Mama’s boy
by Dustin Lance Black
This is a painful, honest book about being queer, poor, different and loved. It’s a memoir from a famous LGBTQ role model (& husband of diving champion Tom Daley). It’s also a beautiful elegy to the authors Mormon traditional mother and to all mothers and the power of family, honesty, understanding and accepting difference, and following your own truth. An Oscar winning screen writer – Milk – and activist Black examines his very humble and poor rural upbringing in Texas. It’s not a narrative you hear much of in America, with it’s shiny, comfy lifestyles, but Black lets us see the struggle his mother went through to both support, feed and protect her family. And to accept that they were not going to become the straight Mormon boys she was hoping for.
He’s honest about his own failings, always reassuring in a memoir, and acknowledges people who have inspired, helped and supported him. His mother comes across as a working-class heroine, full of fire and social justice and unconditional love. Finding ways through their vast difference to understand and respect the choices of her family. Elevating past variance to find connection and hope.
The book moved & touched me with its honesty approach to grief, loss and the difficulties of moving on. He holds up the real angels in his life, his brother and mother, both now dead. With a candour which is unsentimental but tender and embracing tells us their, and his story. Always focused slightly off himself, showing how he stands on the shoulders of his family to become the proud, strong and remarkable humble man he is today.
Blacks book resonated with me, my own poor humble start in life and the way that some of us are so very lucky to have mothers who have fire in their hearts and who pass on and light a flame in ours, fuelled by love. Recommended.
Out Now: £16.99
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