Novel Update

It's been reviewed, edited, re-reviewed. I've drafted a query letter, obsessed over the name and hyperventilated over the probability of colossal failure. So next week, likely, I will jump. My plan is to send queries out first to agents, then small and mid-size publishers, then vanity presses, and when they reject me, I'll self-publish. (Jokes.)

But seriously, it's a short coming out/coming of age novel about a boy whose life is seriously complicated by his alcoholic mother, and how he breaks out of all that. I'm not thinking that's a mainstream kind of a thing. The more conservative members of my extended family will shun me for even suggesting there a gay person might deserve peace and happiness. My mother will not approve, but she will still talk to me. Then comes the next hurdle: There's sex in it. Two paragraphs. Maybe I could put instructions in it: "Dear Mom, don't read page seven."

And then, there will the people going, Anne Bauer? Who the hell is Anne Bauer? She's not gay, so how could she possibly tell the story right?

All I can answer is this: I've loved men. I've felt a good deal of my life like an outsider passing for normal, afraid of being found out and exposed. I've researched and checked my work with people who do know. (Two of my gay friends said, "OMG, I'm surprised, but you got it right.")

I wrote it as it was given to me and I was as surprised as could be when Micheal turned out to be gay. When I tried to write stuff that didn't belong, I couldn't make it work. So, for better or worse, this is the story given to me at this time; this is what I will go forward with. If it's supposed to be helpful to somebody, it will find a home.