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Au Bon Pain: Six Stories, One Life
In six stories, Au Bon Pain follows a young, gay Colorado man from confused college student to established literary editor.
In “Straight People and Their Problems,” Gabe struggles with his attraction to one of his male roommates while getting ever more entangled with a pretty, pregnant party girl.
In “Forgive Me, Father,” Gabe hurries home to his parents’ working-class suburb, sure his cancer-stricken father is already dead. On his way, he agonizes over his father’s destructive role in Gabe’s romance with his African-American boyfriend.
Working in Europe, Gabe runs into a former college friend. Seduced by Paris’ light and heat, and despite her engagement, he falls “Half in Love” with her. Gabe escapes to Barcelona and smack into an affair with an aging male model, only to learn he really can’t escape what he felt in Paris.
In his first career -- as an airport security representative -- Gabe travels the globe in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. As a hoax on his boss, he composes phony “Postcards from Condi Rice” only to discover he may be on the receiving end of a much more complicated and dangerous deception.
Now established as an editor, Gabe again confronts raw power when “The Archbishop Comes for Gabriel.” When he protests the homophobic exclusion of his friends’ child from a Catholic preschool, Gabe must face the Archbishop’s passion and ruthlessness.
Web research leads Gabe to rediscover his first boyfriend, lost decades ago and now a renowned scientist. “Au Bon Pain” unfolds in the rendezvous spot where Gabe finally learns the true reason for their cruel and sudden break-up.
Naïve, virginal, and sexually confused, Gabe Mangan evolves through these six stories with the gains and losses of love and livelihood. Even as he succeeds, Gabe wrestles with self-delusion and misconceptions across every stage of adulthood.
In “Straight People and Their Problems,” Gabe struggles with his attraction to one of his male roommates while getting ever more entangled with a pretty, pregnant party girl.
In “Forgive Me, Father,” Gabe hurries home to his parents’ working-class suburb, sure his cancer-stricken father is already dead. On his way, he agonizes over his father’s destructive role in Gabe’s romance with his African-American boyfriend.
Working in Europe, Gabe runs into a former college friend. Seduced by Paris’ light and heat, and despite her engagement, he falls “Half in Love” with her. Gabe escapes to Barcelona and smack into an affair with an aging male model, only to learn he really can’t escape what he felt in Paris.
In his first career -- as an airport security representative -- Gabe travels the globe in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. As a hoax on his boss, he composes phony “Postcards from Condi Rice” only to discover he may be on the receiving end of a much more complicated and dangerous deception.
Now established as an editor, Gabe again confronts raw power when “The Archbishop Comes for Gabriel.” When he protests the homophobic exclusion of his friends’ child from a Catholic preschool, Gabe must face the Archbishop’s passion and ruthlessness.
Web research leads Gabe to rediscover his first boyfriend, lost decades ago and now a renowned scientist. “Au Bon Pain” unfolds in the rendezvous spot where Gabe finally learns the true reason for their cruel and sudden break-up.
Naïve, virginal, and sexually confused, Gabe Mangan evolves through these six stories with the gains and losses of love and livelihood. Even as he succeeds, Gabe wrestles with self-delusion and misconceptions across every stage of adulthood.
- GenresM M Romance
170 pages, Paperback
First published March 20, 2012
33 people want to read
About the author
Lee Patton
11 books13 followersAfter growing up in an immigrant-lumbering-fishing town on California's Mendocino coast, and after college in Sacramento and San Francisco, I headed to Colorado to teach high school and work on my M.A. in Denver University's Writing Program. I still enjoy Denver's mellow city life, exploring the Rocky Mountains and the redrock canyons of western Colorado and southern Utah.
In the late 80's I joined a group of fellow poetry-writers assembled by Metropolitan State College professor Sandra Doe. We began to gather monthly, rotating hosting duties and proffering "affordable" bottles of Yugoslavian wine as we discussed each other's work. We continued the monthly sessions faithfully (even after Yugoslavia collapsed in the early 90's) and have done so to this day. To original groupies Sandy, Mell McDonnell, and Patty Holloway, we have added Denver poet Carson Reed.
At the same time, I found myself inspired to write plays for Denver's legendary Changing Scene, dedicated only to new work and artistic collaboration. That led me to develop plays around Denver as well as Arizona, New Hampshire, Oregon and Alaska, then Off-off Broadway in New York. Among my favorite experiences was working with renowned, adventurous director Jeremy Cole at the beginning of his career. He helped me develop NOT HEADHUNTERS and re-staged my first produced play, TORTURE: AN INTERROGATIVE COMEDY.
A scholarship sent me to London to study theatre, where a jealous-love murder threat in our dorm inspired the fictionalized events of my first novel, Nothing Gold Can Stay, (which I published as Casey Nelson to avoid embarrassing my fellow students and teachers in the U.K.). In the second novel, Love and Genetic Weaponry, I explored a completely fictitious Hitchcockian-paranoid-romance set among very real Western landscapes.
I'm also wrapping up a long-term creative nonfiction project in collaboration with journalist Kristen Hannum, an exploration of the American South and Southern identity. I have blogged about it at http://southwithinus.com
In the late 80's I joined a group of fellow poetry-writers assembled by Metropolitan State College professor Sandra Doe. We began to gather monthly, rotating hosting duties and proffering "affordable" bottles of Yugoslavian wine as we discussed each other's work. We continued the monthly sessions faithfully (even after Yugoslavia collapsed in the early 90's) and have done so to this day. To original groupies Sandy, Mell McDonnell, and Patty Holloway, we have added Denver poet Carson Reed.
At the same time, I found myself inspired to write plays for Denver's legendary Changing Scene, dedicated only to new work and artistic collaboration. That led me to develop plays around Denver as well as Arizona, New Hampshire, Oregon and Alaska, then Off-off Broadway in New York. Among my favorite experiences was working with renowned, adventurous director Jeremy Cole at the beginning of his career. He helped me develop NOT HEADHUNTERS and re-staged my first produced play, TORTURE: AN INTERROGATIVE COMEDY.
A scholarship sent me to London to study theatre, where a jealous-love murder threat in our dorm inspired the fictionalized events of my first novel, Nothing Gold Can Stay, (which I published as Casey Nelson to avoid embarrassing my fellow students and teachers in the U.K.). In the second novel, Love and Genetic Weaponry, I explored a completely fictitious Hitchcockian-paranoid-romance set among very real Western landscapes.
I'm also wrapping up a long-term creative nonfiction project in collaboration with journalist Kristen Hannum, an exploration of the American South and Southern identity. I have blogged about it at http://southwithinus.com
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
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January 9, 2013I had to sleep on it before I came up with a review that would make some sense about how I felt. The emails exchanged between the Archbishop and Gabriel were fascinating unfortunately there was no resolution to the conversation or points being made. Too much to tell and not enough story to get all the details I wanted. Religious and political statements on certain wartime atrocities are all well and good if they can be elaborated on. It felt superficial because of the confusing issue of another story-line being told at the same time. I think I would have liked it better if the poems were the focus of the story. Too short to make any sort of impact, sorry not really my cup of tea and I won't be rating it.
June 18, 2012
Reviewed for Hearts On Fire Reviews
I had a very difficult time figuring out how to rate this one because it was so sad to me. Gabe is a successful magazine editor, who is trying to verify “many-toed flax”, a noxious weed. What keeps coming up on Google is “marshy toadflax”, along with the eminent professor who has studied it, and may win a Nobel prize for those studies, Dr. Adam Schneider. Dr. Schneider also happens to Gabe’s first love, the man he lost his virginity to and the man who completely heartlessly destroyed them, and Gabe’s innocence and sense of self-worth along with it. Gabe spent years being a slut, a screw them and dump them, all in an effort to prove to himself that he wasn’t the stupid virgin who wasn’t worthy of someone’s time. My god, he made me cry. He keeps no photographs or anything on his desk and keeps people at a distance. Eventually, he does become more adept at being closer to people. No, not close. Just closer.
When he contacts the great Dr. Schneider, Adam is interested in meeting. He blows off the horrendous way he ended things “I always wondered why we drifted apart”. Wanted to hurt the man. They do end up meeting, and Adam explains some things. I didn’t buy it, and I still hate him. Gabe apologizes at one point (I feel like I wasn’t there for you) and oh, that hurt. The story has such a bittersweet feel to it. Gabe is ashamed of his innocence then, when it was a shining, lovely thing. Years later Adam is trying to show him that, but it’s way too late, isn’t it. Adam has ruined something precious in Gabe, and while Gabe did battle his way back, there is no regaining that.
It has such a melancholy feeling to the story, lost hope and lost potential. The fact that there is career success didn’t really matter to me, my heart hurt for Gabe. Adam? Well, he can go to hell. The author makes you feel for them, that is for sure. Wow. I just hated Adam so much, and I had no sympathy for him.
I had a very difficult time figuring out how to rate this one because it was so sad to me. Gabe is a successful magazine editor, who is trying to verify “many-toed flax”, a noxious weed. What keeps coming up on Google is “marshy toadflax”, along with the eminent professor who has studied it, and may win a Nobel prize for those studies, Dr. Adam Schneider. Dr. Schneider also happens to Gabe’s first love, the man he lost his virginity to and the man who completely heartlessly destroyed them, and Gabe’s innocence and sense of self-worth along with it. Gabe spent years being a slut, a screw them and dump them, all in an effort to prove to himself that he wasn’t the stupid virgin who wasn’t worthy of someone’s time. My god, he made me cry. He keeps no photographs or anything on his desk and keeps people at a distance. Eventually, he does become more adept at being closer to people. No, not close. Just closer.
When he contacts the great Dr. Schneider, Adam is interested in meeting. He blows off the horrendous way he ended things “I always wondered why we drifted apart”. Wanted to hurt the man. They do end up meeting, and Adam explains some things. I didn’t buy it, and I still hate him. Gabe apologizes at one point (I feel like I wasn’t there for you) and oh, that hurt. The story has such a bittersweet feel to it. Gabe is ashamed of his innocence then, when it was a shining, lovely thing. Years later Adam is trying to show him that, but it’s way too late, isn’t it. Adam has ruined something precious in Gabe, and while Gabe did battle his way back, there is no regaining that.
It has such a melancholy feeling to the story, lost hope and lost potential. The fact that there is career success didn’t really matter to me, my heart hurt for Gabe. Adam? Well, he can go to hell. The author makes you feel for them, that is for sure. Wow. I just hated Adam so much, and I had no sympathy for him.
August 28, 2016
Reviewed for heartsonfirereviews.com
This is the story of Gabe, a gay college student living in a two flat with other roommates – Conrad downstairs who has a rich father and mysterious stretch Lincoln errands; Rain who has a rich father but works as a janitor to assert her independence; Russ who is Rain’s boyfriend but knows of Gabe’s crush on him; and finally Candy who isn’t really a roommate but parties with Conrad and becomes friends with Gabe. If it sounds convoluted, it sort of is.
Conrad and Russ are both jerks in different ways, though possibly Conrad ends up being the bigger one. Rain is sweet and unsuspecting of her boyfriend’s jerkiness. The saddest part of this whole thing is Candy, who really is a decent person and deserves more than she ends up with. When she talks of “straight people and their problems”, she really encompasses just people and their problems.
This book addresses a short amount of time in the life of Gabe, but it’s so odd (like Gabe and Candy sleeping naked and kissing. Why do they do that, if Gabe is gay and not attracted to her? Randomly sleeping naked with your friends doesn’t seem like the Gabe of the rest of the story). He has visions of things that could be, which won’t be, and that was sad.
This probably needed to be a longer story to make sense of everyone. As it is, we are kind of tossed into a maelstrom of ugliness on several fronts and it was saddening, particularly to think people do in fact act that way. Heart breaking for both Candy and Gabe.
This is the story of Gabe, a gay college student living in a two flat with other roommates – Conrad downstairs who has a rich father and mysterious stretch Lincoln errands; Rain who has a rich father but works as a janitor to assert her independence; Russ who is Rain’s boyfriend but knows of Gabe’s crush on him; and finally Candy who isn’t really a roommate but parties with Conrad and becomes friends with Gabe. If it sounds convoluted, it sort of is.
Conrad and Russ are both jerks in different ways, though possibly Conrad ends up being the bigger one. Rain is sweet and unsuspecting of her boyfriend’s jerkiness. The saddest part of this whole thing is Candy, who really is a decent person and deserves more than she ends up with. When she talks of “straight people and their problems”, she really encompasses just people and their problems.
This book addresses a short amount of time in the life of Gabe, but it’s so odd (like Gabe and Candy sleeping naked and kissing. Why do they do that, if Gabe is gay and not attracted to her? Randomly sleeping naked with your friends doesn’t seem like the Gabe of the rest of the story). He has visions of things that could be, which won’t be, and that was sad.
This probably needed to be a longer story to make sense of everyone. As it is, we are kind of tossed into a maelstrom of ugliness on several fronts and it was saddening, particularly to think people do in fact act that way. Heart breaking for both Candy and Gabe.
July 20, 2012
Great short story collection that comes together to make something more than a short story collection - because they build upon each other, and coalesce into a novel - no, not exactly a novel, because a novel is a single story, with subplots. Au Bon Pain is more than that too.
The stories follow Gabe, a 21-year-old gay virgin in the first story, "Straight People and Their Problems," living with a hetero couple in '70s Denver. When Gabe's crush on the guy works out in the wrong way, he turns to his girlfriend.
"Don't try to understand straight men," she tells him. "You might as well waste your time analyzing rabbits."
True, true - although in my experience, I'm not convinced that gay men are so much easier to analyze!
This story and the others, including "Postcards from Condi Rice" and "The Archbishop Comes for Gabriel," left me both laughing out loud and, at other times, feeling that curling up of sorrow and pity over the human condition. Pathos, the Greeks might say. The stories are about how even though we may know from a very early age that we're gay or straight or bisexual, that still leaves most of the human territory still to puzzle over. The stories are also about how, in the end, as important as sexuality is, relationships are what are far more important and complicated, including relationships with our parents and friends - and that ridiculously complex relationship with oneself.
Recommended.
(One question - why does the description of this book say that the publisher is CreateSpace, whereas my book says JMS Books?)
The stories follow Gabe, a 21-year-old gay virgin in the first story, "Straight People and Their Problems," living with a hetero couple in '70s Denver. When Gabe's crush on the guy works out in the wrong way, he turns to his girlfriend.
"Don't try to understand straight men," she tells him. "You might as well waste your time analyzing rabbits."
True, true - although in my experience, I'm not convinced that gay men are so much easier to analyze!
This story and the others, including "Postcards from Condi Rice" and "The Archbishop Comes for Gabriel," left me both laughing out loud and, at other times, feeling that curling up of sorrow and pity over the human condition. Pathos, the Greeks might say. The stories are about how even though we may know from a very early age that we're gay or straight or bisexual, that still leaves most of the human territory still to puzzle over. The stories are also about how, in the end, as important as sexuality is, relationships are what are far more important and complicated, including relationships with our parents and friends - and that ridiculously complex relationship with oneself.
Recommended.
(One question - why does the description of this book say that the publisher is CreateSpace, whereas my book says JMS Books?)
September 6, 2016
Reviewed for heartsonfirereviews.com
Gabe is in love with his boyfriend, Marty. It is an interracial relationship, one that Gabe’s father would loudly disparage. To save Marty from this, Gabe doesn’t allow Marty, or anyone really, to meet his father. Marty has met his sister and his mother, but he feels that Gabe is ashamed. He’s right, Gabe is ashamed – of his father.
Gabe’s father is a bigot, a racist, a homophobe and a drunk. At times he is violent, and possibly abusive. Gabe has never learned anything of value from his father, who spent little time with Gabe.
The story is told from Gabe’s point of view, and it is the end that confused me. I am not the sort who believes that dying is a reason to change what you think of someone; rather it should be a change in either your vision of the person or the person themselves. It really didn’t seem to happen that way here. Gabe’s father remains the hateful bigot throughout, so Gabe’s apology to him at the end was hopefully for Gabe to feel better. Maybe I missed something in the reading, but Tony (Gabe’s godfather) talking to Gabe about how he underestimated his father just reinforced the fact that all people have something good about them and all have bad. It is the balance that makes the difference. I didn’t see much good in Gabe’s father, and I could only hope Gabe, the failed son, would see himself better.
Gabe is in love with his boyfriend, Marty. It is an interracial relationship, one that Gabe’s father would loudly disparage. To save Marty from this, Gabe doesn’t allow Marty, or anyone really, to meet his father. Marty has met his sister and his mother, but he feels that Gabe is ashamed. He’s right, Gabe is ashamed – of his father.
Gabe’s father is a bigot, a racist, a homophobe and a drunk. At times he is violent, and possibly abusive. Gabe has never learned anything of value from his father, who spent little time with Gabe.
The story is told from Gabe’s point of view, and it is the end that confused me. I am not the sort who believes that dying is a reason to change what you think of someone; rather it should be a change in either your vision of the person or the person themselves. It really didn’t seem to happen that way here. Gabe’s father remains the hateful bigot throughout, so Gabe’s apology to him at the end was hopefully for Gabe to feel better. Maybe I missed something in the reading, but Tony (Gabe’s godfather) talking to Gabe about how he underestimated his father just reinforced the fact that all people have something good about them and all have bad. It is the balance that makes the difference. I didn’t see much good in Gabe’s father, and I could only hope Gabe, the failed son, would see himself better.
April 27, 2012
2.5* it felt like a huge chunk of story was missing
July 9, 2012
Poignant short story about a guy who has the chance to reconnect with his first love - the first love who dumped him and vanished.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews