Word Out 2013

Normally in this post I would be highlighting a book from my LGBTQ book list for Word Out. This time I have to deviate and tell you about a book that is not on the list that I just finished reading this weekend and it blew me away.

Natural Order is the second published book by local author Brian Francis and this book is an absolutely amazing piece of work. In what is clearly an homage to Margaret Laurence's "The Stone Angel" Francis creates an amazingly dynamic character in his anti-heroine Joyce Spark. Joyce is a somewhat bitter woman toward the end of her life and is living out her remaining days in a seniors residence. Her bitterness does not make her mean spirited, but just much more common sense and less willing to put up with nonsense. A new volunteer starts at the home – Timothy – and he reminds her of her deceased son. This new person sets off her memory and she reveals to the reader the many different significant moments in her life where she feels that she has made mistakes.

The first in this series of events (that seem unrelated but at the end all come together) is her first love Freddy. Freddy left town for Hollywood and never came back and was said to have committed suicide, but many years later Joyce finds out this may not be true and decides she wants to find out what happened to Freddy. There is a link between Freddy, the death of her son John and where she is now in her life.

Not wanting to spoil anything for the reader this is a book about gay men, but told from the perspective of a reserved and repressed woman who is unable to admit that some men are gay. I read this book in one go and was sobbing at the end. This book is remarkable and I would find it impossible to believe that this book would not have an impact on its reader.

Also Brian Francis will be the keynote speaker for the Young Voices conference this year in October and based on this book, his first book "Fruit" and his blog I see no way that he will not be delightful and engaging.