If you want to get MLVC60 — my latest labor of love with Anthony Coombs — and Amazon is being a bitch, you may order it here, directly, for $75 FLAT with free shipping anywhere in the world:
Easy fix: Just buy the book elsewhere, like Barnes & Noble — it's in!
Amazon has a problem when it comes to print-on-demand books, or at least it has that problem with print-on-demand books from Ingram Spark.
My MLVC60 book with Anthony Coombs just went on sale, but Amazon's link offers the above very deceptive result. From this result, it would appear my book is available, but at $89.80, not the list price of $75.
If you click in, you get another layer of deception. It still appears it's $89.80. But if you squint, you see there are new books at $75.
Finally, when you click on the $75 option, you get the actual book as sold by Amazon — and it is listed as temporarily out of stock. The message does say you can order it and will be notified when it's back in stock, but I can assure you most people have given up by now or ordered it for too much money from secondary sellers.
In reality, a print-on-demand book is never out of stock. But Amazon sticks to this silly message each and every holiday season with my books, and I invariably lose sales. Amazon has replied in the past that it has to do with Ingram Spark, and Ingram Spark has replied that it has to do with Amazon.
Order Here — Pick the $75 Option!
Bottom line, for you or anyone you know you would like to order: If you order at $75 directly from Amazon, it will be shipped relatively soon. Bank on it.
(Image by Curtis Knapp)
My new book, a co-production with Anthony Coombs, is here!
MLVC60 has over 1,000 Madonna magazine covers inside, it's hardcover and it's ready to order at Amazon.
It is currently up on Amazon in England and France, too, and will continue to pop up wherever you buy books online.
Welcome to the (Boy) Culture wars!
It blows my mind to realize that Boy Culture is now 13 years old — it turned 13 on November 6.
I am naturally technophobic; I avoided the computer classes that started just as I was entering high school, preferring to focus on more useful fare like British Tradition. (So glad I at least forced myself to sweat through my O.P. tops in the somewhat related typing class, which proved to be the most useful course I ever took.) Therefore, when I decided I should launch a blog to keep my writing skills from rusting over and to add my voice to the world, it was a challenge for me to figure out how to create one, and what it should or could be.
The first blogs I remember seeing were Towleroad and Page Six Six Six aka Perez Hilton, and I didn't even totally grasp how to read them at first. Visually, it was confusing. Content-wise, I of course cottoned to Towleroad, but Perez made me queasy — how were so many typos okay? (How are so many typos okay to this day for TMZ?)
I can still remember the joy I felt when I figured out how to post, how to upload an image and how to embed a video. I remember every time a post blew up, bringing in hits and new readers. I remember the longtime commenters, the trolls, the (not-exaggerating) stalkers, the anti-gay gays, the friends I met in person after they discovered my blog, the spam and the never-ending (and validating!) pitches and free tickets and photographers' snaps of half- or all-naked male models that I was sent and told to use at my discretion.
I've used Boy Culture to express myself, to help express others and to connect to people internationally. Have I built a brand? Maybe a very small one.
I've used it to show off my humor (both high and low), to flaunt my obsessions, to reality-test my sexual diversions and perversions, to laud the art I love, to lash out against the enemies of gay people and to broadcast my admiration for Madonna. Unfortunately, I've also had to spend time debating a long list of pathetically time-worn topics, everything from what free speech is, whether gay people should be expected to be liberal, why people who do not identify as racists can still do racist things, why it's okay to take photographs of people in public without their permission, why flamboyant gay people are not why homophobes hate us and many more. It gets exhausting, and I think it's a microcosm of why people get very concerned about their lawns as they age — they're sick and tired of engaging in the same debates over and over with new cycles of citizens.
I've used my blog to help me gather Kickstarter funds for my Encyclopedia Madonnica: 20th Anniversary Edition, and I will also shortly be announcing how to order my next book, MLVC60. It was very helpful in raising money for Boy Culture: The Series (which is shot and will soon be edited).
In spite of all these things, positive and negative, the blog has faced and continues to face some serious existential challenges. I was once part of a blogging network, earning a small but worthwhile amount of money each month from Google and other ads. Because I've always kept things on the verge of racy, this led to my expulsion from that network, and to a ridiculously unfair banning by Google AdSense that was, in part, the fault of my not being forwarded the exact image Google objected to, resulting in the image staying up for over a year. By the time I'd removed it, Google AdSense had apparently lifetime-banned me — and there is no way to get any representative to explain why or to offer any insight as to whether making changes could lead to my being welcomed back. Losing that sum of money every month year after year has been a drain, and it doesn't help that I still encounter people who earnestly believe this blog is my day job and primary means of support.
I have way too many Madonna mags ... soon, you will, too! (Images via Encyclopedia Madonnica Collection)
My next book — and likely my last Madonna-related book — is nearly here ...
(Images of Snoopy calendar by Matthew Rettenmund)
I can condemn Brett Kavanaugh for many things — but having access to his calendar from 1982? That one, I'm going to have to give him.
My own calendar from 1982, a Snoopy-branded month-by-monther that, in retrospect, looks like an ad for Gay Pride, sits in a box inches away from my desk where I work every day. When I saw Kavanaugh's calendar ...
... I reached down and pulled it out, wondering if it would actually be 1982 and not some other year. Nope. I was on the money ...
