, it’s annoying. I get it,ā
āWhen I first started making videos and then my followers were growing, I was blocking people left and right and for the same reason. I don’t hate them. It’s annoying to see this thing on my feed,ā he says. āThose Instagay couples that were always taking pictures. I blocked all of them.ā
Anderson spoke to The Blade in West Hollywood, where heās in town to promote Gay Science at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books with a panel discussion on āThe Gay Agendaā on April 21 ā two days before the book becomes available at bookstores everywhere.
He says he created the āGay Scienceā video series to poke fun at and reclaim stereotypes about gay men.
āI made my first video about why gay men like iced coffee because I wanted to have fun with those sorts of stereotypes I find online. Like why do gay guys run like that? Why do they write like girls, you know, and then all the other fun stereotypes that we’ve kind of like made up about ourselves like why we can’t sit in a chair the right way, because apparently we love having stereotypes,ā he says.
For the book, Anderson applies the same skewed scientific take to explain more than 50 different stereotypes across the entire LGBT spectrum. So the book has chapters that ask āAre Pansexual People Living Better Lives?ā āDoes College Make People Bi?ā and āDo Lesbians Hate Electricity?ā
āI challenged myself to write about everyone. I think everyone deserves to have something to laugh at because things are so awful politically. So asexual people, intersex, non-binary chapters. There’s a chapter āDid trans people invent pronouns?ā And, like everything else, the chapter proves thatās right.ā
Gay Science doesnāt take on the question of why so many gay men find Anderson annoying, but he has some theories.
āI attracted the attention of gay people, and some people choose to take that and give you back love, and then some people choose to take that and hate on you,ā he says. āIt’s really not even about me. It’s always about them, like something they’re going through.ā
āAnd honestly, I get it. Being gay is hard and we had a lot of tough times growing up, and then once you come out, you struggle to feel accepted in a gay space.ā
Maybe he can study this in Gay Science Volume 2.
And sometimes that backlash has just made Anderson even more powerful.
Two years ago, when he was about to go on his first comedy tour, a Twitter user from Washington, D.C. shared a now-infamous opinion about Andersonās $100 VIP meet-and-greet tickets.
āONE HUNDRED DOLLARS TO MEET R*B AND*RSON? When I can see him sucking dick on the dance floor at the after party for free? Iāll pass,ā wrote @livefreeordavid.
The tweet generated thousands of likes, retweets and comments ā many of them even more hateful. But the upshot is that Anderson sold out his D.C. shows within days and the rest of his tour shortly after. Anderson says he only learned about the tweet months later, when someone tagged him in the thread.
āI just kind of kept it. I screenshot it. I’m like, I just need to remember this. When people hate on you, it’s gonna be good. And I had to bring that back up again recently because I was on [Watch What Happens Live] for Gay Science and someone on Twitter was like, āOh, how embarrassing. He’s the bartender.ā They’re trying to hate on me for like being on TV.ā
Some of Andersonās zen attitude to toward the haters can also be attributed to a recent successful shift in his content. While he was working on the book Gay Science, he paused making new videos in the series ā all that new content is in the book.
Instead, he started posting video recaps of movies and TV shows from his youth, which has attracted a broader audience.
āI’d been rewatching Seventh Heaven and I was like, actually this show is ridiculous. I’m just gonna post about these shows. And those took off because it’s more universal. My audience has grown since then, and now it’s mostly not gay people.ā
āI really feeling like the content that I’m making is still gay. Like I’m a gay guy and you can tell that I’m not straight, but I get a lot less hate. Isn’t that crazy?ā
āNot just supportive, but fun DMs that were like, āyou need to do this movie because this is so fucking crazy.ā And it was because women are involved now and they’re just better than men,ā he says.
Maybe thatās another topic for future volumes of Gay Science.
Gay Science will be released in stores April 23.
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Rob Salerno is a writer and journalist based in Los Angeles, California, and Toronto, Canada.
Books
Out CBS reporter Jon Vigliotti recounts covering a warming planet
“I always loved storytelling,” said Vigliotti who grew up in the village of Mount Kisco in New York & now lives in Southern California
By Matthew S. Bajko, Assistant Editor | HOLLYWOOD, Calif. – In 2018, Jonathan Vigliotti was working as a foreign correspondent based out of CBS News’ London bureau. To say it was a coveted journalism job would be an understatement.
Yet, as he recounts in his debut book, “Before It’s Gone: Stories From the Front Lines of Climate Change in Small-Town America,” Vigliotti’s life would be upended professionally and personally by a warming planet. During a Cape Cod vacation that August with his family and husband, IvĆ”n Carrillo, Vigliotti fielded a call that had him making a hasty exit ā leaving his lobster dinner untouched ā to catch a flight for Southern California.
He was sent to cover a wildfire encroaching on the city of Lake Elsinore in Riverside County. The impromptu assignment led to him relocating to the national broadcaster’s Los Angeles Bureau the next year and taking on the natural disaster beat.
“In the time between then and now I have covered historic hurricanes, thermometer-shattering heat waves, record-breaking droughts, mega wildfires, back-to-back ‘hundred-year floods,’ unprecedented blizzards, and never-before-seen mudslides,” he writes in the prologue of his book.
Released in April by One Signal Publishers/Atria Books, a division of Simon & Schuster Inc., the book not only recounts his experiences covering a warming planet these past six years. It also serves as a memoir of his rising through the journalism ranks, from working for the NPR station based on the Bronx campus of his alma mater, Fordham University, to now being a national correspondent for CBS News.
“I always loved storytelling,” said Vigliotti, 41, who grew up in the village of Mount Kisco in New York.
Speaking with the Bay Area Reporter by phone, Vigliotti said he’s been a nature lover his entire life. He spent hours exploring the woods by his childhood home. When his parents joined the fight to stop a housing development that would have bulldozed his forested retreat, Vigliotti learned about the fragility of ecosystems and how collective actions can protect such places.
“It had a lasting impact on me,” he said. “My work as a professional journalist always has gravitated toward environmental stories.”
His book is broken into four parts centered on the elements of fire, water, air, and earth. The tragic events he’s covered are paired with solutions to mitigate the effect rising temperatures are having on communities across the U.S. (Vigliotti writes about reintroducing beavers to ward against wildfires in an excerpt of his book for this week’s Guest Opinion.)
“One of the reasons why I wrote the book is I feel climate change is abstract to people. Even people who may be climate deniers, I think that comes from a lack of understanding,” said Vigliotti. “One of the best ways to understand climate change is radicalizing our weather is to be there on the front lines. Through our reporting, I try to visually connect those dots for people.”
‘No warning’
A theme throughout the book is the oft repeated ā and disingenuous ā phrase, “There was no warning.” Time and time again local officials have known beforehand the threats their communities face from climate change, said Vigliotti.
“Why this happens is hard to say, but I do believe a lot of people find climate science to be overwhelming,” he said. “The solutions oftentimes seem daunting.”
Rather than dismiss climate change as “some politicized issue,” he hopes his audience sees it as the threat it is to their livelihoods and hometowns. He utilizes the term “habitat changes” in the book when writing about what is occurring due to changing climates.
“If saying climate change is a barrier for some people, maybe you don’t need to say it,” said Vigliotti. “As long as people understand weather is changing and an increased threat to communities on the front lines, the more people are willing to take action. That is my finding at least,” he said.
He believes the planet still has time before it’s gone.
“We are a very intelligent species, us humans. We have proven time and time again we have a unique ability to adapt, unlike some other species,” said Vigliotti. “I think we have an opportunity if we listen to the warning signs and take action to rebuild or upbuild our communities so they are resilient.”
Even more so than in his on air segments, Vigliotti is front and center throughout the book, talking to readers in the first person.
“I wasn’t sure how much of my own experience would be a part of this book. It documents my education and my understanding of the role climate change is having,” he said. “I felt like if I was going to invite readers into my world, I needed to be as honest as possible in those moments where I am sharing my personal experiences.”
Professionally, Vigliotti said he “never actively” hid being gay. But as he explains in the book, he routinely was “straightening out my gay” when sent to report in places like the Middle East.
An assistant news director at the Milwaukee TV station where he once worked advised him to “rein in the fagginess,” he writes. He also disclosed losing a network job “because the main anchor at the time didn’t like the way I ‘tracked.'”
Vigliotti told the B.A.R. he publicly came out in either 2011 or 2012. He credited gay CNN anchor Anderson Cooper, who is also a correspondent for CBS News’ “60 Minutes” newsmagazine, for giving him the courage to do so.
“The role I think he had in giving a voice to other journalists who were also quote-unquote closeted … I don’t know him personally but I am forever grateful for that,” said Vigliotti. “It gave me a way forward and a way to be more authentic as myself and more transparent without having to hide parts of myself.”
Doing so in his book marked a departure from his usual reporting focus.
“I have always believed as a journalist my role is to disappear into the background and to give a platform to the people I am interviewing. I always naturally shied away from sharing too much of myself to begin with,” said Vigliotti.
To not reveal his own story in his book would have been a disservice to his interview subjects, he reasoned.
“I have come to expect so much from people who are often sharing the worst moments of their life with me. I felt it would be a hindrance to not return that favor,” said Vigliotti, who is at work on expanding his nightly news broadcast’s coverage of small-town America.
The book doesn’t mark an end to his coverage of natural disasters. He plans to continue heeding the call when such assignments break.
“I do love California and do find a sense of purpose covering these kinds of stories,” said Vigliotti, who lives in Hollywood. “I will continue covering extreme weather events.”
The book can be purchasedĀ online here: (Link)
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The preceding article was previously published by the Bay Area Reporter and is republished with permission.
Books
New book offers observations on race, beauty, love
āHow to Live Free in a Dangerous Worldā is a journey of discovery
āHow to Live Free in a Dangerous World: A Decolonial Memoirā
By Shayla Lawson
c.2024, Tiny Reparations Books
$29/320 pages
Do you really need three pairs of shoes?
The answer is probably yes: you canāt dance in hikers, you canāt shop in stilettos, you canāt hike in clogs. So what else do you overpack on this long-awaited trip? Extra shorts, extra tees, you canāt have enough things to wear. And in the new bookĀ āHow to Live Free in a Dangerous WorldāĀ by Shayla Lawson, youāll need to bring your curiosity.
Minneapolis has always been one of their favorite cities, perhaps because Shayla Lawson was at one of Princeās first concerts. They werenāt born yet; they were there in their motherās womb and it was the first of many concerts.
In all their travels, Lawson has noticed that ābeing a Black Americanā has its benefits. People in other countries seem to hold Black Americans in higher esteem than do people in America. Still, thereās racism ā for instance, their husbandās family celebrates Christmas in blackface.
Yes, Lawson was married to a Dutch man they met in Harlem. āNot Haarlem,ā Lawson is quick to point out, and after the wedding, they became a housewife, learned the language of their husband, and fell in love with his grandmother. Alas, he cheated on them and the marriage didnāt last. He gave them a dog, which loved them more than the man ever did.
Theyāve been to Spain, and saw a tagline in which a dark-skinned Earth Mother was created. Said Lawson, āI find it ironic, to be ordained a deity when itās been a ā¦ journey to be treated like a person.ā
Theyāve fallen in love with āmiddle-American drag: itās the glitteriest because our mothers are the prettiest.ā They changed their pronouns after a struggle āto define my identity,ā pointing out that in many languages, pronouns are āgenderless.ā They looked upon Frida Kahlo in Mexico, and thought about their own disability. And they wish you a good trip, wherever youāre going.
āNo matter where you are,ā says Lawson, āmay you always be certain who you are. And when you are, get everything you deserve.ā
Crack open the front cover of āHow to Live Free in a Dangerous Worldā and you might wonder what the heck you just got yourself into. The first chapter is artsy, painted with watercolors, and difficult to peg. Stick around, though. It gets better.
Past that opening, author Shayna Lawson takes readers on a not-so-little trip, both world-wide and with observant eyes ā although it seems, at times, that the former is secondary to that which Lawson sees. Readers wonāt mind that so much; the observations on race, beauty, love, the attitudes of others toward America, and finding oneās best life are really what takes the wheel in this memoir anyhow. Reading this book, therefore, is not so much a vacation as it is a journey of discovery and joy.
Just be willing to keep reading, thatās all you need to know to get the most out of this book. Stick around and āHow to Live Free in a Dangerous Worldā is what to pack.
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Books
Story of paralysis and survival features queer characters
āUnswerving: A Novelā opens your eyes and makes you think
āUnswerving: A Novelā
By Barbara Ridley
c.2024, University of Wisconsin Press
$19.95 / 227 pages
It happened in a heartbeat.
A split-second, a half a breath, thatās all it took. It was so quick, so sharp-edged that you can almost draw a line between before and after, between then and now. Will anything ever be the same again? Perhaps, but maybe not. As in the new bookĀ āUnswervingāĀ by Barbara Ridley, things change, and so might you.
She could remember lines, hypnotizing yellow ones spaced on a road, and her partner, Les, asleep in the seat beside her. It was all so hazy. Everything Tave Greenwich could recall before she woke up in a hospital bed felt like a dream.
It was as though sheād lost a month of her life.
āLife,ā if you even wanted to call it that, which she didnāt. Taveās hands resembled claws bent at the wrist. Before the accident, she was a talented softball catcher but now she could barely get her arms to raise above her shoulders. She could hear her stomach gurgle, but she couldnāt feel it. Paralyzed from the chest down, Tave had to have help with even the most basic care.
She was told that she could learn some skills again, if she worked hard. She was told that sheād leave rehab some day soon. What nobody told her was how Les, Leslie, her partner, girlfriend, love, was doing after the accident.
Physical therapist Beth Farringdon was reminded time and again not to get over-involved with her patients, but she saw something in Tave that she couldnāt ignore. Beth was on the board of directors of a group that sponsored sporting events for disabled athletes; she knew people who could serve as role models for Tave, and she knew that all this could ease Taveās adjustment into her new life. It was probably not entirely in her job description, but Beth couldnāt stop thinking of ways to help Tave who, at 23, was practically a baby.
She could, for instance, take Tave on outings or help find Les ā even though it made Bethās own girlfriend, Katy, jealous.
So, hereās a little something to know before you start reading āUnswervingā: author Barbara Ridley is a former nurse-practitioner who used to care for patients with spinal cord injuries. That should give readers a comfortable sense of satisfaction, knowing that her experiences give this novel an authenticity that feels right and rings true, no faking.
But thatās not the only appeal of this book: while there are a few minor things that might have readers shaking their heads (HIPAA, anyone?), Ridleyās characters are mostly lifelike and mostly likable. Even the nasties are well done and the mysterious character thatās there-not-there boosts the appeal. Put everyone together, twist a little bit to the left, give them some plotlines that canāt ruined by early guessing, and youāve got a quick-read novel that you can enjoy and feel good about sharing.
And share you will because this is a book that may also open a few eyes and make readers think. Start āUnswervingā and youāll (heart) it.
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Books
Mark S. King chronicles & celebrates 40 years of surviving with HIV
From addiction and recovery, fear to PrEP, stigma to fetish, King has seen it all. He will be in West Hollywood on April 8
By Rob Salerno | WEST HOLLYWOOD – Nearly forty years ago, Mark King tested positive for HIV in a clinic in West Hollywood. Back in 1985, there was no reliable treatment for HIV and a positive test was understood by many to be a death sentence. Many of the hundreds of thousands of young gay men who received an HIV diagnosis at the time began writing their wills.Ā
Mark King began writing essays.
Since the early days of the HIV epidemic, King has been chronicling life with the virus in virus in My Fabulous Disease, a column that was syndicated in gay newspapers and magazines across the country ā back when most cities in America had local gay news outlets ā before moving to his blog.
Now a selection of those essays has been published as My Fabulous Disease: Chronicles of a Gay Survivor, and King will be presenting readings of his essays by other well-known long-term survivors at āA Gathering of Long-Term Survivorsā at the West Hollywood Library on April 8.
āIt turns out that if you live long enough and you write long enough you gather a volume of work along the way,ā King tells me over Zoom from his home in Atlanta. āI just wanted to tell the story from that time till now because as the years have gone on, the story changed about what it’s like to get up and live again.ā
King has also lived long enough to see the social perception of people living with HIV transition from them being tragic angels into a looming threat, a shift he chronicles in his essay āThe Sound of Stigma.ā
āIn the early days, we were innocent tragic victims they didn’t have to think too much about because we were going to be dead soon anyway, so you might as well feel sorry for us. Then as we became healthier, and suddenly we returned to the social scene and to the dance floor and to the bathhouses, that’s when HIV stigma really started to rise again because we wanted to be amongst the rest of you,ā he says.
King is quick to name PrEP as one of the most impactful developments in how queer people face HIV. He says the once-a-day pill that can be taken to prevent acquiring HIV shifted the burden of the disease onto people who are HIV-negative.
āHIV-negative people were being mocked and criticized and shamed for even considering to take PrEP. What’s wrong with you? How big a slut are you? Why don’t you use a condom?ā he says. āIt was ironic because suddenly HIV-negative men were getting the same shit thrown at them about their worth and their sexual lives as those of us living with HIV had.ā
āWhat was so threatening about prep is that it put prevention into the hands of people who do not have HIV, as opposed to always having the burden on those of us living with HIV.ā
Kingās writing about HIV is both a significant historical artifact of what life was like under the greatest crisis to afflict our community, and a prescient accounting of who we are today. Through his essays about pornography, sex, fetishes, dating and more, King reveals that the more the community changes, the more it stays the same.
King says that the speaking tour in support of his book has shown him how relevant his essays remain to newer generations of gay men who havenāt had to come of age with the specter of HIV.
In the unique format of Kingās book tour, heās invited other queer men to read his essays, which he says puts a new spin on things.
āA young man [at a reading] in Chicago read my piece, āProbing my Analphobia,ā about when I was just a little twink and one completely disastrous douching,ā King says. āAnyway, I ruined his entire bedroom. I mean ruined ruined it. And it’s all very explicit in the essay and I was really just doing it for laughs and to see what I could get away with telling this terrible story.
āAnd when he finished reading it, he said, āI really want to thank you for writing this because I was so ashamed of the mechanics of gay sex. I didn’t know what I didn’t know and you have lifted the veil in this essay. You make it okay,ā he says.
Some of the notable people presenting readings of My Fabulous Disease in West Hollywood include city council member John Heilman, ABC News Broadcaster Karl Schmid, and actor Dean Testerman.
A Gathering of Long-Term SurvivorsĀ will take place at the West Hollywood Library Meeting Room at 625 N San Vicente Blvd, on April 8 from 7-8:30pm.Ā My Fabulous Disease is available in paperback or ebook.
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Rob Salerno is a writer and journalist based in Los Angeles, California, and Toronto, Canada.
Books
Examining importance of queer places in history of arts and culture
āNothing Ever Just Disappearsā shines with grace and lyrical prose
āNothing Ever Just Disappears: Seven Hidden Queer Historiesā
By Diarmuid Hester
c.2024, Pegasus Books
$29.95/358 pages
Go to your spot.
Where that is comes to mind immediately: a palatial home with soaring windows, or a humble cabin in a glen, a ramshackle treehouse, a window seat, a coffeehouse table, or just a bed with a special blanket. Itās the place where your mind unspools and creativity surges, where you relax, process, and think. Itās the spot where, as in the new bookĀ āNothing Ever Just DisappearsāĀ by Diarmuid Hester, you belong.
Clinging āto a spit of land on the south-east coast of Englandā is Prospect Cottage, where artist and filmmaker Derek Jarman lived until he died of AIDS in 1994. Itās a simple four-room place, but it was important to him. Not long ago, Hester visited Prospect Cottage to āexamine the importance of queer places in the history of arts and culture.ā
So many āqueer spacesā are disappearing. Still, we can talk about those that arenāt.
In his classic book, āMaurice,ā writer E.M. Forster imagined the lives of two men who loved one another but could never be together, and their romantic meeting near a second-floor window. The novel, when finished, āproved too radical even for Forster himself.ā He didnāt āallowā its publication until after he was dead.
āPatriarchal power,ā says Hester, largely controlled who was able to occupy certain spots in London at the turn of the last century. Still, āqueer suffragettesā there managed to leave their mark: women like Vera Holme, chauffeur to suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst; writer Virginia Woolf; newspaperwoman Edith Craig, and others who āmade enormous contributions to the cause.ā
Josephine Baker grew up in poverty, learning to dance to keep warm, but she had Paris, the city that āmade her into a star.ā Artist and ātransgender iconā Claude Cahun loved Jersey, the place where she worked to āshow just how much gender is masquerade.ā Writer James Baldwin felt most at home in a small town in France. B-filmmaker Jack Smith embraced New York ā and vice versa. And on a personal journey, Hester mourns his friend, artist Kevin Killian, who lived and died in his beloved San Francisco.
Juxtaposing place and person, āNothing Ever Just Disappearsā features an interesting way of presenting the idea that both are intertwined deeper than it may seem at first glance. The point is made with grace and lyrical prose, in a storytellerās manner that offers back story and history as author Diarmuid Hester bemoans the loss of āqueer spaces.ā This is really a lovely, meaningful book ā though readers may argue the points made as they pass through the places included here. Landscapes change with history all the time; donāt modern āqueer spacesā count?
Thatās a fair question to ask, one that could bring these āhiddenā histories full-circle: We often preserve important monuments from history. In memorializing the actions of the queer artists whoāve worked for the future, the places that inspired them are worth enshrining, too.
Reading this book may be the most relaxing, soothing thing youāll do this month. Try āNothing Ever Just Disappearsā because it really hits the spot.
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Books
Upcoming books offer something for every reader
From a history of the gay right to a look at queer womenās spaces
Daylight Savings Time has arrived, giving you more sunlight in the evening and more time to read. So why not look for these great books this spring?
If your taste runs to historical novels, youāre in luck. When Yorick spots his name on the list of the missing after the Titanic sinks, he believes this to be an omen: nobodyās looking for him, so maybe this is his opportunity to move to Paris and open that bookstore heās been dreaming about. In āThe Titanic Survivors Book Clubā by Timothy Schaffert (Doubleday, $29.00) his decision leads to more than a bucolic little business. Out April 2.
If youāre looking for something a little on the lighter side, discoverĀ āRiley Weaver Needs a Date to the Gaybutante BallāĀ by Jason June (HarperTeen, $19.99). Young adult books are perfect light reading for adults, and this one is full of high-school drama, romance, comedy, and more drama. What fun! Out May 23.
Canāt get enough of graphic novels? Then look for āEscape from St. Hell: A Graphic Novelā by Lewis Hancox (Graphix, $14.99). Itās the continuing story of Lew, who just wants to live his life as a guy, which he started doing in the last novel (āWelcome to St. Hellā) but you know what they say about one door closing, one door opening. In this new installment, Lew grapples with the changes heās made and how his friends and family see things, too. This book is fresh and honest and great for someone whoās just transitioned. Out May 7.
For the mystery lover, you canāt go wrong with āClean Kill: A Nicky Sullivan Mysteryā by Anne Laughlin (Bold Strokes, $18.95). As the manager of a sober living home in Chicago, Nicky Sullivan has her hands full with 10 other residents of the home. But when one of them is murdered, Sullivan reaches back into her past as an investigator to find the killer by calling on her old partner. Fortunately, heās still working. Also fortunately, heās got a new partner and she catches Sullivanās eye. Can love and murder mix? Out May 14.
Canāt get enough of politics? Then youāll be happy to find āComing out Republican: A History of the Gay Rightā by Neil J. Young (University of Chicago Press, $30). In the fractious political atmosphere we have now, itās essential to understand how gay conservatives have influenced politics through the decades. Find this book before November. It may be one of the most eye-opening books youāll read. Out April 3.
The reader who loves her āspaceā will want to take āA Place of Our Own: Six Spaces That Shaped Queer Womenās Cultureā by June Thomas (Seal Press, $30) there to read. Itās a book about historically safe places for queer women to be themselves ā and some are surprisingly very public. Interviews with iconic feminists and lesbians round out a great look at the locales that queer women have claimed for their own. Out May 28.
And now the housekeeping: Release dates can change and titles can be altered at the last minute, so check with your favorite bookseller or librarian. Theyāll also have more recommendations if you need them because thereās a lot of time for reading now.
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Books
A travel memoir with a queer, Black sensibility
Nonbinary author Shayla Lawson is the Joan Didion of our time
āHow to Live Free in a Dangerous World: A Decolonial Memoirā
By Shayla Lawson
c.2024, Tiny Reparations Books
$29/320 pages
Joan Didion, one of the greatest writers and journalists of the 20th century and 2000s, wrote superbly crafted essays ā telling engaging stories about the places she traveled to. Reading her, you sensed Didion reacting personally to her travels, and, as a writer, clocking it. To write in stories for her readers.
Shayla Lawson, a nonbinary, Black, disabled poet and journalist, is the Joan Didion of our time.
Their new work,Ā āHow to Live Free in a Dangerous World: A Decolonial Memoir,āĀ is a provocative, impeccably crafted, hard-to-put down, travel memoir in essays. (Lawson uses they/them pronouns.)
Lawson is author of āThis is Major,ā which was a finalist for the National Book Criticsā Circle and the LAMBDA Literary Award, and the author of two poetry collections, āA Special Education in Human Beingā and āI Think Iām Ready to See Frank Ocean.ā They have written for New York Magazine, Salon, ESPN and Paper, and earned fellowships from the Yaddo and the MacDowell Artist Colony.
Yet, despite this impressive track record, Lawson, who grew up in Kentucky, and has lived and traveled everywhere from the Netherlands to Brazil to Los Angeles to Kyoto, Japan to Mexico to Shanghai, had to wait nine years before a publisher would wrap their head around releasing a travel memoir in essays.
Thankfully, Lawson had the chutzpah to persist in seeking a home for her memoir. Kudos to Tiny Reparations Books for valuing Lawsonās writing and publishing āHow to Live Free in a Dangerous World.ā
From the get-go of their memoir, Lawson draws us in. Weāre with them on the plane. Right away, weāre with Lawson ā a writer whoās clocking it ā telling their story ā while theyāre on the plane. At the same time, weāre reading the story that Lawsonās writing.
In a few nano-secs, we get that Lawsonās stories have a queer, Black sensibility.
āOur story starts in an airplane,ā Lawson writes in the opening of the memoir, āwith the sound of long acrylic nails tapping on laptop keys, the sound of black femme poeticsā¦ā
āOnly connect,ā writes queer writer E.M. Forster in his 1910 novel āHowards End.ā
Lawsonās daring memoir is a dazzling mosaic of connections between race, class, gender, sexuality, death, queerness, love, disability, grief and beauty.
Lawson met Kees, their ex-husband, a white man from the Netherlands, when he was in Harlem during a layover on a flight to Brazil for a six-month back-packing trip through South America, Lawson recalls. They meet cute over pizza, fall in love, and marry.
In the Netherlands, Lawson has to learn a new language and is stuck living in a beautiful, but boring village. They volunteer at a refugee village, that Lawson discovered had been an āinsane asylum.ā That village, Lawson thought, wasnāt beautiful.
Lawson discovers beauty and sexuality when she meets up with a hunky gondolier in Venice.
In post-dictatorship Zimbabwe, they experience what itās like to hang out with other Black people, where everyone is Black.
In one of the memoirās most compelling chapters, Lawson visits artist Frida Kahloās house in Mexico City. Kahlo was disabled. She had spina bifida.
At age 39, Lawson was diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. They have chronic pain from the disability.
A doctor (with the bedside manner of Attila the Hun) told Lawson that they would die. āItās a strong presentation,ā Lawson remembers the doc said to her.
Often, disability is left out of storytelling. If included, itās put in a box ā separated, disconnected, from other intersections of the narrative (gender, sexuality, race, class, sexual orientation, etc.).
One out of five Americans is disabled, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and Lawson writes, post-COVID that 60 percent of Americans have been diagnosed as chronically ill.
Lawson brings ableism out of the shadows.
Iām white, cisgender, queer and legally blind. Iām one of the many for whom Lawsonās experience of ableism will ring true.
Theyāve ācalled me a bitch,ā for moving slower, Lawson writes.
The last time Lawson traveled when āI didnāt return in a wheelchair,ā was 2019, they write.
But that wonāt stop them from traveling, Lawson writes.
āHow do I want to live,ā Lawson asks, āin such a way that someone will be honored by how I die.ā
āHow to Live Free in a Dangerous Worldā is exhilarating, but sometimes discomforting reading. Lawson makes you think. If youāre white and, using all the right pronouns, for instance, you can still be clueless about racism or being entitled.
But Lawsonās memoir isnāt a hectoring sermon. Itās a frisson of freedom, liberation and hope.
āNo matter where you are, may you always be certain who you are,ā Lawson writes, āAnd when you are, get everything you deserve.ā
Check it out. You wonāt be able to get it out of your head.
Books
Gay author takes us on his journey to fatherhood in āSafeā
One manās truth about the frustrations and rewards of fostering
āSafe: A Memoir of Fatherhood, Foster Care, and the Risks We Take for Familyā
By Mark Daley
c.2024, Atria Books
$28.99/304 pages
The closet is full of miniature hangers.
The mattress bumpers match the drapes and the rug beneath the tiny bed. Thereās a rocker for late-night fusses, a tall giraffe in the corner, and wind-up elephants march in a circle over the crib. Now you just need someone to occupy that space and in the new book,Ā āSafeāĀ by Mark Daley, thereās more than one way to accomplish that dream.
Jason was a natural-born father.
Mark Daley knew that when they were dating, when he watched Jason with his nephew, with infants, and the look on Jasonās face when he had one in his arms. As a gay man, Daley never thought much having a family but he knew Jason did ā and so, shortly after their wedding, they began exploring surrogacy and foster-to-adopt programs.
Daley knew how important it was to get the latter right: his mother had a less-than-optimal childhood, and she protected her own children fiercely for it. When Daley came out to her, and to his father, he was instantly supported and thatās what he wanted to give: support and loving comfort to a child in a hard situation.
Or children, as it happened. Just weeks after competing foster parenting classes and after telling the social worker theyād take siblings if there was a need, the prospective dads were offered two small brothers to foster.
It was love at first sight but euphoria was somewhat tempered by courts, laws, and rules. Their social worker warned several times that reunification of the boys with their parents was āPlan A,ā but Daley couldnāt imagine it. The parents seemed unreliable; they rarely kept appointments, and they didnāt seem to want to learn better parenting skills. The mother all but ignored the baby, and the child noticed.
So did Daley, but the courts held all the power, and predicting an outcome was impossible.
āAll we had was the present,ā he said. āIf I didnāt stay in it, I was going to lose everything I had.ā So was there a Happily-Ever-After?
Ah, you wonāt find an answer to that question here. Youāll need to read āSafeā and wear your heart outside your chest for an hour or so, to find out. Bring tissues.
Bring a sense of humor, too, because author and founder of One Iowa Mark Daley takes readers along on his journey to being someoneās daddy, and he does it with the sweetest open-minded open-heartedness. Heās also Mama Bear here, too, which is just what you want to see, although there can sometimes be a lot of tiresome drama and over-fretting in that.
And yet, this isnāt just a sweet, but angst-riddled, tale of family. If youāre looking to foster, hereās one manās truth about the frustrations, the stratospheric-highs, and the deep lows. Will your foster experiences be similar? Maybe, but reading this book about it is its own reward.
āSafeā soars and it dives. It plays with your emotions and it wallows in anxiety. If youāre a parent, though, youāll hang on to every word.
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