I was giddy when, only an hour after I sent an e-mail to her, NancyKay Shapiro replied saying I could call her at home in the evening and she’d be happy to talk with me about her debut novel “What Loves Means To You People.” I stumbled across her book on the recommended reading rack at the W.R. Castell Central library. The cover displays a gorgeous black and white photograph of a muscled arm embellished in colour with a swallow tattoo. I could tell by the title that this was a queer novel and I eagerly checked it out and took it home.
The story unfolds in New York City. An older gentleman observes a young man while out at a shoot for his advertising agency. The gentleman is Jim and the young man, as we quickly come to learn, is Seth. Seth came to New York from his small town of Drinkwater, Nebraska to become an artist and leave his abusive past behind. As each character catches the other’s eye, all the potential of their relationship is foreshadowed.
The first part builds on this relationship, establishing the truth behind their love for each other and the struggle that their significant age difference creates for them. There’s also the foreboding cloud of a little lie Seth told during their first date. As their relationship deepens, so does the lie and for Seth, its importance. As long as he keeps it close he feels that his life with Jim will be unblemished by the truth and he can go on living contentedly in the arms of the man he loves.
Part two brings on a huge challenge for Seth as we go to Drinkwater, Nebraska and the story of Seth’s sister, Cassie. Cassie has her reasons to escape as well, and when the opportunity presents itself she comes to New York and finds her brother. This temporarily throws Seth for a loop as he prepares to have Jim discover the truth. For a time it might seem like all things will work out but as we all know, nothing is ever easy for fictional characters. The best books always have as much conflict as they can hold.
My first question for Shapiro was about the location choice for Seth’s hometown. The book refers to Lincoln, as well as Drinkwater. Anyone familiar with the book ”All She Wanted” or the more popular movie ”Boys Don’t Cry” will find the names familiar. Indeed, Brandon Teena lived in Lincoln, but Shapiro said this wasn’t an influence on her choice.
“It took me about ten years to write the book and I had already chosen the location of the middle of the country to play as the antithesis of what Seth wanted,” Shapiro told me. She can’t recollect on whether she had even heard of the Brandon Teena story before she started her novel, but she’s pretty sure that she hadn’t. Initially her intent was to write the story from Cassie’s perspective and focus more on her. She wanted a naïve young woman from a mid-west town in the big city atmosphere of New York. Nebraska was her choice for no other reason than that. As for moving away from Cassie as her choice of main character, it seems that both Jim and Seth grew on her. She declares them as her favourite two characters on an equal level.
On her website Shapiro has a little piece about why she wrote the novel. She says she has been asked on occasion why, as a heterosexual woman, she chose to write a story about gay men. She honestly states that she “…never set out to write this novel with a social message.” She simply wanted to portray a story of love that could be about any two people. Her own fascination with gay culture was a part of the inspiration, but, as she said while I was talking with her, she wanted this to be something anyone could relate to. It’s not just a gay novel as she has seen by the overwhelming responses from women who loved the book. It’s a story about relationships, about people and about how we all fit in this world. Well, she did an excellent job of portraying this and I, for one. look forward to seeing her next work.
“What Love Means To You People”
By NancyKay Shapiro
www.nancykayshapiro.com
