On Sunday, July 13, Troy Ford joined me for our second QLP Book Club hosted via Substack LIVE, to discuss his debut book, Lamb.
It felt especially appropriate to finally talk to Troy because, when I launched The Queer Love Project last summer, he was one of the first people I reached out to since he also hosts and runs Qstack, which is an invaluable resource for all the LGBTQ+ creators on the platform to find and support one another. He also answered the QLP Questionnaire! By now, it feels like we’re old pals, but it’s only been emails and DMs—so this was our first time officially talking.
We discussed the many autobiographical elements that informed Lamb, including Troy’s time attending a California prep school and the friend of his who inspired the character of Lamb (aka Willam Broeder) and the the great line by D (the narrator of the novel), who stated: “I guess we all look at our friends through the lens of me.”
In particular I was intrigued by the erotic and platonic love between D and Lamb and the elastic nature of gay male relationships. As Troy writes from D’s perspective:
“We fooled around a couple times back at Wolcott, but having to hide that we were gay from everyone just sort of sealed this bond between us. In some ways, it was more intimate than sex—I didn’t need a fuck buddy, I had a hand for that. Two!”
To dig deeper, I asked Troy to explain Lamb’s sexual dynamics, in particular the fact that he’s a big, 6-foot-6 punk and a bottom, which disappoints many potential hookups.
“I think Lamb being a bottom, and the whole question of gay men and their elastic, fluid relationships is a really rich topic of conversation,” Troy explained. “The tone of the gay community changed significantly after AIDS hit, and sex became a much more fraught dynamic between gay men. After many years when it was gays vs. the world, the does/doesn’t he have AIDS/HIV introduced a gay vs. gay question that severely curtailed the ‘I fuck my friends’ attitudes of post-Stonewall gay liberation.”
We also discussed Troy’s years of sobriety and the continuing issue of substance abuse in the gay community. “We want to present this idea of having it all together,” he explained. “But the reality that is not a lot of people’s experience. … A lot of my fiction deals with the ‘less glamorous’ sides of being gay.”
“Do you think, above all else, your book Lamb is about the need for gay men to shed shame and fear?” I asked.
Troy had a wonderful response, so make sure you watch the video to hear it in his words. (Hint: It’s around the 45:00 minute mark.)
If you haven’t already secured your copy, Lamb is available in paperback or ebook at Bookshop.org, Barnes & Noble and Amazon. Plus, as Troy mentioned: If you buy the book—either ebook or paperback—through any retailer wherever you can order or find it, he will comp you a six-month subscription to his newsletter, FORD KNOWS. Same goes if you review it on either Goodreads or Amazon—because authors depend on those reviews!
Big thanks to
, , , , , Michael Horvich and many others for tuning into my live video!
