Literature

Written works, fiction, poetry, short stories, quotes, memoirs

Lambda Literary has a new online home

March 3, 2010 in Literature, books by Antonio Cerna | No comments

Dear HN readers. For the past 2 months I’ve been working with LambdaLiterary.org to launch our new website. Well I’m happy to say that on Monday we launched and it’s been an amazing ride. Some of you may know that my background is in books, so I will always have a special place in my heart for literary culture.  Right now, I’m happy that I’ve helped build a place for queer authors and writers to congregate. I enourage you to check out the site and give us your feedback. Thank you to all the friends out there for the incredible support.  [Video: Karina Melendez of Word Is Up]

Mary Literary Launch Party

February 26, 2010 in Literature by smhayhurst | No comments

_MG_3375

The bow tied editor and publisher of ‘Mary,’ a literary quarterly, William Johnson, hosted a launch party Sunday at Duplex for the most recent issue. Johnson, who we met at the Fine and Dandy launch party in June, spoke with Homo-Neurotic last month about the DUMBO-based magazine that features gay writing and art. Check out excerpts from the magazine after the jump, including an interview with gay hip-hop artist Last Offence (Facebook page, Myspace page), the coverboy for this issue who joined the handsome crowd in attendance.

Nick Burd wins ALA Stonewall Book Award

February 1, 2010 in Literature by Antonio Cerna | 2 comments

Photo: Eric Luc

Great news! Last week, hN contributor/friend Nick Burd won an American Library Association, Stonewall Book Award, for his beautifully-written debut novel, “The Vast Fields of Ordinary.” We reviewed his novel last summer and we’ve supported Nick every step of the way.

Nick, from the bottom of our rotten little hearts: “You rock and you deserve that award!” Incidentally, 2010 marks the first year that the ALA Committee is giving an award for children’s and young adult literature—which makes the prize so much more special.

‘Letters of Note’
A blog of fascinating correspondence

January 29, 2010 in Fashion, Film, Literature, Music by smhayhurst | No comments

salinger_memo_intro

Let’s be honest; it’s probably going to happen in the near future. We’re going to see J.D. Salinger’s masterpiece of teenage angst and rebellion translated (twisted?) onto the silver screen. With his passing earlier this week, I imagine producers are circling the estate with hopes of securing the movie rights for The Catcher in the Rye (people are already salivating at the prospect of reams of unpublished works in his safe).

McSweeney’s Bazar of Literary Treasures

January 25, 2010 in Literature by smhayhurst | No comments

mcsweeneys

If your day is anything like mine, it’s punctuated by several short bursts of procrastination from work. I’ve found the gems of fiction, bizzare lists, and essays on McSweeney’s Internet Tendency—a division of the eponymous publisher that also puts out The Believer, Wholphin, and McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern—are perfect for a few minutes of diversion before tackling your bloated inbox or the pile of files on your desk. With contributors including James Franco, Spike Jonze, Francis Ford Coppola, Jonathan Ames, and a deep-sea spatulator there’s always something to tickle your fancy, and they even have a nifty iPhone app that pushes these pearls—including exclusive content not published on the website—to your phone.

Check out excerpts from McSweeney’s archives after the jump.

Gay On The Range | Vintage Books

January 16, 2010 in Art, Literature by Antonio Cerna | No comments

xbrothersinlove xfewoftheboys

Ryan Richardson may be our new hero. His website, Gay on the Range, is a stunning, hilarious archive of gay paperback book covers from the 50’s and 60’s. (The range, we assume, is a reference to Richardson’s Austin, TX home.) If you’ve ever spent time in the bathroom of New York’s Eastern Bloc (like we have), then you know exactly what we’re talking about here: unabashed, delicious smut.

Augusten Burroughs’ XXXmas Spectacular

December 11, 2009 in Literature by TPreston | No comments

You Better Not Cry: Stories for Christmas (Hardcover)

BOOK REVIEW | Whether you celebrate Christmas with your family in some god-awful suburb or spend it holed up in your tiny Harlem apartment trying desperately not to catch a glimpse of “A Christmas Story” (believe me, I know) the holidays are unavoidable. We all probably have one or two Christmas tales fraught with humor and tragedy. Just last year I watched my mother fall into the Christmas tree after downing several bottles of champagne with my friends and me. The next morning, she couldn’t join my father in taking me to the airport. She was busy throwing up. Never one to avoid basking in his own family dysfunction, Augusten Burroughs has released his own collection of homo-biographical Christmas themed stories, “You Better Not Cry,” just in time for the forced December gift exchange.

Gifted Holiday Guides

December 4, 2009 in Accessories, Design, Literature, Music, Objects by smhayhurst | No comments

christmas_giftsSnooty Doonan declares on high that to holiday gift guides we should say goodbye. “Fiddle faddle,” I say to that pecksniffian blatherskite. I appreciate their suggestions and the ideas they alight.

Such guides sift, sort and, I daresay, curate selections of gifts that I may never have come across otherwise. (I most likely wouldn’t have found his partner’s love/hate/joy/anger druggist ceramics were it not for the suggestion of a gifted guide.)

Both the Gray Hag and NY Mag offer fairly comprehensive guides that are always a good place to start, but I’d like to introduce a few sites I’ve used in recent years that have listed intriguing gifts or that focused on specific types of items (the sites themselves—mostly blogs—are worth a look as well). I’ve also included links to past year’s guides as they still have some interesting, if not entirely timely, suggestions. The next step, of course, HN’s own gift guide. In the meantime, though, I hope these spark some ideas.

Core77

Industrial design magazine

Journal of Popular Noise Solvate: outsource customer service haggling Piggy bank + altruism
‘Journal of Popular Noise’ Solvate: outsource customer service haggling Piggybank + altruism
BoingBoing

A directory of wonderful things

Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman's Co-creator Joe Shuster Get High Now (without drugs) Rolling Stone Cover to Cover: The First 40 Years (on DVD, searchable)
‘Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman’s Co-creator Joe Shuster’ ‘Get High Now (without drugs)’ ‘Rolling Stone Cover to Cover: The First 40 Years’ (on DVD, searchable)
Notcot

Catalog of ideas, aesthetics, and amusements

Glass vacuum coffee maker God is a Verb poster AK-47 ammunition ice cube tray
Glass vacuum coffee maker ‘God is a Verb’ poster AK-47 ammunition ice cube tray
Gizmodo

Gadget blog

Casio Exilim EX-FC100 Camera with 1000fps slow-motion video Panasonic X1: Best 42-inch HD TV under $1,000 Stellar sound: Shure SE110 earphones
Casio Exilim EX-FC100 Camera with 1000fps slow-motion video Panasonic X1: Best 42-inch HD TV under $1,000 Stellar sound: Shure SE110 earphones
…and for the swine lovers among you:

Neatorama

Mish-mash of nifty curiosities

neatorama_jelly_beans neatorama_floss neatorama_wallet
Bacon jelly beans Bacon floss Bacon wallet

To Be Smart, Stunning and Slutty:
‘Sordid Truths’ by Aiden Shaw

November 7, 2009 in Literature by TPreston | 4 comments

yhst-71760699885419_2079_5331141

MEMOIR | Hopefully you know who Aiden Shaw is by the “Sex and the City” reference alone. However, in case you are too young or too prude to know, Mr. Shaw was one of the highest, if not the highest paid gay porn star in history.

British born, he made his way through the California porn industry with his rugged good looks and one of the largest dicks in the industry. Today, retired and HIV positive, Shaw has turned his attention to other pursuits. To date he has written 3 novels, 2 biographies, (one of which became a best-seller), 2 books of poetry, produced and written 2 albums, and managed to get a masters in Creative and Life Writing.

‘Every Thing Design’ | Hatje Cantz

November 5, 2009 in Art, Design, Literature by Joe Roumeliotis | 2 comments

GIFT IDEA | With its 800 pages covering 700 design objects, “Every Thing Design“, from Hatje Cantz publishers, makes as great a doorstop as it does a beautiful coffee table book.

ETD_COVER_WEB

Designed by legendary book designer Irma Boom, the tome is the catalog from a show of the same name earlier this year at Zurich’s Gestaltung Museum, but rather than an afterthought, the book holds its own as a compendium of  a staggering array of print works, consumer products, fashion, and furniture from the museum’s collection.

Through images and accompanying texts, “Every Thing Design” touches on such questions such as: what is design?  What determines an object’s worth?  How have attitudes towards design changed in the more than 125 years of the museum’s existence?   Essays by Boom, MoMA’s Paola Antonelli, London’s Royal College of Art’s Glenn Adamson and others discuss such questions, in this book which moves far beyond mere eye candy.

“Every Thing Design” certainly makes a great gift for the design lover on your list this holiday season.  It can be purchased from D.A.P., Amazon, or your local bookshop (see stores on D.A.P.).

Following images from Amazon:

layout_WEB

Boys Gone Wilde – A Queer Poetry Salon

October 19, 2009 in Literature by smhayhurst | 4 comments

Wilde Boys October 09
“Wilde Boys is a queer poetry salon for beautiful boys who write and appreciate beautiful poems”, as its creator Alex Dimitrov puts it. The salon brings together established and emerging queer poets in New York City.

Organized and run by Dimitrov, a 2009 Sarah Lawrence graduate who now works at the Academy of American Poets, the salon meets monthly in Manhattan and Brooklyn at the apartments of various salon members, and frequently at poet Tom Healy’s West Village apartment. The first meeting was held there this past May and began with a reading and discussion of the poems of James Merrill.

“I wanted to create a smart and sexy gathering of queer poets where aesthetic, formal, and political issues pertaining to contemporary poetry could be discussed without pretension,” says Dimitrov. “I was, of course, inspired by the original French salons of the 17th and 18th century, and I also wanted to adopt Oscar Wilde as our patron saint.”

Isabella Rossellini Reveals the Incredible, Scandalous in ‘Green Porno 3′

September 25, 2009 in Film, Literature by smhayhurst | 3 comments

_MG_7507

Before becoming a model and actress, Isabella Rossellini’s first passion was animals. And, apparently, being filthy, she revealed at the ‘Green Porno‘ film screening and book signing at the Tribeca Barnes & Noble Tuesday evening. “I was always running after my dog, playing with cats, picking up dogs from the street—that was my problem. I took in all the dogs I could find and cats, and growing up in Italy there were many in the streets, and my house was always flea-infested. My father was going nuts.”

After a conversation with Robert Redford about an experimental internet video project that the Sundance Channel was pursuing, Rossellini found an outlet for her childhood interest in animals. And being filthy in an altogether different way. “He said, ‘If there is anything concerning the environment, I will be more inclined to finance it because that’s one of the missions of Sundance.’ And Sundance had a lot of programming called ‘Green House’—how to make your house greener—’Green Kitchen’—how to eat organic—but it didn’t have green porno! So I thought I will make a funny series to make two minutes film about animals that are very common—flies, earthworms, bees… because they mate in incredible, scandalous ways.” And thus Green Porno was born.

green_porno_shrimpCreated with Jody Shapiro, Rick Gilbert, Andy Byers, Sam Levy, and Claudio Campagna (the scientific expert introduced in the third series), these scientifically accurate films humorously portray animals’ reproductive methods with deceptively sophisticated construction paper costumes and props. Their artistic combination of the informative and the salacious have scored millions of views. And they’re exactly what would capture the interest and imagination of students. Rossellini noted that Green Porno is shown in some high school biology classes (they’re a good complement to the videos of promiscuous leather daddy carbon molecules for chemistry classes), although schools and sponsors alike have been put off by the name. “The only negative feedback sometimes is the name. Some people think that the name ‘porno’ is too frightening, so when we were looking for sponsors we couldn’t find any. On the other hand,” she explained, “It worked as bait. I don’t know if didn’t have the name porno we could find five million hits on the internet.”

O Brother, thou art kind;
Robert Smiths’ queer reading series

September 24, 2009 in Literature, Nightlife by hadjalexiou | 2 comments

“WE EAT OUR OWN,” said writer Robert Smith, at the first installment of his new queer reading series, Brother, My Lover at the Hose.

IMG_0640

Photo: Joseph Alexiou

“The name ‘Brother, My Lover’,” Smith explained later, “is to promote love and mutual respect in this community.”

The gay cannibalism Smith referred to was our tendency towards extensive cruelty to our fellow feys, dykes, and trannies. Smith wanted to create a communal project where everyone is  “welcome and as loved as I have always wanted and expect from the queer community,”—big surprise, he hasn’t found it yet in NYC.

The “PRO SEX, PRO BODY, PRO WEIRDO, PRO NON-WEIRDO PRO whatever U R, and having people SHUT THE FUCK UP and listen to what it is you got to say,” gathering recalled the Reading for Filth, a dirty queer reading series founded by the late Dean Johnson in the now-defunct Rapture Cafe.

Glenn Marla, one of Wednesday night’s readers, agreed.

“They have same kind of energy,” said writer and performance artist Glenn Marla, referring to Reading for Filth. Brother, My Lover, while not necessarily sex-oriented, encourages participants to “just be.”

Marla’s reading, delivered in his signature bubbly style, discussed his feelings on fertilization (at one point calling it the “world’s deepest fuck”) and how the idea of impregnating his girlfriend, although physically impossible, gets him off.

Spotted in the audience were several scene players, including a bespectacled Justin Bond (the performer, whose recent Sunday show at Joe’s Pub was very well received, politely declined a photograph), Earl Dax, and VGL boy Cole Escola (of LOGO’s Jeffery and Cole Casserole).

For Forks’ sake: My twisted ‘Twilight’ love

September 23, 2009 in Film, Literature by Adrian Muniz | 2 comments

TWIHARD-ON | In the last few weeks I’ve spent a lot of time repeating these five words to myself over and over: “you aren’t what you read,” “you aren’t what you read,” and it’s all Stephenie Meyer’s fault.

17-year-old Taylor Lautner plays shape-shifter Jacob Black in "New Moon"

JAIL BAIT | 17-year-old Taylor Lautner plays shape-shifter Jacob Black in "New Moon"

For the last month my entire life hasn’t been my own, it’s belonged to a family of vampires in a town called Forks, where one accident-prone human girl met the love of her life in the form of a Vampire who was doomed to repeat high school for all of eternity all because he was dying of the flu during that pesky turn-of-the-century pandemic.

Yes, my name is [redacted] and I am a fan of “Twilight.”

“But what exactly is ‘Twilight’?” I know, the thought plagues a lot of you. Some may think that they’re too old, too learned, or just too cool to care about this, the biggest literary phenomenon not involving Jesus or a boy wizard, and to those people I say this: you’re probably right. But after I say that I’m also going to tell you that maybe Stephenie Meyer has something. Like the Osmonds and Julie from the “Real World: New Orleans” before her, she has proven that Mormons can do more than just kill marriage equality in California: they can also entertain the masses.

Over the course of four books I have followed dutifully the many twists and turns that the journey of Bella and Edward’s love has taken, and though it might be easy to dismiss the series as just one in a stream of vampire related texts that have come into being over the last decade–”Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “the Vampire Diaries,” Eddie Murphy’s star turn as “Vampire in Brooklyn,” and “True Blood”–what Meyer has done is actually tap into the core of our emotional register. She has reached into the heart and soul of millions of boys and girls yearning to find their own true loves and shown us that even in the face of the many dangers that face the immortal ones that love can and will prevail…

Andrew Holleran’s Ode to Autumn

September 17, 2009 in Literature by Antonio Cerna | No comments

September_the_Light_changes

AUTUMN IN L.I. | BB Nichols’s recent essay about welcoming in autumn got me thinking about a short story I love by Andrew Holleran. It’s no secret that Holleran is one of my favorite authors — since I wrote about him here, and here, and here. This particular story is relevant now, because it chronicles the days after Labor Day on Fire Island.

Both the story and the collection are titled, “In September, the Light Changes” which was first published by Plume in 2000. Here, the nameless narrator (many of Holleran’s narrators are nameless) has chosen to stay behind in the Fire Island beach house where he and his friends have spent the summer. Holleran’s descriptions of the beaches, the water, the stillness of the island — I can only imagine, having never been there — are poetry.

Isabella Rossellini to Present ‘Green Porno’ at Tribeca Barnes & Noble

September 14, 2009 in Film, Literature by smhayhurst | No comments

SILVER SCREEN ROYALTY | Actress, filmmaker, and author Isabella Rossellini—daughter of Ingrid Bergman and Roberto Rossellini—will be presenting her Sundance Channel series ‘Green Porno’ at the Tribeca Barnes & Noble (97 Warren St.) for the release of her book and DVD on Tuesday, September 22. We fell in love with Rossellini’s series of short films documenting the hermaphroditic, homicidal, and hilarious sex lives of wildlife (check out some of the clips here), so we’ll be on-hand to report about her discussion and book signing.

‘A Memoir According to Kathy Griffin’ Preview: Oprah, Rhoda and the LGBTQI

September 9, 2009 in Literature by smhayhurst | 3 comments

_MG_7338

When I cracked open Official Book Club Selection: A Memoir According to Kathy Griffin and saw it started with “Have you ever looked at the online photos of Britney’s peesh?” I knew that two things were true. First, the three hours I spent huddling among hundreds of Griffin fans for her book signing at the Tribeca Barnes & Noble were worth the wait. The book was certain to satisfy my appetite for acerbic yet revealing celebrity gossip. Second, this would be the best book ever if it had come with scratch and sniff stickers. In her brief comments before the signing, though, Griffin promised her readers that the book isn’t just a translation of her My Life on the D-List schtick into print and that in it she examines the events and relationships that have shaped her and her vowel-challenged career. We’ll have a book review coming soon, but in the meantime check out these pearls from the interview and reading group guide included at the end of the book.

A conversation with Kathy Griffin (pp. 337-344):

Random House: State your name and profession.
Kathy Griffin: My name is Kathy Griffin, and I am a teller of dick jokes. And a plumber.

RH: This is your first book. Had you ever considered writing anything before? A novel? Or a scholarly work of history? Or a children’s story?
KG: I had not considered it, because I’d always been told by the nuns at St. Bernadine’s that my cursive was poor. A children’s story is an interesting idea. How’s this for a title: Waterboarding Preteens: The Debate Is Back On. I have a political side as well.

RH: You seem fairly obsessed with Oprah. Is this something you’ll ever outgrow?
KG: I will never outgrow my obsession with Oprah. Just as she will never outgrow her cardigan sweaters. Oops, she already has. Now look, that sounds like a dig, but it’s not. It’s called a struggle, and I’m on it with her. I support her. (Not as much as she needs those underwire bras to support her, because she’s got some serious ropes and pulleys going on there.) The point is, I worship her, and fear her at the same time. And believe me, that’s how she wants it. Don’t be fooled.

Juergen Teller’s influence

September 2, 2009 in Advertising, Art, Literature by Antonio Cerna | 2 comments

testuser5_jul2009_10_marcjacobs_jp140709_xtdtbk_bjwqtn

Photography by Juergen Teller, courtesy of Steidl publishing

ADV-ART // It’s not difficult to admit that advertising images have played an enormous role in the life of this blogger. If I think back to the image-makers who’ve impacted me most you’ll find some obvious names like Chris Cunningham, Matthew Barney, Julian Schnabel (my neighbor!), Julie Taymor, Larry Clark and, perhaps less well-known by fashion outsiders, Juergen Teller. I remember Juergen Teller’s adverts for Marc Jacobs like I remember Nadja Auermann and Claudia Schiffer topless for Versace Jeans Couture (vintage fashion by now). I remember Sofia Coppola in a swimming pool (back when we all believed she’d be the voice of generation Y2K — long before YouTube and Facebook); and Cindy Sherman, Kim Gordon, and Victoria Beckham in that ubiquitous white Marc Jacobs shopping bag; and Rachel Feinstein’s jungle-red lips, loose locks and blonde sable fur coat. Those are the glamour-defining images that will haunt my own sense of beauty long after I stop caring for Tim Hamilton and Rick Owens. Lucky for me, there’s a new book with these such images — Marc Jacobs Advertising 1998 – 2009, by Juergen Teller — available now from Steidl (US $120.00). Let the 90’s nostalgia begin.

Photography by Juergen Teller, courtesy of Steidl publishing
Photography by Juergen Teller, courtesy of Steidl publishing

L.C. ‘Candy’ Possibly Delicious? | Review

August 27, 2009 in Literature, Uncategorized by TPreston | No comments

LC IN WONDERLAND // While the mainstream media covered Lauren Conrad’s (aka LC from the Hills) ‘LA Candy’ the moment it was released, it took Homo-Neurotic a bit longer to stomach the idea of reading it — and even longer to get through the first twelve of forty-five chapters.

lc-la-candy

However, once you reach Chapter 13, ‘L.A. Candy’ grows into pure, unadulterated, trash gold. A girl on a reality TV show writes about a girl on a reality TV show! How one can begin to wrap one’s brain around this concept is beyond me.

Much like LC’s show “The Hills” itself, the book begins with entitled, fussy rich girls chatting about boys while they scout out new watering holes. The lead character Jane and her BFF Scarlet move to LA together to start a new life, a thinly veiled representation of Lauren and Heidi Montag (the now super-fame whoring slut extraordinaire of Spidey notoriety).

The story drags as Lauren gets an internship with a Nazi PR woman (*cough* ‘Teen Vogue’ *cough*) and spends close to 100 pages documenting what they’re wearing while on bad dates or while at glitzy LA hotspots: “She had chosen a peach top with ruffles down the center, tucked into a red, high-waisted chiffon skirt that ended just above her knees.” It’s really thought provoking stuff and probably the only contribution from Lauren herself who wrote the novel with “collaborator” Nancy Ohlin.

But just as one begins to suspect that millions of trees were wasted to produce this most trivial, contrived storyline, the book takes a 90-degree turn for the better.

Stripped Uncensored: in print & in the flesh

August 21, 2009 in Art, Literature by smhayhurst | No comments

Stripped Uncensored

With the promise of an adult-themed exhibition of artwork and a living erotic sculpture garden, we stopped by the New York LGBT Center earlier this week for the Stripped Uncensored release party. An anthology of homoerotic art published by Bruno Gmünder, the volume is a follow-up to Stripped – The Illustrated Male. We first heard of Stripped from illustrator Glenn Hilario who when we met him at Richard Haines’s show at Envoy Gallery last month mentioned that his work would be included in the book.

The diversity of artists featured in the book was reflected in work displayed at the event—x-rated cartoons, sincere oil portraits, playful abstracts, and tack-sharp graphite drawings. The pieces that really caught our eye, however, were the ones not in the book—the boys in the beach-themed living sculpture garden.

Check out the interactive preview of the book as well as more photos of the boys and the artwork after the jump.

_mg_6752

5840_1114989276704_1286117798_30344618_1373528_n 6531_1187724176779_1338555378_30498997_968983_n

_mg_6726

« Older entries