One Gay American

Genre: Memoir

Published by: Coffee Town Press

Pages: Paper Back

Ratings: 7 JAGS

 

Dennis Milam Benise return memoir; One Gay American is a beautifully crafted coming of age, coming out story. Benise takes the reader on brief history lessons of the strides the people of the LGBT Community have accomplished, all the while making parallel connections to his own personal struggles.

As a child born into 60s, Dennis grows up in the conservative Mid-west. From an early age, he realizes he is way different than other boys his own age, all the while navigating a secret fascination for wedding dresses and Barbie Dolls from his passive aggressive parents. Dennis learns to cope with his effeminate mannerism by joining theater, where he eventually finds his future wife at the young age of 19 and gets married.

Dennis Milam Benise’s One Gay American is a wonderfully written story of real life, and the obstacles that we all face to find our true identity-and with that, true love. Dennis’s matter of fact approach to the foibles of everyday life as a young gay man is stereotypical in most period memoir pieces of similar fashion, but his monologue shines brightly as he puts forth a connection in his growth of being a shy effeminate male, to an out and proud gay man.