On writing and looking back

Something else I did while the power was out was unplanned but not unprovoked.

From time to time, readers of the TJB books mention to its four writers, or on social media or book sites like Goodreads, that they’re reading the five Manhattan novels again (the fourth of those isn’t set in Manhattan but is connected peripherally with two or three cameo appearances by or references to the Manhattan characters). There are also people who say they reread my two Coventry books (especially A Coventry Christmas during the holiday season). There are still people who tell me Three Fortunes In One Cookie (written with Timothy) is their favorite of all the books I’ve cowritten (and some who contend that in The Deal, the main character chose the wrong man at the end, which always tickles me; as readers, we bring our own histories with us to the books we read).

I understand this compulsion to reread, because there are novels I’ve been rereading since I was a kid. They’re comfort novels, or novels connecting me to childhood, or funny novels that still make me laugh, or novels with love stories that I never tire of. There’s nothing like a satisfying ending to a love story. One set of novels I’ve reread more times than I could count, written in the 1940s/50s, is a series that tracks a family from the American Revolution to World War II. It connects me not only to my joy of reading as a young teen, but to my mother and sister, who also read, treasured, and reread the series. (Note: The last time I read these, I said, “Debby, these novels would be problematic now,” and she agreed. I guess they’re like early love: recalled with affection, but with awareness that it probably wouldn’t appeal to you at a wiser age.)

Additionally, beginning around 1990, I read a lot of gay fiction (and non-fiction, for that matter), much of it recommended by my late friend Steve, a bookseller and avid reader. It was Steve who said to me, “One day, when you write, please tell our stories. Please don’t let all these things be forgotten.”

In the early to mid ’90s, every attempt I made to do so (mostly in short stories) felt flat to me. It could be because I felt flat. There was a lot of loss to take in over a few short, intense years. I knew I’d rather write nothing than write it badly.

And then into my life came very much alive men who urged me to write those stories, and the three men who began to write them with me, with the outcome of that: books on bookshelves.

About those novels I wrote or cowrote: I read them so much when writing, editing, and proofreading them, that by the time they were released (usually about a year after the final manuscript was submitted), I didn’t have a lot of interest in revisiting them. As soon as a novel was released, I’d read it once, for two reasons: I looked for any errors that made it through all those sets of eyes (ours and our publishers), and I wanted to refresh my memory before I read industry reviews and reader reviews, and before I/we started getting reader email.

Not including short stories in anthologies, the nine novels I’ve written or co-written were released over the years 2001 to 2007. I likely haven’t reread any of them since their publication year, other than quick checks to ensure continuity (since characters are shared in the TJB books and they are linear, and the same is true of the Coventry books).

Upon the release of the TJB novels, I could say with pinpoint accuracy which of the writers wrote what scenes, as well as recall discussions of what edits were made by us to all of us. And now… I have discovered that’s no longer true. While the power was out, during daylight hours, I picked up the first Manhattan novel, It Had To Be You, and read it again. I was amazed by all the things I’d forgotten. I knew the general plot and how it would end, but mostly it was like reading it for the first time. The most startling thing was that I COULDN’T REMEMBER WHO WROTE WHAT.

All that made for a much more pleasurable read. I’d worried about a couple of things over the years: that the books would be dated (especially with how technology has changed); and that some things might seem insensitive, because we understand or are learning so much more about LGBTQ+ lives and issues in 2024 than we did when that first book was written (beginning in 1998 and up until publication in 2001). All of those concerns melted away as I got to read that book with fresh eyes. Would I rewrite the book? No. Are there word choices I might edit? Sure. Always. But none of that took away my enjoyment of the characters, the humor, the pathos, and the drama–because some characters are actors, female impersonators, or drag queens, of course there is drama. Drama is their profession. And after all, outside of novels, we are each of us the main characters/heroes/villains of our own ongoing stories.

I don’t know if I’m ready to reread all of the novels I’ve written or cowritten, but I don’t mind admitting that when I closed the back cover on this one:

I immediately returned it to the shelf and took out this one:

In both novels, though I couldn’t say for sure who wrote exactly what, there are points when I said, “OH, this sounds like me, and I hope I wrote that. Either that or part of it.” And points when I realized there are connections/similarities between things in those first two novels to things I’m currently writing. That leads me to believe those things were written by me, or if not, as I texted Timothy and Jim, “Don’t sue me.”