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This is a mix of dramatic events and the absolutely everyday – and I think that is one of its most important messages – in the midst of Syria being torn apart people still had lives they were living – shopping to buy, washing to do, etc.
We follow an ordinary man just trying to get through life – this is not a story about the high drama and heroic acts of war, it is the other side of that story – but I would say no less heroic.
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This is a slim volume, small, notebook sized for reasons that I guess are obvious.
It is Tom Cox at his best, the snippets of thought shared without much context.
It is rich in its encounters with the natural world, we have moments of family life especially Tom’s Dad who seems to be a great gift to a writer.
A couple of quotes that I liked a lot …
“Someone once described me as ‘part tree’ and it remains the greatest compliment I have ever received.”
“A solid cooking rule to follow is to remember that when recipes say ‘ass two cloves of garlic’, it’s always a misprint and what they actually meant is six.”
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Steacy Easton uses Dolly Parton’s Album White Limozeen as the lens to explore Dolly’s construction of “authenticity”.
Dolly seems to increasingly be seen as a saint, with ‘What Would Dolly Do’ wristbands and all that, and Steacy Easton asks us to step back and see where all this comes from, and to notice some aspects that can feel a little uncomfortable.
Somehow Dolly has managed to hold the manufacturing of her image (with lines like “it costs a lot to look this cheap”) with the sense that she is real, authentic, based in large part on the real poverty of her childhood. But her success as a musician and as a business means she has been a very wealthy for a very long time.
A key part of Steacy’s challenge is that the Appalachian roots that are so important to Dolly are part of a White version of Appalachia – which tends to deny and ignore the First Nations and the other non-white people of the region. This is a complex issue, cutting deep into the American soul, and the point that Steacy I think wants to make is that before anything else the first thing Dolly Parton has to do is sell a lot of records, and don’t do that by rocking the boat.
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I put this on my reading list after we watched the film – the haunting nature of the film is here to. The structure of the novel and film differ but the essence of the storytelling has the same quality.
A summer of love, on the eve of ‘adulthood’, the nerd and the farm boy, love across a social divide all the sweeter for it.
An then separation – lives lived away, but shaped with a longing, when in middle age the nerd now a successful but not entirely happy writer returns, and encounters his lover’s Son.
But this is not the beginning of a happy ending – his lover seems to have lived a life trapped by responsibilities and unable to acknowledge his sexuality, until things unwind into his suicide.
This is such a sad story, and yet it is written as a gem.
To come of age as a gay man in a small town in the early eighties was tough, there has been progress, but some days it is hard to be hopeful.
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Reading this on the plane to Gran Canaria for Winterpride when the Yumbo is overflowing with Cis Gay White Men, this telling of the experience of Gay Black Men’s truth was powerful.
I love that this is the story of real people – there are egos in conflict within this account – it is not an airbrushed account of queer harmony.
That White Cis Men, like me, who happen to be Gay have claimed space without making room for those who are not White, are not Cis, are not Men is shaming – but even in saying that I risk making it about me.
A lot of these stories made me think about The Diaries of Mr Lucas, the people Jason tells us about are living big impactful lives as the margins in a way that Mr Lucas was, certainly when he was doing his thing a generation before them.
Gay porn reduces black men to a fetish about big cock and a hypermasculinity – plays into the narrative that (white) bottoms are gay, (black) tops are straight.
This book does so much to reset us – make us see reality.
Johannes is a beautiful person, and is one of the (many) reasons I love Strictly.
At 250ish pages this is a short autobiography for someone with such a big story, compared to others I have read who have used a lot more pages to say an awful lot less…
South Africa is such a complex country, and the UK’s relationship with it, even in the great scheme of Empire, stands out as poor. That Royal wives seem to be falling over themselves to shake Jojo’s hand is something to celebrate, but I hope they do it with a pinch of context.
One of the things that Johannes’ story tells us is you need a big dose of luck to make it to the top, but if your parents have money the chances of you being in the right place at the right time when that luck comes along are massively improved.
Having read John Whaite’s account of their partnership it was clearly interesting to read the other side – but John actually said very little, and Johannes says even less – I don’t object to that, we have no right to a show and tell on things that are between two people even in this age of the goldfish ball of social media.
This is a book that ticked all the boxes, and I am sure has been a success, but I have this feeling that with a better ghost writer we might have got a book that really engaged with the complexity of Johnannes’ story, a book that might not have sold as many copies but might have changed the world.
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Following on from Sacha Coward’s Queer as Folklore and Stephen Fry’s Heros this is a delight.
Seán Hewitt’s words and Luke Edward Hall’s illustrations work so well together – both are dynamic, colourful, sexy…
Many of these are extracts for longer tales – a handful of pages yet complete in themselves.
Much of it is lusty and joyful, but some of it is violent and abusive. These myths are about truth telling not white washing.
In some ways it feels like this is a timely reclaiming, talk of “greek” love by the likes of Oscar Wilde had for a time trapped these tales in minds of queer people in an unhealthy era. Now, as I said about Queer as Folklore, when we are being denied a history we need these stories, this is a joyful read but it is also a political statement - we have always been, we will always be.
I got this best on my love of Andrew McMillan’s work, and it was pleasing to find plenty of Fourteen Poems poets included …
I put tabs in the following :
Dinner by Galia Admoni – a great combination of food and heart break
The Boy I Shared a Tree With by Kit Ingram
Ballgown by Chris Beckett
Forever Young by Colin Bancroft
The Bed by Diana Cant
The Gazelle by George Ayres
Queer Time by James McDermott
Clutter Jar by Christopher Horton Bravado by Dale Booton
When my father was in hospital by Caroline Druitt
This Voice by Andrew Hodgson
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I read this in a single sitting on the plane / train home from Gran Canaria – it held my attention, it is a “page turner”.
The return to the underbelly of life in Glasgow is one that Welsh clearly enjoys writing.
I found it a much more successful book that A Lovely Way to Burn but I never reached the level of investment in it I did with The Cutting Room or The Second Cut.
My suspension of disbelief hovered in the balance – that Jim Brennan had managed to escape his beginnings and become part of the establishment only to be dragged back is clearly an interesting narrative device but something just didn’t quiet slot into place for me.
I tagged …
No Speech from the Scaffold, which concludes by saying that what matters “… is his conduct | as he rests there, while | he is still human.”
Snowfall, which concludes “… | I find an edgelessness.”
In the Tank, with it sense of clarity coming in to “the felon” in their cell.
Significant
Others
The unfolding of the AIDS crisis increasingly dominates this tale and Michael Tolliver’s loneliness.
As usual there are powerful ideas explored within the comedy to the situations that play out – weaving the two together – for example towards the end DeDe and D’Or share moment of mutual confession and forgiveness which is captured “In a burst of hideous insight, DeDe realized the depth of her commitment to this marriage. She had just traded adultery for a cheeseburger and an order of french fries.”
At one point Michael reflects that “nothing would ever happen, no one would ever care until straight people started getting it.” - that AIDS was just a gay problem and therefore for not worth worrying about – I think Diana played a big part in changing that for us, but we need to be constantly watchful for those things that impact the lives of the marginalised and minorities which we allow ourselves, as “normal” people, to ignore.
Sure of You
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This is the final of the first run of novels although it doesn’t read as a finale, so I am glad to know that this are more books for me to go on a read.
I think reading this directly after Black Deutschland set a context, both being set in a similar time, but I am not sure exactly what that context was…
There is a domesticity to this episode, the nesting of Michael and Thack had an echo of Hide by Matthew Griffin but it is there too, in a funny sort of way, in Brian and Mary-Ann’s break up. A particular ache and intensity of love in the ordinary not the Rom-Com soft focus fluff.
The shadow that HIV/AIDS hangs over Michael made me almost weepy – the fear about getting ill but also the stigma – we are still not over that, the dragging of heels to make PREP freely available is the currently playing out of the stigma, in not so subtle ways it reinforces our belief that gay men are dirty and should know better. It makes me feel sad and tired. We snatch space of our love, we can’t take it for granted.
Reading it in Gran Canaria I was mindful that staying in hotel where around a third of guests were same-sex couples you start to feel normalised in a way that you are not in day to day life, however much we have formal equality, and the chance to be in such space is a privilege.
Maybe the Moon
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This is not part of the “Tales of the City” but it is a close relation. Cady has a view of Hollywood based on being on the margins, because of her size, which perhaps allows the holding up of a mirror in a way a true “insider” could not do.
Maupin gives Cady the dignity of her sexuality, something that society struggles to do for people whose bodies do not fit the “norm”. In his playfulness he is able to explore “issues” without ever preaching at you.
Writing in 1992 a major part of the plot is closeted existence of a young gay actor – sadly this aspect does not feel as dated as it really should – there is some space for openly gay people within Hollywood but it feels like it is still a limited and contested space.
The Night Listener
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This is something of a Russian doll, storytelling within storytelling within storytelling, and the sense of nothing being as it seems is an unsettling delight.
There is something warm and reassuring about a Maupin book – surprising but familiar territory. I think it is enjoyable to read about the dysfunctional lives of people who happen to be gay. Being gay is not the root of the dysfunction – they have difficult relationships with lovers, with parents, but so do most straight people. It is a world complete in itself.
Michael Tolliver Lives
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This return to the Tales of The City clearly carried risks, the best part of 20 years had pasted between the publication of Sure of You and Michael Tolliver Lives – years when the world of gay men in liberal western cities was remade, 2007 may have been something of a high point (LGBTQ+ life seemed to be getting ever better, the pathway to full inclusion seemed inevitable in ways that now feel, frankly, naive) – it was a moment when it could almost have felt like there was nothing left to say.
But it deals with being a middle aged gay man – and I have to put my hand up and accept that I am perhaps reading this as the sweet spot in terms of my own life – lots of things drive the “Peter Pan” mentality of so many gay men, in this novel Armistead helps us let that all go and be ourselves.
There is also a little bit of a flavour of a greatest hits album, all the old characters are name checked in ways that give the faithful reader a warm glow but would be lost on anyone starting their journey here.
Mary Ann in Autumn
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Once again we have the familiar cast, and as with Michael Tolliver Lives it is an exploration of middle aged lives – how have the twists and turns shaped these people, how have they found happiness, how have they ended up still searching for it?
While it was an enjoyable read there was a moment about two thirds of the way through when I saw what the classic Maupin plot twist was going to be, how the seemingly unconnected parts of the narrative were going to turn out to be inextricably tied together – and I felt a little flat when the big reveal finally came as I tried to politely muster my surprised face…
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This collection of short stories allow Tom Cox to play with the enchantment of the world. In the tradition of folk tales, ghost stories, these have little modern twists – some it is the contemporary setting, some it is the ‘form’. Some have the mystical element front and centre, others it remains in the corner of your eye. Throughout it is his characteristic deep attentiveness to place that really draws you into the heart of the story telling.
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This exploration of Pulp’s 1998 album was enlightening, setting the album in context of their wider career when for me it had been my entry point to the band, indeed it is really the mainstay of my engagement with Pulp.
Therefore Savidge drawing a clear distinction between what came before and This is Hardcore makes me think again about it as I didn’t really know that much about what went before. I didn’t encounter it as different, as marking a change.
The close reading of the songs also showed how much of the lyrics went over my 17 year old head – the fact that it is about sex and drugs was not entirely lost on me, but the depths of those references certainly were.
I remember someone at Scripture Union camp complaining that they didn’t want to hear Jarvis Cocker panting and moaning on a record – but if I am honest that only made me like the album all the more.
This is a fascinating book, guiding us through 8500 years it deals with the gap between the physical remains that we have uncovered and the beliefs that will have shaped the way the dead were treated.
To go from artefact to belief inevitably requires an imaginative step. Prefacing each chapter with a short story of the burial, based on one of those discussed in the chapter, and bookending the word with poetry allows Cooney to bring that imaginative process to the fore.
Too often archaeologists present their interpretations as “facts”. We can make reasoned and reasonable inferences from the archaeological record, and from comparisons with practices in our own era – but we should hold those lightly.
Cooney shows that richness and complexity of the treatment of the dead across the vast span of prehistory, showing the development over time of some features but equally the way that this was in no way linear – some practices come in and out of favour, most periods are characterised by multiple traditions, and there is always the awareness that those represented in the archaeologic records are only a handful – the majority, mostly the overwhelming majority, are invisible to us. There is this unseen hinterland beyond the practices we can speak about archaeologically.
