Tag Archives: Gay and Bisexual Books

Copperas Cove … A Review on Amazon

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***** – Copperas Cove – November 27, 2011

By R. A Rippy “rarippy” (Shelbyville, Tennessee United States)

This story takes place in 1954 during the segregated era. One man is on a journey to get away from his hometown and impending divorce to start a new life. His car breaks down near a small town in Mississippi (Copperas Cove) and he ends up staying there and his life takes a whole new turn. The racial divide is high and he ends up changing the way people think about Blacks by breaking down barriers and stereotypes that still lingered in the town despite it being the time of the demise of segregation. This book has it all that occurred during this era with lynching, beatings, murder and being falsely accused of a crime due to the color of your skin. There is romance and even a hint of homosexuality but as trademark of Martin Brant, it was tastefully done. I am Black and it hurt to read about the injustices done to my people during that time but it did happen and the sad part is that it is still happening today. Due to Martin’s outstanding writing style, while reading this book you will feel as if you are actually there while reading each page. Despite the subject matter, I really enjoyed this book and did not put it down until the last page. Some may be offended about the subject content of this book but it happened so it is what it is.

Available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and most E-book devices

A Review of Copperas Cove

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Review by: Douglas Gellatly on Nov. 07, 2011, on SMASHWORDS:

Martin Brant sure knows how to put a good story together, and he’s done it again in Copperas Cove. With the main character, Jonathan Scott, challenging his inner urges, readers are also left with a few challenges…be they where we all stand in the full spectrum of human sexuality or our attitude to racial discrimination.

Set in the USA deep south in the mid-nineteen-fifties, the tale is gripping/surprising/enlightening, and a whole lot of other “ings” which all amount to fascinating, and damn good reading.

One hopes that Martin can keep going with more of his stories, and I for one wait with eager anticipation.

What is this novel about?

When Jonathon’s marriage crashes around his head, pictures in a travel magazine inspire him to leave Pittsburgh to start a new life on the Gulf coast. Followed by phantoms from the past, he sets out envisioning the bliss of solitude and long lazy Saturdays on warm southern beaches. Maybe he can find a drugstore in Biloxi that needs a pharmacist. Maybe, if he meets the right woman, he can get these misguided notions about men out of his head.

 

The generator on his ’48 Ford coupe goes out fifty miles south of Tupelo, a long hot three mile walk to the next town, an isolated hamlet called Copperas Cove. Temporarily stranded, he finds himself having a hamburger at Rexall soda fountain, unaware that his destiny is taking shape in the mind of a young woman three stools down. Betty Marie, the quixotic town flirt, has taken an interest in him. Jonathon soon learns, if he’s looking for a job as a pharmacist, he came to the right place. Old man Peterson, the Rexall’s ancient pharmacist, has been wanting to retire for years Betty Marie quickly points out, that other than a beach, they don’t have anything in Biloxi he can’t find right here in Copperas Cove.

 

Simpler times in another era. An exiled husband facing life-changing events. An age old dilemma. A small town in the deep south. A brutal rape and murder. The bigoted dramas of 1950’s Mississippi … Ingredients all for a witches brew of emotion, mystery and intrigue. Copperas Cove weaves an unpredictable thread through the lives of all concerned, a thread that changes Jonathon’s life forever.

ALSO available at AMAZON and BARNES & NOBLE

An Excerpt from Copperas Cove

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To stretch my legs, I get up from behind the desk to check on Corley.  He doesn’t hear me walk in, immersed the way he is in his writing.  Plugged into the wall in the linen room, the extension cord lays on the floor across the aisle and into his cell.  He now has a small lamp on his table, along with a pitcher of water and empty glass.  Since he has no windows, I’ve left the fan back here.  Nevertheless, these hot summer days are unbearable; he has taken to leaving his shirt on the wall hook and going shirtless.  His shoes remain under the cot, which he leaves unmade.

For a moment I stand there and watch him, his broad sinewy back tapering gracefully toward his impossibly narrow waist, his mind totally absorbed in the work before him.  I find myself wondering why a young man like him doesn’t have a girlfriend.

“You hungry yet?”

He turns with a start.

“Uh, Tommy Lee’s suppose to be back around noon with your lunch.  I put him in charge of your meals.  Any complaints about food are his department.”

I see the hint of a smile in his eyes.

“Anything you need?”

“Haven’t had a shower in three days.” he says.

“Oh, yeah, that’s right,” I say, reaching for the cell key.

He leaves his jeans crumpled on the floor outside the shower room.  I sit down on the bench across the aisle and lean back against the wall facing the door to the front office.  Almost as if I’m compelled, my head turns toward him.  He’s standing beside the spray, adjusting the water temperature.  I find myself staring, wondering if all men secretly compare their penises to other men’s.  That’s something men don’t talk about, but I can’t think of a really good reason we shouldn’t.  Seems like it would be fun to walk over there, drop my pants and the two of us compare, maybe see which one stretches further.  There are some obvious differences.  For one thing the color: his is so much darker than mine, and it seems to hang a bit lower, probably compliments of this heat.   But there are also similarities.  Like mine, his is darker than the rest of his body, almost tar black, where mine’s kinda ruddy brown, not to mention they serve the same purpose.  Wonder he’s compared mine to his—he’s seen it enough times out at the lake, what little there is to see once it hits that cool water.  His doesn’t recede into his body like mine, it just hangs gloriously between his legs.

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Cassandra Mott’s Mysterious World of Debauchery

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From the third chapter . . .

“The ninth gate?  I … “ Johnny stopped mid-sentence, frustrated.  He felt gullible, like an innocent boy.  Cassandra Mott, obviously a woman of the world, was saying things that flew right over his head.

Her quick smile took on a hint of mischief and her eyes shifted to her brother.  “Perhaps Julian would be willing to show you the ninth gate.”

Like a lost lamb cowering between them, Johnny turned his gaze to Julian.  Their eyes locked.  Unnerved, he felt as if he were being looked at caged and unclothed.  Staring into the crystal blue eyes, he saw something he could not identify, not wicked, not threatening, but puzzling.  He drew from them a premonition, a kinship on some obscure level, and the feeling it caused ran through him warmly.  His curiosity ran wild.  He recognized an urge to know more about him, to hear his thoughts.

Johnny watched him come to his feet.  His eyes followed Julian’s hands to the buttons on the white linen shirt.  When Julian lifted it from his shoulders and laid it on the sofa, Johnny realized that he intended to disrobe.  He sat spellbound, his gaze fixed on the twitch and flex of a masculine chest.  Mired in disbelief, he watched Julian’s hands move to the front of the white linen pants and unfasten the buttons one at a time, while Cassandra remained attentive to Johnny’s unsuspecting reaction.

A different kind of unease came over him.  He tried to deny the sudden desire welling inside, a desire to see Julian’s body.  Feeling stimulated by this was wrong.  A man undressing should be perceived with indifference, though the promise of Julian’s nudity was unfolding before his eyes as a visual treasure.  Facing the laws of right and wrong, he should be indifferent, yet, against his conscious will, he had become eager for it to happen, as if a long dormant urge had been lying in wait. He wanted to see Julian undressed, to see his body, his male form, all of him.  But why?  Why all of a sudden?  Why these long forgotten urges between his legs and across the pores of his skin?  Why this sharp desire that he had so easily denied all these years?

The pants slid fluidly down Julian’s legs.  He stepped out of them, naked, his skin bronze, his forearms and legs and chest swept lightly with golden blond hair, his genitals inflamed and pendulous between muscular legs.  Julian walked around the low table, looking down at his guest, the guest that had become a taut mass of anxiety and nerves.

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Call Me by Your Name

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You’d like to find a thoughtful, well-written novel about like-minded men (or like-minded boys in this case).  You don’t want two naked men on the cover because you might want to read it in a restaurant or on an airplane.

Andre Aciman has written one I highly recommend.  It’s rare when you find yourself involved in the muscle and grit of a character’s innermost emotions, including desire that you’ll probably identify with and feel on the tips of your fingers.  This is one you’ll want to read twice; perhaps not right away, but the day will come you’ll want to relive this story.

From School Library Journal

Seventeen-year-old Elio faces yet another lazy summer at his parents’ home on the Italian coast. As in years past, his family will host a young scholar for six weeks, someone to help Elio’s father with his research. Oliver, the handsome American visitor, charms everyone he meets with his cavalier manner. Elio’s narrative dwells on the minutiae of his meandering thoughts and growing desire for Oliver. What begins as a casual friendship develops into a passionate yet clandestine affair, and the last chapters fast-forward through Elio’s life to a reunion with Oliver decades later.  Elio recalls the events of that summer and the years that follow in a voice that is by turns impatient and tender. He expresses his feelings with utter candor, sharing with readers his most private hopes, urges, and insecurities. The intimacy Elio experiences with Oliver is unparalleled and awakens in the protagonist an intensity that dances on the brink of obsession. [...]  His longing creates a tension that is present from the first sentence to the last. -Heidi Dolamore, San Mateo County Library, CA. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.


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