Movies That Made Me Gay – Larry Duplechan (Team Angelica Publishing)

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When I was a kid, my folks cleaned office buildings at night to supplement their day job incomes, leaving me in the care of my sofa-bound grandmother who lived with my widowed aunt. The TV was always on, tuned to the soaps or Mike Douglas or old movies of any stripe, so I was raised in the same 10 inch screen world as Larry Duplechan (they sold these movies in packages after all), and I absorbed my share of The Women, “Busby Berkley” musicals, Mickey and Judy pics, The Wizard of Oz, Franklin Pangborn, Little Rascals, and other childhood delights, and I’m sure they had a hand in shaping my lavender viewpoint. But Duplechan connects the dots both personally and culturally, putting many films important to him in a commonsense context that’s factual, entertaining, and inextricably entwined with his life.

Duplechan’s essays are mostly grouped by movies usually seen during a major holiday like Halloween or Christmas or his personal film festivals tied to Pride Month or Black History Month, a structure that allows him to explore an astonishing variety of films within each of these chapters–especially the latter. What’s more, Duplechan is a pragmatist when it comes to watching these fifty-, sixty-, and seventy-year-old films through today’s lens. Take, for example, the egregious idea of “blackface.” It has to be confronted as so many ex-vaudeville performers of that time period “blacked up” for a minstrel show number. Duplechan does an excellent job of deploring the practice while being objective enough to put it into, again, context for its time. By the same token, Duplechan gives a positive spin to the coded mannerisms of “pansy” actors such as the aforementioned Franklin Pangborn. It may not be ideal representation, but for a time, it was all we had.

Indeed, he’s not afraid to deliver the unpopular take, either. Consider his critique of William Friedkin’s adaptation of Mart Crowley’s The Boys in the Band. Revisionist criticism rails against the self-loathing in the film but Duplechan wisely looks past that and sees the love between many of these men. Of course, it always helps when the reader agrees, which I do.

But more important than the opinions about film–we all have them, after all–is the personal thread Duplechan weaves throughout. He takes great pains to explore not only those opinions but how he came to form them, treating their origins with frankness and a wicked, wicked sense of humor. This is particularly relevant to the section of the chapter on Black History Month when Duplechan takes us through the process of having one of his books, “Blackbird,” turned into a film. The twists, turns, and unintentional ironies of the incident make me grateful none of my books have been optioned (that’s a lie, Hollywood–feel free to call).

We all have those movies that made us gay, and reading this will being even more to mind. Duplechan has crafted a wise, warm, and very knowledgeable exploration of some of his favorites. May the next volume be even longer.

JW

© 2023 Jerry L. Wheeler

Little Nothing – Dee Holloway (Queen of Swords Press)

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Queen of Swords Press

In a Florida that is not quite our historical Florida, Johanna “Jonnie” Brunner is renowned throughout the town of Sawgrass for her ability to ride and train the limerunners, the deadly water horses that live in the swamps and streams flowing from the nearby Okeechobee Lake. Elizabeth “Bess” Ramsey, on the other hand, is known for working at her family’s inn, The Nag’s Head, and for her “little nothings”: knots, braids, embroidery stitches, and rhyming couplets taught to her by Maria, Jonnie’s mother, a runaway from a Carolina plantation. Maria and Bess both use this homespun magic to help the local woman look pretty (but not too pretty), bless marital unions, and to offer protection to Jonnie as she runs messages (also stitched in code by Bess) to the Union Army. But when Confederate soldiers overtake Fort Leon, and hatch a plan to exploit limerunners in general and Jonnie in particular (despite her being a girl, and a Black one to boot) in preparation for the imminent war, Bess’s magic may not be enough to keep her beloved Jonnie safe.

Little Nothing is a delightful mixture of the familiar and the that-seems-familiar-but-not-quite. For example, anyone who has read historical fiction set during the nineteenth century will feel right at home (there’s even a reference to Godey’s Lady’s Book); even the little nothings of Bess would not be out of place in any nineteenth-century fantasy (e.g., Orson Scott Card’s Tales of Alvin Maker). Juxtaposed with these familiar elements are the limerunners, who seem analogous to the kelpies of Celtic folklore (minus their shape-shifting abilities) but are just as dangerous (and apparently native to Floridian swamps).

Additionally, Holloway’s research into our historical Florida comes through in the diversity of her cast and even the geography. Her characters include fourth-generation Europeans of various Christian denominations, former slaves of African descent, and Maroons from Jamaica, who intermarried with escaped slaves and the indigenous Seminole. These cultural strands are plaited by Holloway into a greater “little nothing.” For example, Ada Nuit, the Maroon’s ghost queen, derives her name from as da nuite, the ghost procession from certain Spanish myths. And while the Spanish may no longer be in evidence, their influence on the local landscape remains (i.e., the Sanctus River, the local Catholic Church). My only complaint, such as it is, is that it would have been fun to delve into a little more of the different cultural strands (something explicitly Seminole, for instance).

Nevertheless, Little Nothing delivers fully on the Queen of Swords promise. It may be a novella, but it packs plenty of bold, swashbuckling derring-do, with enough mystery, romance, and magic to satisfy any type of queer reader. However, it is the fourth volume in the Queen of Swords Press Mini Series, and readers used to longer fare may find themselves at the end of the story sooner than they expect, especially given its breakneck pacing. This is just more proof that Queen of Swords Press needs to publish more stories by Holloway (hopefully further adventures of Bess and Jonnie).

Reviewed by Keith John Glaeske

New Releases for October

From Team Angelica Press:

Movies That Made Me Gay – Larry Duplechan

Buy/Preorder

From Rebel Satori/Queer Space:

Love(ly) Child – Emanuel Xavier

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The Body and Its Dangers – Allen Barnett

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Bleeding Stone – Brian Yapko

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Bonds & Boundaries – Dale Corvino

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Make The Dark Night Shine – Alan Lessik

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From Rattling Good Yarns Press:

Hippie Faggot Freak: The Making of a Gay Liberationist – Dale Mitchell

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Breaking the Rules: The Intimate Diary of Ross Terrill – Philip Gambone, ed.

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Soul Murder – Thomas Domenici

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Encore! Encore! – Elias Miguel Munoz

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From Bold Strokes Books:

Sweat Equity – Aurora Rey

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Mate of Her Own – Elena Abbott

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I Know About You – Erin Kaste

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Hands of the Morri – Heather K. O’Malley

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Pumpkin Spice – Tagan Shepard

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Taking the Plunge – Amanda Radley

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We Met In a Bar – Claire Forsythe

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Western Blue – Suzie Clarke

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Windswept – Patricia Evans

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Love Is a Poisonous Color – Marshall Moore (Queer Space/Rebel Satori Press)

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Rebel Satori Press

Marshall Moore is a master of the opening line. Whether it’s rooted in what passes for normalcy here (“Stuart Coleman died on the filthiest day of the year.” from the title story) or in Moore’s trademark absurdity (“The day Alexander’s sense of humor disappeared, we blamed it on jet lag.” from “Parts of Alexander Sometimes Vanish”), these openers reveal just enough story to hook you in without hinting at the twists that lie ahead in this most excellent collection of short fiction.

Urban angstmaster Moore has been on a creative roll lately, publishing a number of essays and short stories as well as a memoir, I Wouldn’t Normally Do This Kind of Thing, since his real life escape from the political and social strife in Hong Kong. It’s no surprise that the material appearing here was written during that period, as it reflects not only Moore’s usual delight in unease but a total deconstruction and refurbishment of reality, producing a Bizarro cubist world as alien as it is recognizable.

The focus in many of these tales is instability and how closely we skate to the edge. For grace of a tweak, we could be the owners of the sentient clothing populating “The Trousers Had Opinions of Their Own” or the hapless victim of intermittent missing components in “Parts of Alexander Sometimes Vanish,” the latter being particularly vivid. Moore’s prose is sharp and clear–as pointed as it needs to be to perform the sort of surgery we see in these pieces.

All of the stories have something to recommend them, but my favorites include “The Man Who Loved Airline Food,” a sublime melding of commerce and childhood memory, “The Brittles,” about one consumer’s appetite for human replicas (“Ted broke Melinda last night.” is my new favorite opening line of all time), and “Darjeeling,” a twisty tale about a psychic mum who murders her clients for a surprising reason. I also enjoyed the post-apocalyptic “Our Love Is A Gun That We’ll Point At the Sky,” which seems to be set after the MAGA takeover. A grim future, indeed.

If you like your fiction predictable and rote, this is not the place for you. However, if you enjoy off-kilter universes and narratives that defy your expectations, you should jump right in to Love Is A Poisonous Color. But mind your step. It’s tricky in there.

JW

© 2023 Jerry L. Wheeler