curated by scott alexander hess novelist/teacher/queer new yorker
The year's first bonafide "It Lit" hot debut, HIGH RISK HOMOSEXUAL was tagged "exciting...a breath of fresh air" by the New York Times in January.
Edgar Gomez came roaring out of the gay gates with a ton of social media sass making him one to follow. Check out Edgar's swirling line up of readings including a stop at trendy Brooklyn, NY Pete's Candy Store on March 13.
HIGH-RISK HOMOSEXUAL
A Memoir
By Edgar Gomez
287 pp. Soft Skull. Paper, $16.95.
I first came across the wonderful writer L.A. Fields in 2013 when she was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award for Best Gay Romance with her My Dear Watson. In that novel, the title character discovers that her husband shared more than adventures with Sherlock Holmes: they were lovers.
Nearly a decade later, Fields is back with Mrs. Watson Untold Stories (Lethe Press) a collection of historical tales sure to satisfy fans and new readers alike. I caught up with the author to find out what led to the follow up and of course, who she'd cast to play Mrs. W. in the film!
What inspired you to do this follow up?
These companion stories began with one commission from Steve Berman of Lethe Press for a Sherlock Holmes story fit for a Dorian Gray anthology. Since my version of Holmes exists in the real world with Oscar Wilde rather than the fictional world of Dorian Gray, I wrote "The Nightmare Pygmalion," which begins this collection. It's set shortly after the first book, My Dear Watson, leaves off.
I thought the story would be a one-time epilogue of sorts, but after writing a coffee table book of LGBTQ mini-bios, Gay A Day, with my friend and co-author Tyson Kadwell, I had too many more stories to tell.
So that project got your creative fire going and stirred up a lot of questions?
Did you know that reclusive poet and Latin professor A.E. Housman liked dirty jokes? Did you know that Bram Stoker wrote letters from the closet to Walt Whitman? Did you know that President Lincoln shared his bed with far more men than women, and liked the way Walt Whitman carried himself "like a man"? What about women with wives like Anne Lister, aka Gentleman Jack? Or folks called women who lived as men like Nell Pickerell, aka Harry Allen or Harry Livingston? How about Civil War veteran Albert D.J. Cashier, who was born Jennie Irene Hodgers, but buried with a soldier's send-off despite an unfortunate late-in-life gender reveal?
Don't even get me started on all the kings and queens, just read these stories instead—Mrs. Watson and Sherlock Holmes discuss homosexual royalty over tea, biscuits, and a game of chess.
Is this book very similar or different from the last one?
Mrs. Watson: Untold Stories has a far lighter tone than My Dear Watson, and in a lot of ways more optimism, camaraderie, and laughs.
When Mrs. Watson first meets Sherlock Holmes in the novel, she thought she was meeting her competition: a bad ex-lover of Mr. Watson's in her house, possibly to cause more harm than good. My Dear Watson is the story of that first introduction, and Mrs. Watson's summation of the tempestuous relationship Holmes and Watson had shared at Baker Street and before WWI. It isn't until the end that she makes a sort of peace with the reality of Holmes in their lives.
In Mrs. Watson: Untold Stories, that peace has settled in, and in the span of years between 1921-1939, the tolerance between Mrs. Watson and Holmes grows into friendliness and familial regard. No one else in the world knows or loves Watson as well as they do, after all. The more Mrs. Watson learns about the lives of contemporary gay, bisexual, and transgender people, the more she understands that love is love, and they're all in it together.
What makes this a uniquely LGBTQ+ book?
This book is 10 pounds of LGBTQ in a 5-pound bag. It's absolutely bursting at the seams with true stories of gay loves throughout the ages and across the world. But not just lovers, those who died alone too, heroes and villains, and folks living lives no one had the vocabulary to even name at the time. One of the stories talks of suicides, another of "Boston marriages." One takes place on Valentine's weekend, one during Halloween, and another over the Christmas holiday. There's a story for a new year, and one for a trip to the symphony.
In fact, you may come away from this book realizing that practically everything and everyone has been at least a little bit queer this whole time! At the very least you'll have a lot of scandalous conversation-starters for the rest of your life.
Who would play your heroine in a film version?
I think someone like Kate Winslet would hit Mrs. Watson's mark perfectly—halfway between astute and agreeable, able to be critical yet cheery when confronted with another wondrous and strange situation in her life.
Hot Lit Finale!
I was aghast when Kristen Stewart did not score a SAG nomination for her transformative work as Diana in Spencer. I am counting. on an Oscar nod on Feb. 8! This is a performance for the AGES so as Ru says Don't $%uck it up!
