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Rich Merritt during his career in the Marine Corps. (Photo courtesy Merritt)
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HOME > SOVO SCENE > BOOKS
By: MATT SCHAFER
COMMENTS |
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that helped launch their writing careers help
brighten the spring calendar. Just next week,
three writers with Georgia roots and huge
lesbian and gay followings kick off an abundant
season for literature.
Pulitzer Prize winning author Alice
Walker returns to her home state March 25
to speak at Emory University. On March 27,
Atlanta novelist and playwright Pearl Cleage
returns to Charis Books & More for a reading,
and memoirist Rich Merritt reads from
his first novel at Outwrite Bookstore &
Coffeehouse, where he used to read and
watch people approach his first book,
"Secrets of a Gay Marine Porn Star."
“I would love to sit at that counter and
watch people and their reaction,” Merritt
says. “I remember two young guys picked
it up, and one says ‘Sure, this guy has
some issues,’ and I was like, 'I can’t disagree
with that.'”
Merritt's memoir not only made waves,
but also put him on the path to leave Atlanta.
As the book found its way to success, Powell
Goldstein, a top Atlanta litigation firm,
released him from a contract. The firm made
clear it was because of the behavior detailed
in the book, not just because he was gay,
Merritt says.
“After 'Confessions' came out, I was unemployable
in Atlanta,” he says. “No one wanted
to hire me because of the taboo surrounding
porn.”
His new book, “Code of Conduct,” follows
a fictional gay Marine who falls in love with
a Marine helicopter pilot.
Merritt now works as an attorney in New
York City, and writes because it’s something
he loves.
“I’ve spent so much more money on promoting
my two books than I’ve ever made on
them,” he says.
him to find more work and focus on his writing,
but Cascade Heights novelist Cleage
finds inspiration in her Atlanta neighborhood
and at Charis Books & More, one of the
oldest surviving feminist bookstores in the
country. She has been visiting the bookstore
almost since its inception.
“Charis is a place that not only gave us all
the books that you could ever want, that you
couldn’t find easily anywhere outside of
New York, but it gave us the books and a
place to get together with other women who
were feminist women,” Cleage says. “Charis
is a place where I actually feel that I grew
into my feminism. That is where I discovered
it and was able to nurture it.”
She returns to the store with each
new novel, and it's always one of her
favorite stops.
“At Charis, what I always find is an audience
of bright, conscious women, and a few
good men, who understand exactly what I’m
talking about,” she says. “It’s like going
home ...”
Many of the fans who came to see the
reading of Cleage's sixth novel, “Seen it all
and Done the Rest,” at the Margaret Mitchell
House on March 17, were black women. But
Cleage is often surprised by who appears at
her readings.
“I didn’t think about it in that way, 'will I
get this audience, or will I get this audience,'”
she says. “What I’m always trying to
do is to tell the stories that I know in as honest
of a way as I can. All different kinds of
people show up in my books, and I think that
is one reason why my readers are all different
kinds of people.”
Cleage also reads at Outwrite on April 20.
Walker’s hometown of Eatonton, a home
she has told reporters she never felt comfortable
in because of the labels people place on
each other. This will be her first appearance
at Emory since the university archived her
papers in December. The reading, which is
expected to reflect a broad swath of her
work, is among the highest profile literary
events this season.
Outwrite owner Philip Rafshoon says his
store has partnered with the Alliance
Theater to bring in yet another big name
author, but until the final contractual details
are in place, he can’t release details.
“It’s going to be big and it’s one of our
customer’s favorite authors,” Rafshoon teases.
“That’s all I can say about it.”
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