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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 17, 2000)
Southminster Presbyterian Church Music Minstries present Cutting edge A/T otherlode a in c o n c e r t A machete-wielding lover seeks revenge in Testosterone , and a redneck dyke comes of age in the sharp A Year of Full Moons Saturday, December 2 8:00 pm • Tickets $ 18 12250 SW Denney Road (Denney Rd exit off 217 @ Hall Blvd) Beaverton, OR 97008 (503) 644-2073 info A portion of the proceeds of this concert will go to benefit Nazareth House, Capetown, South Africa in their work with H1V/A1DS affected infants. “ I WAS PREPARED TO BE IMPRESSED AND ENTERTAINED. INSTEAD, I WAS SIMPLY BLOWN AWAY,** - D. P ascoe, con cert review L yn n F ran ces A n d erso n Getaway to the Oregon Coast... Join Lynn at C a f e U n io n t o w n 218 Marine Drive Astoria, OR Thursday, December 14th • 8pm Email lynntunes@mindspring.com to sign-up for Lynn’s email list. One lucky emailer will win a free House Concert in your own home with as many friends as you’d like to invite! Winner will be posted on www.lynnfrancesanderson.com BORDERS BOOKS & MUSIC 708 SW 3rd, Portland, OR Contact: 503-777-7999 • 503-735-3992 S ee w e b s it e fo r a sch ed ule o f perform ances UNLIM ITED ACCESS s 1 9 95/ m o • 59900/5 M 0S NO START UP FEES • CALL TODAY 503-240-8200 E-mail: info@SpiritOne.com 7302 N Richm ond A vo Portland O R 97203 fax 503-240-8205 L O C A L L Y OWNED • SERVING PO R TL A N D * VANCOUVER and online at www.lynnfrancesanderson.com They'll tune your engine. They'll fix your car. And as an added bonus, they'll save the planet. • m Winter's Coming!! Yet another goo4 excuse to sleep in. a futon that feels like a cloud! P D X Autom otive is a certified Eco-Logkei Business. ( 503 ) 282-3315 1916 NE Broadway 10-7:30 Mon-Sat esto ster o n e by James Robert Baker. Alyson Books, 2000; $22.95 hardcover. ¡f his story is not for the faint of heart. Testosterone is one of the most strange, angry, violent and deliciously quirky novels of the year. Deliriously fast-paced and highly charged with a dangerous eroticism, it is destined to become a cult classic, perhaps even outside queerdom. T h e book tells the messy, drug-heightened tale o f Dean Seagrave, a gay graphic novel writer and movie buff who suspects his lover, Pablo, has just tried to kill him by burning his house down as he slept. As he seeks out Pablo, he learns of the twisted, psychopathic behavior his lover has been hiding from him and real izes he is the only person who can stop this “emotional serial killer.” The first-person narrative is made extremely immediate and intense by taking the form of a transcript of tape recordings that Dean is mak ing as he actually searches the streets, bars and homes of Los Angeles— machete in hand— seeking revenge on Pablo: “PH tell you this much. I’m out looking for action, some very serious action, today. I’m seeking catharsis, a visceral catharsis— that’s what I’m up to right now. I’m a no-bullshit guy, and one angry queer, so don’t fuck with me because I’m on a mission. Attention all breed ers. You’d better part for me like the Red fuck ing Sea, because I’m plenty pissed off, and if you get in my way, I’ll ram your rear-end and squash your little baby.” O f course, as the novel progresses, one begins to wonder who the real psycho is here, Dean or Pablo. As Dean’s obsession for revenge escalates, his friends become more nervous and fearful for his own stability. The end of this novel is one of the most brutal, violent pas sages I have ever read and— I have to he hon est— one of the most satisfying. James Robert Baker was a unique new voice in gay literature, and his loss to suicide in 1997 was devastating to readers and fans. He wrote five books, most notably Tim and Pete and Adrenaline, both of which will soon be repub lished by Alyson Books. He was also a film maker and was highly praised for his cult hit Mouse Klub Konfidential, about a Mouseketeer turned gay bondage filmmaker. Testosterone is not a tale for everyone. But for those of us who occasion ally like a good mind-fuck ing, angry, erotic, roller coaster ride of a novel, this is for you. — Glenn Williams A Y ear of F ull M oons by M adelyn Arnold. St. Martins Press, 2000; $25.95 hardcover. (t 12-5 sun Beaverton 503.626.0400 12300 NE Broadway 10-6:00 Mon-Sat 6 12-5 sun www.cotton-cloud.com ond novel is not again set in a mental hospital, hut the envi ronment is equally stifling. Jos, a brilliant 15-year-old baby dyke, tries to grow up in a poor, working-class family in the redneck town o f Summit, Ky. Mom, once a talented musician, is relegated to the bedroom, where she is re duced to recovering from and producing more stillborn and premature babies. Her flimsy presence, com parable to Jane Eyre’s mad woman in the attic, forces Jos and her twin, Elbe, to run the dysfunctional family o f seven kids themselves. Dad, not much more than an unstable and cruel dic tator, regularly throws violent fits to exert his power and regain his personal sense of control. T h e man considers Jos a “failed experimental system.” A Year o f Full Moons stretches from its first chapter, “April is the crudest month,” in 1963 to exactly one year later with the final chapter, in which April is still “the crudest month.” The accurate illustration of Jos’ painful sexual awakening conveys Arnold’s sharp insight into the human psyche and unveils her strong sense of empathy. The lesbian awakening generally requires a temporary heavy toll, and that is genuinely represented in this cruel, yet enlight ening, year. A Year o f Full M oons presents a fairly typical lesbian coming-of-age story with a lot of classic ingredients. Jos does not want to wear women’s clothes or play with horsies. Bom a tomboy, she smokes cigarettes, changes tires and is interested in the mystery of explosives. Slowly hut surely, she develops a gaydar of her own and figures out both herself and the hypocrisy of her hostile heterosexual surroundings: “They’d want you to make them come and then they screech how they weren’t gay! Then they remind you you’re sick. And they might catch God and turn you in.” Interestingly, Jos’ first affair with another queer dramatically leaps off the classical track. T h e representative pupil-mentor romance is replaced with a short affair with a stem , sadistic riding teacher, which gears up rather abruptly and could easily be mistaken for a Pat Califia scene. Sim ultaneous with Jo s’ personal battle for civil rights, Arnold explores the whole backdrop o f turbulent racial, class and gen der issues festering in the early ’60s A m erican South. A lot o f issues at once but masterfully pulled together. — Els D ebbaut J£7] A YEAR Portland 503.335.0758 T A U T O M O T I V F Mechanics With A Conscience (end x-ray vision) iM M Q r w IiU k ¿Sec«««« Gerard Lillie *5934 N.E. Halsey ou could find it in the Lambda Award-winning Bird-Eyes, and it’s back in A Year o f Full Moons— the merciless, rigid structure of a diversity-blind society. Seattle author Madelyn Arnold’s sec- Y OF FU LL MOONS M adelyn A rnold will read from A Year of Full Moons 7 p.m . Nov. 29 at In O ther Words, 3734 S .E . Hawthorne Blvd. G lenn W illiams writes poetry, prose, plays, periodica and pom in Portland. E ls D ebbaut is a Portland free-lance writer.
