Loud Whisper

Clifton Snider's first published novel

Now available from  Xlibris Corporation,
International Plaza II
Suite 340
Philadelphia, PA 19113
Order directly from Xlibris by telephone:  888-795-4274, x.276
Or online at www.xlibris.com/LoudWhisper.html
Trade paperback edition available, 180 pages.
Now also available as an eBook.

Author photo by Mario Hernandez.



"Loud Whisper is the story of a bisexual, charismatic leader of a popular rock band in Long Beach, California. . . . [It is] the story of a talented but troubled musician involved in the drugs, alcohol, and sex associated with the world of the popular music industry and, in particular, rock bands. . . . Snider has a keen ear for dialogue, which is almost invariably natural and flowing. . . . [he] accepts gayness and bisexuality as a given aspect of contemporary life with no moralizing or special pleading. What sexual drama is present involves the realization of Adam, matured by suffering, of his love for Mark."--review by Arnold T. Schwab in the International Gay & Lesbian Review.  To read the entire review, click on the title of the journal.

Loud Whisper is the story of Adam (Zed) Avery, the bisexual front man for the 80's rock group, The Spacs.  Through the eyes of various characters, Adam's story of fame, addiction, and recovery from a drug-induced, paralyzing accident gives the reader insights into worlds most people never experience.

Description

Adam (Zed) Avery is the hub around which the spokes of this novel revolve. Sexy, impulsive, reckless, he is the dedicated leader of a Southern California rock band called The Spacs. Beneath his defiant veneer lies a sensitive, literate, generous individual. The product of an upper middle class family, Adam is never content for long with the numerous obsessions that occupy him, including drugs.

The members of The Spacs include Danny Devil, Adam's school friend and the leveling influence on the band; Davey Dynamite, the Hispanic keyboard player; Adrian Cocksure, the sexy bass player; and Brenda Cashew, the alcoholic leader singer until Adam replaces her in that position. Other key characters in the novel are Mark and Melanie, Adam's lovers, and Henry Langford, the reporter from the national music magazine, Nitty-Gritty.

The Spacs had begun to achieve national prominence when, at a concert at The Forum, drugged and lacking self-confidence, Adam falls from the stage, paralyzing himself from the neck down with, doctors say, no more than a ten per cent chance of his walking again.

The novel opens with this concert and quickly moves into Mark's story. Langford has come to interview him for a feature article on Adam and The Spacs. The following chapters tell Adam's story through interviews with the other band members and Melanie, so that the point of view changes with each chapter.

Then the focus switches to Adam in the hospital and his long struggle to recover and eventually return to the music business. The theme is recovery from drug addiction and a self-destructive life style and from the paralyzing accident caused in part by the addiction. Love is also a theme, combined with determination and a spiritual awakening.



Loud Whisper is the third of three novels I wrote in the 1980s, and I am grateful to Xlibris for the opportunity to see it in print at last.  The Spacs are very loosely based on a Long Beach, California, band, I met.  However, the characters I've created are entirely fictional and bear no actual resemblance to anyone living or dead.

The first of my novels, Bare Roots, about a boy born in Wisconsin and raised from age seven in Southern California by a divorced mother, is also available from Xlibris.  Bare Roots is a coming out/coming of age novel whose protagonist, Justin Crystal, learns to accept his sexual orientation through an intense but ultimately broken relationship with his roommate at a fundamentalist college in San Diego, California.

The second of my novels, Wrestling with Angels: A Tale of Two Brothers, is the last of my novels published by Xlibris.  It is a fictional memoir of my gay older brother and me, focusing on the friendship of the two brothers, Darren and Brandon in the novel, Darren's disappearance under ominous circumstances, and Brandon's dealing with that and with his own alcoholism.


Note: Loud Whisper is available through Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com, but the least expensive way to purchase it is directly through Xlibris.
 


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Read "Hilda," a short story by Clifton Snider.
Read about his last two books of poetry, The Alchemy of Opposites and Aspens in the Wind.
Read about Clifton Snider's book of Jungian literary criticism.
Read "New Age," a poem from The Age of the Mother.
Read about his other books of poetry
and his latest, Moonman: New and Selected Poems.

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--Copyright © Clifton Snider, 2013.  All rights reserved.

Page last revised: 16 March 2013