Exploring how the world has shaped him as a queer Latinx person, Gomez debuts a humorous memoir.
Edgar Gomez is the main character.
While there’s a humorous tone through the memoir, Gomez found sharing his life story daunting.
Soft Skull
The biggest takeaway is in the title risk.
What did you want to explore?
However, as a queer person, I feel like you start with zero pride.
What does it mean to you to put a queer Latinx coming-of-age story into the world?
It still feels super surreal, to be honest.
I didn’t see people like me on TV.
There wasQueer As Folk,Noah’s Ark,The L Word.
I related to them on a queer level, but these weren’t my lived experiences.
I would watch these shows or read books by people like David Sedaris.
My expectations were different from the reality of my experiences.
Part of your coming-of-age story is your coming out story.
There are so many different [versions] of coming out that aren’t explored enough across media.
Another way I thought about this book is each chapter I’m coming out in different ways.
In the first chapter, I’m coming out to myself.
In the second chapter, I’m coming out to a boy at school and my classmates.
I come out to my mother, I come out as femme, as a sexual being.
There are like a million different ways we can explore what it means to come out.
That’s also an idea that should be mined more.
You don’t necessarily owe it to anyone to reveal yourself.
It’s a privilege to let people know who you are.
You discuss the connection you felt to Jennifer Lopez growing up.
What was it about her that drew you in?
I really needed that fantasy to keep me going on a straight-up day-to-day basis.
You include your experiences at Pulse and some information about Omar Mateen in the book.
Can you talk about why you decided to include that additional context?
One of my impulses to write is to process my chaotic and difficult memories.
Pulse was one of those things.
I just had a lot of questions about the shooting and the aftermath.
Mainly why it happened; another was figuring out why I didn’t want to visit the memorial site.
I wanted to give context as a person from Orlando and Omar Mateen’s life to answer those questions.
How do we prevent shootings like this from happening again?
I wanted to verify I approached it with care and respect and not retraumatize my community.
I’m not excusing him, but I experienced a lot of what he did.
[High-Risk Homosexual] is a story about how the world shapes who we are.
We have to acknowledge how we’ve been shaped and start to unpack that.
In addition to Pulse, you include some background information about PREP, The Castro, and Stonewall.
It would have been hypocritical of me to erase the people who made my life possible.
I wanted to make room for as many experiences as possible in other people.
I don’t know when another book like this is gonna come out.
Your baby is out in the world.
What’s next for you?
I am working on another book.
Poor looks very different for everyone, and it’s not a competition either.
They’re all gonna have to do with money.
This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
