my new novella, out May 6 (Kindle) and June 1 (paperback)
A lot can happen in two days. For Tom Mollicelli, passing
out in gym class, being saved from a bully by his sister, getting drunk at a
party, going camping with his straight crush, and almost ditching a speech
tournament, all lead up to his first kiss from a guy.
Set in a small Ohio town
at the peak of the 1970s, Lessons in Teenage Biology offers a searingly
honest depiction of a gay youth struggling to just get through another day or
two.
– Larry Duplechan, author of Blackbird
and Movies That Made Me Gay
“Lessons in Teenage Biology is a delightful journey
back to a small Ohio town in the late 1970s. And it enveloped my attention
right away. That was my upbringing, though mine was years earlier and his
classmates were more hip and aware than mine. Through Tom, we hear his thoughts
about friends and high school classmates and imagined gay partners, as he
navigates a world of trying to fit in, to not stick out, and to still be
himself.”
– JD Doyle, author of 1981: My Gay American Road Trip
Lambda Literary Award-winning novelist Jim Provenzano brings a swift wit to
his latest story, which is actually his first. Hand-typed on a manual
typewriter in 1986, the author of seven subsequent novels and other works
recently rediscovered his early novella in a box of documents, then scanned and
converted the pages. While expanding the story, he retained its sense of urgent
eccentricity. While fitting for the Young Adult genre, Tom’s wild two days, a
somewhat autobiographical coming of age tale, will spark a nostalgic light for
readers who remember teen life in the 1970s.
I finally completed the trailer for my late uncle, John Rigney Jr.'s novel, "The Lost of New York." Yes, it was published in May 2022, but as the saying goes, better late than never.
In putting it all together, I realized there was a vast difference between my uncle's ability to hand-type his novel, as well as other stories, never knowing if they'd ever be published. Compare that to my spending a few hours on an upgraded video editing application to try to capture the tone and spirit of his book. This is after spending months scanning, editing and twice formatting it in book form!
If you didn't know the background of this book, you can read more on my website, which talks more about uncle Butch's story, and how he managed to assemble a novel, a few short stories, and parts of an incomplete novel. At the time he was dealing with drug addiction, unemployment, and being apparently shipped off to Alaska for a government job in lieu of a federal prison sentence.
So how did he manage to save all these pages with no such thing as a photocopier in the late 1950s and early '60s? He must've held onto it dearly. Did he own a typewriter? I don't know how he managed to do all this. His history is kind of lost, other than stories from my mother, and remembrances of repeated stories via my brother.
But his sheer determination is what inspires me. I'm pretty sure that the writing instinct comes from my mother's side of the family, although Uncle Butch was the only one who actually got this far. The fact that he'll never know that I actually ended up publishing his book –and made a few editorial changes, but basically tried to get the spirit of it and clean it up a lot– might amuse him.
In putting together the trailer, I was noting how technological advances have made it so much easier to put together a book and promote it. I'm part of the last generation that spans these two eras, the hand-typed manuscript, which I actually did a few times before I had a computer in the 1980s, to the now-commonplace ebook and audiobook. And then we have artificial intelligence that's basically rewriting books in a bootleg style and robots are selling them online.
For my technological advances over the years, I've had to make changes and adjustments and adapt. I have a website. I have a blog. I have social media. I've made video trailers for almost all of my books, because I can. Also, I learned all these skills after literary agents failed me, and publishers ghosted me, or were occasionally polite enough to reply with a 'No thanks.'
For Christmas, I bought myself a new Macintosh Mini after 11 years of dealing with an old one from work that was sluggish, but functional. So when I bought the new computer, I knew there would be a lot of changes to make. Specifically the video editing software, which is terrific (Filmora Wondershare; not a plug, but it actually works.
Oh, I also composed the music! I did a lot of that back in the 1980s, and fortunately the song I use totally fits the mood of Butch's book. When I composed and recorded it, we used cassette tapes, kids. The internet was not widely used by the public, and Uncle Butch manuscript sat hidden in a box in my parents' house in the attic.
Anyway, there are a lot of adjustments to make the basic things; moving text, old video, as well as lots of new doodads and ways to move things around. So it's a good thing that I waited to make this trailer, because there were certain things I wanted to do that we're unable to do in the previous version. And in Uncle Butch's time, I don't think there was any kind of book trailer.
The downside is that with the new computer, I forgot to export my bookmarks, so my passwords for virtually every single website that I use had to be updated and changed and verified, along all that other baloney that goes along with 21st-century technology.
Not that I'm complaining. Thanks for double-checking to make sure it's actually me doing this blog post, Google!
As I share my new book trailer on the Internet, perhaps even boost it on social media here and there, I'm happy that I was able to actually get this done. I've actually made a few hundred dollars off of Uncle Butch, so thanks for that. It's basically paid for the cost of publishing, etc. Mostly, it's libraries that have purchased it, another advancement that would make Uncle Butch proud.
I encourage you to give it a try. In paperback or e-book, it's a bargain because it's an archival document of lost era in our history, specifically, New York history and that of my family.
While the holiday shopping season may be over, authors like myself hope that you still consider buying books. A new outlet, along with a recently developed one, provide the opportunity to purchase books like mine from independent booksellers online.
One book that you won't find among those is my first novel PINS. I'll explain why, but first the good news.
ShopQueer.co is a new LGBTQ-owned online shop co-created by author Eric Servini. They're growing their inventory evevry day, and you can find the best recent LGBTQ books there.
It was very easy to use as an author. I simply entered my ISBNs of my books and in a matter of days they were (almost) all listed.
And with Bookshop.org, I was able to list almost all my books, including The Lost of New York, written by my uncle seventy years ago. The straight-themed novel, which I edited and self-published, doesn't quite fit into a queer-focused seller's inventory (You can read more about that on my website).
But why is my debut novel far and wide missing from these lists? That's because if you ask a bookseller for the copy, they'll look it up on the wholesalers list like Ingram and Baker and Taylor, which consider it out of print. But that's not true. In fact I still have about 150 copies left.
The problem is, since I closed Myrmidude Press as a DBA, I stopped shipping to Ingram, Baker and Taylor and other smaller book distributors. So, according to them, the book has run its course. You can also find use copies on Amazon and elsewhere, of course. And via e-books/Kindle, all my other books are available as well.
Having contacted wholesale buyers/resellers, they don't buy a case full of old books, especially more than 20 years old. Which make sense, but it would be nice if some smart professor added the book to their curriculum lesson that I can to ship some free copies to some university. PINS was part of nearly a dozen college courses years ago.
But with the flood of new LGBTQ literature, there's really no need for it right now and most people are reading online, and even on their phones.
But what bugs me is the idea that PINS is considered out of print when it actually isn't. Having self-published in a variety of formats, I have found that Ingram is the most dependable and easy for bookstores to find your books. Also, by not publishing through (evil) Amazon, indie booksellers are happier to carry your books. It is a bit of a hassle; you have to input chapter by chapter and the formatting can be difficult with a limited array of fonts.
And if you didn't know, PINS actually had two printings. The first edition was only a thousand copies. It was all just a big experiment to see if it would work. It did. After the success and reviews, I then ordered five thousand copies from the printer in Michigan. I review excerpts to the front and back cover; well, most of them. There were so many! And then cleaned up all the typos and adjusted the coloring on the cover art.
The idea of doing a third printing would put it back in circulation in any bookstore in the world. I'm considering it now and I understand that it's a lot of work when I have other books already in the process.
In the meantime, however, if you're reading this, and I know people aren't reading blogs much anymore, but feel free to inquire, send me an e-mail or a DM on my Facebook author page, and I'll be happy to send you a few free paperback copies of PINS while they last.
Or you could just go to your local library. I recently checked, and was happy to see that 84 U.S. libraries have a copy.
So until the next book project is under way, I'll consider revamping PINS one more time. It's done me well with a translation, a stage adaptation and an audiobook.
Among the recent reviews on Amazon, I'll leave you with this expanded insightful rave (with spoilers!) from reader Philip:
"Jim
Provenzano explores the homophobic teenage jock culture which sometimes
can escalate to ugly incidents in his 1999 first novel PINS. The
story is told through the eyes of 15-year-old sophomore Joey Nicci ("his
name was not pronounced Nitchey, but Nee-Chee, after which he was
dubbed Neech") who has just made the varsity squad wrestling team and
fallen for teammate Donald "Dink" Kohrs ("everybody called him Dink
because his penis was small -- Dinky Dick -- but the way it pushed up in
his sweat pants, Joey figured that wasn't always true"). While Neech
and Dink explore their mutual attraction, the team's bullies direct
their homophobic wrath against Anthony "The Whiner" Lambros who not only
is gay but perhaps more damning is a poor athlete who never wins a
match. It's a brutal ending for poor Anthony, and that tragic moment
becomes a turning point for Joey Nicci.
"Provenzano provides
an authentic voice in portraying the high school locker room, and
accurately captures every nuanced dynamic in this complex environment.
PINS honestly portrays wrestling's homoerotism and how that can result
into homophobic defenses among teenage boys, and captures the innocent
rough-and-tumble world of boys and how that can escalate into sinister
over-the-line violence.
"Joey Nicci is a
likable kid with a Jersey accent -- he wrestles in the "one-twenny-six"
weight class -- that makes me smile each time it comes out but it's not
so constant that you have to be fluent in "Nerk" (translated as "Newark"
in the King's English) in order to understand him. Neech is as nuanced
as the book. He's no choir boy but he's a good kid who in the end does
the right thing after appreciating that one doesn't go along just in
order to belong. It's also refreshing to see a teen character who
genuinely loves his family which is there for him in both the triumphant
and the trying times. "It's an Italian thing," as Joey says.
"God
bless Joey Nicci in PINS. Notwithstanding all the homophobic crap that
Neech went through on his high school wrestling team, he found love and
kissed a boy."
