Dale Peck

Sixteen-year-old Daniel “Sprout” Bradford is gay. It’s not a secret, not even in their conservative little Kansas town, although perhaps Sprout would like to think that it does not define him. Neither are the facts that Sprout’s father is an eccentric alcoholic, his mother is dead, and he is their English teacher’s shining hope for winning the annual statewide essay-writing competition.

Sprout’s sexual adventures have always been “closeted”—literally and no pun intended. show more Then he meets Ty, and his world explodes. Ty is odd, religious, a little scary, and a victim of abuse. When he and Sprout share, however, is something that Sprout had never dreamed of experiencing. But their relationship must remain a secret, otherwise Ty’s father will kill them both. Or so Sprout thinks.

Who is Sprout really hiding from? Has he truly come to terms with his sexuality?

SPROUT is a hilarious, heartbreaking, and important addition to the world of GLBT literature. Dale Peck’s writing style is fascinating: reading SPROUT is like entering the mind of a highly intellectual and insightful teenage boy. Sprout frequently goes off on linguistic tangents that occasional distract, but more often add to the genuineness of the story.

While the plot moves slowly, I believe this was okay because the book is more like an elaborate character sketch of Sprout. It is not what actually occurs in Sprout’s life that is important, but rather his thought process that gets him to where he ends up at. By the end, you want to live in Sprout’s world, be his friend, have his friends. You want to have conversations with him, console him when he is distraught, advise him when he is being dumb.

SPROUT is a 2009 must-read by a talented author whose insights and wonderful way with words will take him far in the near future. Sprout may say that his book will never be allowed in school libraries, but I hope that that doesn’t deter everyone from picking this book up and learning something from this precocious young man. show less

This is the first time I have ever not finished a book I received through Early Reviewers. But I couldn't do it. I ragequit this book during the very first disc. The rampant and obvious misogyny in both the writing of these stories and the narration of the audiobook are appalling. Male audiobook narrators: please stop doing high, nasal voices for female characters. You don't sound female; you sound deranged and bigoted. Male literary authors: please stop exploiting female pain for the sake show more of your "art" - it's crass.
Absolutely do not recommend. show less

Mouthy, catty, bitchy. Smart and articulate too, though that should be taken for granted. Peck's selling point and sole outstanding characteristic (there are others who write as well or better) is his unabashed snark. Come to the judgments themselves, he's sometimes right, often wrong, and who really cares? If you read him at all, you read him for the atavistic spectacle of criticism as bone-crunch and blood-spew. The corollary being that when he gives the hatchet a rest and tries to talk show more straight, he's as dull and plodding a critic as most. show less

Dale Peck's Visions and Revisions is part memoir and part historical and cultural analysis written in a fierce, tight and poetic style that brought me right back to those horrible and life-changing days before protease inhibitors. While not a full history of ACT UP it gives an excellent sense of what it was like to organize when it was a matter of life and death and there was nothing to lose. While sometimes it seems as if it was so long ago and that the communities that was created, show more especially in large cities, have moved on, I still see remnants of it in #BlackLivesMatter or in Occupy Wall Street (and of course the biggest debt also goes to the Civil Rights movement) or in the organizing in the Trans community. I love Peck's bold style and his ability to write about his sexuality in a raw and unapologetic manner and his rage at a government that did not care whether gay people lived or died. The last part of the book "13 Ecstasies of the Soul" knocked me flat out (and I agree with the reviewer who said it reminded him of "Love Alone: Eighteen Elegies for Rog) and I confess I wept and then began reading the book again. Thank you Edelweiss for allowing me to review this book for an honest opinion. show less