Nicholas Snow

Floridian Venus Perez, a forty-something Latina who has been HIV positive for over two decades holds among her role models, not surprisingly, her medical team.  About the 2nd edition of her sought-after book, “I’m Still Here,” she explained, “We have come so far yet we are not quite there.  Many lives were lost yet many still live.  Many know the means of transmission, yet many neglect to follow it.  Many of us live the fast life, looking for excitement, for success.”

Venus was swept away at the age of 19 by a 27-year-old man in the greater New York area where she had been born and raised.  “I allowed him into my life at a very vulnerable time…  The relationship became intimate, and I never practiced safe sex,” she confided.

Ultimately, as Venus explained, “I reluctantly broke off my relationship…  After the breakup, I never heard from or saw him again.”

In 1986 Venus met and began to date a nice guy. A year later, on February 14th, 1987–Valentine’s Day–her boyfriend delivered the life-shaking news: “After handing me a gift, he held my hand, and said to me, ‘I have very serious information. Your ex-boyfriend died of AIDS.’  I asked him to repeat what he had said, and he did. I was silent.  ‘This can’t be true,’ I thought.”

Her life changed forever.  After more dramatic twists and turns as revealed in her book, Venus explains, “I had to decide whether I was going to fight or give up.  Did I have enough fight in me to fight the good fight?  I had to find a feasible method to give it my best shot.  I didn’t want to give up.  I decided I wanted to live!  Even though the results were grim, I wanted to try.”

“Nobody would know by looking at me that I had HIV,” Venus shared about finding a support group.  “We were newly diagnosed individuals with HIV (asymptomatic, showing no symptoms of the disease).  There were fifteen people who attended that day.  I cannot express how it felt to experience the long suffering and sadness and then the newfound release. We developed meaningful friendships and relationships.  We supported each other through good times and bad.”

That was over two decades ago!

Venus wrote and published the first edition of her book in 2006 to help those around her living with HIV who were having difficulty coping.  With the recent edition, she’s added two chapters which speak about the history, testimony, education outcomes and strength of people living with HIV/AIDS and other STD’s.

“Everyone has a light that shines within.  My gifts and talents consist of singing, writing, and enjoying time with family and friends in addition to socializing with people.  I always enjoyed people.  I surround myself in environments and places where I can exercise my gifts.  I offer to the world my ability to learn and to teach others which involves the gifts of service.  I try to be a positive person in the world exercising generosity, joyfulness, being hospitable and humble and reminding individuals that their life counts.  I try to be a positive influence in a negative world,” Venus concluded.

And she is!  For her books, please visit most online booksellers or her web site at www.VenusPerez.com.

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My West, the latest release from world-renowned and celebrated author Patricia Nell Warren (of The Front Runner fame), is “a sagebrush bouquet of 47 favorites on everything from agriculture to zest, by way of cooking, ethnicity, history, politics, sexuality and other subjects.” In his foreword, noted author/filmmaker Gregory Hinton, himself a born Westerner, says the book is “a masterwork by one of our most gifted storytellers. Patricia’s deeply evocative stories will quickly transport even the most dug-in urban reader to the heartland that is the American West.”

In our exclusive interview, my good friend Patricia explained that her “core audience” is both gay and non-gay, and that for both, “the open discussion of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgendered people in the American West, both past and present” is a new topic.

“I was inspired to do this book, by the way, in which the Autry National Center in L.A. stepped forward last year to become the first museum in the U.S. that directly addresses this subject. They did it when they put the two iconic Brokeback Mountain cowboy shirts on display in their gallery devoted to classic Western films.

Its action opened the door to producer Gregory Hinton’s ‘Out West’ program which is ongoing at the museum now, and promotes study and discussion of this theme in a really wonderful way. Gregory is also taking the ‘Out West’ series to other cities and states, mostly to museums, public libraries and other cultural institutions.”

The stories in My West are in sections which include among many Gender, Politics, Sexuality and Spirituality.  In the Gender section about native American berdaches, Patricia writes, “To understand how a Two-Spirit saw himself/herself, and how others in the tribe or band saw this person as well, a twentieth century American has to put aside all the traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs about sexuality, and even the western European non-Christian humanistic notions of sexuality.  We have to step through the looking glass, into a different world.”

In “It’s My History Too” in the Sexuality section, Patricia explains, “Though many Americans today think of the West as the phalanx of ‘red states’ on the TV map during election night, the West can surprise with its sudden shiftings of spiritual sunlight and shadow, its social landslides that can reveal unsuspected layerings of raw experience and ideological challenge. In fact, the West’s essential quirkiness has enabled all kinds of LGBT people to find something out here – from hiding places to homes. At times, we have not only survived here, but thrived here.”

In her own My West introduction, Patricia explains, “So my body of Western writing is rayed through a changing perspective over half a century – as I evolved from young hopeful college scribbler to published best-selling author. As I left Christianity to become an ever-questioning pagan. As I came out to live the life of a gay woman.”

In “Moments of Stillness” in the Zest section, Patricia gives us the perfect reason to curl up with My West: “SCW (severe communications withdrawal) is my term for what I experienced,” she explained about being isolated in a western bed & breakfast. “It’s a syndrome not yet studied by western medicine – but it does exist. Many of us live with multiple TVs in our homes; television even invades our cars now, where it compounds the uproar from radios, cell phones and CDs. Many of us spend the day with phone headsets on, or walk around with cell phones glued to our ears. We’re suffering from CA (communications addiction).”

Patricia concluded my interview by explaining, “So many people think of me as a fiction writer. But I’m also passionate about nonfiction – not just political commentary, but history as well. I love the challenge of thinking about how I have experienced Western history from childhood, and how I’ve come to have my own perspective on it.  Part of that history is how we LGBT people have been semi-hidden out there in the dust, and now we’re becoming visible.”

And for some breaking and fantastic news, My West, The Front Runner and other of Patricia’s titles will be available soon on Amazon’s Kindle.

SnowBiz Florida Agenda

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“I had a strong desire to write ‘Playground’ because I wanted to explore how a kid becomes a bully,” 50-Cent said in a statement announcing the book. “I drew on events from my own childhood and adolescence, but was excited to see the story take on its own life.

This book would have been very helpful for me growing up and now that I have a teenage son, it is my goal that this will have a positive influence on all teenagers.”

Colfer told Entertainment Weekly, “When I was 10 years old, I promised myself that if I ever had the opportunity towrite this book, I would jump at the chance. This book has been at the core of my imagination for a long time and I’m excited and nervous to share it.”