Hi, everyone. So Fat Hoochie Prom Queen came out last Tuesday, May 6, and I'm so happy it's finally in stores! (Mostly Borders and independent stores, to be more specific...) I had a great time at my first reading at Teen Author Reading Night, along with several other YA authors (hopefully a more in-depth blog entry to follow), and I'm psyched about all these UPCOMING EVENTS:

Saturday, May 17 / 2:00 p.m. / NYC / New York Public Library - 5th Ave and 42nd St / Humanities Library - Berger Forum / Prom Reading with Brian Sloan (A Really Nice Prom Mess), David Levithan (21 Proms), Jeanine Le Ny (Once Upon a Prom), Robin Palmer (Cindy Ella), and me! (Fat Hoochie Prom Queen)

Monday, May 19 (This is The Big One!!!) / 6:30 p.m. / NYC / Borders - Time Warner Center / Columbus Circle / PROM PARTY (Reading, Signing, Q&A, Refreshments, Merriment, and I will be dressed up ), with all those other prom authors (see above)

Saturday, June 14 / 5:30 p.m. / Philadelphia, PA / Giovanni's Room - 345 South 12th Street / Reading & Signing with Brian Sloan (A Really Nice Prom Mess) and Josh Aterovis (Bleeding Hearts)

Thursday, June 19 / 4:00 p.m. / Stafford, VA / Borders - Stafford Marketplace / Reading & Signing with Brian Sloan and Josh Aterovis

I promise to be animated and funny and not make you wish you'd stayed home, should you decide to come out for any of these readings.

In other news... Hoochie has gotten a very nice review in Publishers Weekly. "Readers will get a kick out of Margarita and appreciate her growing honesty with herself," they say (among other things). Click here and scroll down to read the whole review, if you don't mind a few minor spoliers that aren't really spoilers at all.... Teens ReadToo has also posted a lovely review of the book, although it does give a liiiittle more away. But it's a great review (I got the highest rating possible--yay!), and here's what they have to say: "I love this book!  It is honest, and sweet, and evil, and hilarious!  This is real high school, with drunken parties, swearing, gayness, cattiness, pettiness, crushes, frustration, and serious attitude.  And, really, how can you not love the title?"

And last but not least, I've had the pleasure of doing two interviews, one with soon-to-be-published YA author Rhonda Stapleton of the Fictionistas, and one with the ever-busy Book Chic. Check 'em out, if you're interested, and check back with Book Chic soon to see reviews for both The Straight Road to Kylie and Fat Hoochie Prom Queen.  

 

 

Hey, all.

I’ve posted another "teaser" from my upcoming book Fat Hoochie Prom Queen, which is due out on May 6th.

Just visit nicomedina.com, and it’s on the main page under the picture of the new book cover. You’ll see a link for Chapter 1, as well as a link for Chapter 2, Part 1.

Also, I’ll be reading and taking Q&A--as part of a "prom panel" with fellow YA authors Brian Sloan, David Levithan, Robin Palmer, and Jeanine Le Ny--on May 19th at 6:30 p.m. (or so) at the Time Warner Center BORDERS store in New York City.

I do hope to do more events this spring/summer/fall, but it’s just been too busy to plan anything yet. But anything in the way of news will be posted here or on the Web site....

Yay!

Yeah, so I know it’s been a while. But I have excuses. Excuses galore that include but are not limited to: packing/moving/unpacking/settling, the busiest I have ever been in my LIFE at work, revising the second book, the holidays, etc., etc.

But I wanted to let you know of a couple updates I’ve made to my Web site, nicomedina.com.

 

1. Teaser chapter from the upcoming Fat Hoochie Prom Queen! (Another chapter will sometime between now and the May 6th release date.)

2. A rundown of my semi-disastrous and embarrassing night in Washington, D.C., promoting The Straight Road to Kylie.

3. Pulse Blogfest: My publisher, Simon & Schuster/Simon Pulse, is throwing its first annual Blogfest, where 120 of their authors answer all sorts of reader-submitted questions. The blogfest goes from March 14 to 27th, and I took part.

4. Kylie’s been named a New York Public Library 2008 Book for the Teen Age, and a YALSA 2008 Popular Paperback for Young Adults. Yay!

5. Billy and I were in a music video! (For a second, anyway.)

 

So run on over to the main page of nicomedina.com and check it all out! (Sorry again to have been MIA for so long.)

Yeah, I couldn't let this go unblogged. Not like a million other people aren't doing this same thing, but it's not like I really care. But I have my own (I think) original ideas regarding the manner, including how she could've done it WAY better and WAY more interestingly. I'm, of course, going to discuss the "Comeback" performance of Britney Spears on the '07 VMAs in Vegas last night.

If you haven't seen it yet, I'll post the performance here. Keep an eye out for screwed-up lip-synching and awkward attempts at "dancing" (more like falling and strutting and running-to-catch-her-missed-dance-cues-throwing-the-whole-performance)...but more on that after the vid.



Okay, let's go point-by-point, since that's how I roll.

1. Try harder! It's painfully obvious that this entire performance was completely under-rehearsed. I'd heard rumors about Criss Angel (the illusionist/magician freak with the hot body) choreographing her performance with mirrors and illusions and cool shit like that. Obviously there wasn't time for this--either that or Brit-Brit was too busy going out on the town pantyless with her pathetic skanky enabler/friends to give a shit. I'm sorry. If you're going to go against everyone's better judgment and attempt a "comeback," you absolutely have to have it PERFECT! (Oh....and, um...good would be advisable, as well.)

I think the writers on The Family Guy called it YEARS ago, when they predicted what a Britney "comeback" might look like. Frankly, I would've enjoyed this performance a lot more, so long as they'd been able to douse the fire in time.



OH!
1. a) This whole thing (the red background, the black boots and outfits, the cages) was a complete ripoff of the "Cell Block Tango" number in Chicago, which obviously was far superior! When I see that background that Brit ripped off, I expect to see some intense dancing and high-kicks, baby! And what'd I get? Missed dance cues, skipping around stage like a buffoon, and generally giving a performance that most people can outdo when cleaning their apartment and listening to their iPod.

2. Tan more evenly! and Get a better weave! If you go searching through the online pics of this performance, you'll notice that Britney's body is a completely different shade of orangeish fake tan than her face is. Which makes her hideous wig/weave/whatever look even freakier. Essentially, it looks as if Britney's so-so face was Photoshopped onto someone else's so-so body, and then a cheap, strawlike wig was hastily saftey-pinned on. I've seen cracked-out drag queens in with more convincing hair, lady!

3. Do more dancing! I think this is self-explanatory. My god, what in the name of all that is holy was she doing up there? I dance better after eight drinks and a Valium! (Then again, she might've beat me there, from the looks of it. Could she have looked any more dazed out and loopy?)

4. Y'know...actually, I think that about covers it.

But you know what I would've LOVED to have seen?

I think Britney's at the point where she needs to make more fun of herself. I mean, Step One was releasing a song called "Gimme More" as her comeback single. My friend Kendra at work said, while we were discussing the semi-shittiness of the song (she hates it, I'm lukewarm on it): "Um, I can't imagine what she wants more of at this point!"

But why not make an entrance to the stage by stepping out the back of a limo pantyless (or with the ILLUSION of pantylessness, since this is TV and all), have mock-vomiting during instrumental breakdowns (like Britney's pre-and-post-rehab party nights), break down in tears after doing a little pole-dancing (the ill-fated video shoot for "Gimme More"), and have the vocal-singalong-track skip in the background (the, again, ill-fated performance at House of Blues in Orlando)? Oh, and why not have a chorus of backup dancers wearing $3,000 designer dresses with dog-shit and fried-chicken stains on them?! Twirling Duane Reade Bags!!!



Because let's face it: She wasn't ready, she can't dance, she can't sing (and we ALL KNOW IT, honey!), and she would've had to do a lot more to save face considering her insane actions over the last four years.

Oh, yeah: And forget singing "Gimme More." Well, sure, okay, she could sing it. But in my fantasty Britney Comeback VMA Performance, she'd have to have an intro with this song. Okay, so when Brit released her greatest-hits CD back in 2004, she put on two new songs: "Do Somethin" and "I've Just Begun (Having My Fun)." The latter has the most poignant and ironic lyrics ever, considering how her life's been going lately. So how amazing would it have been for her to emerge onto the stage, looking like this: and singing the following lyrics:

I just wanna have some fun
And I'll do it until I'm done
I'm telling you
I'm just a crazy kind of girl
I'll tell it to the world
I've just begun having my fun yeah
Inside me there's something I found
I wanna shop around
I've just begun
Don't wanna settle down

AND THEN SHE RIPS OFF THE WIG, GOING RIGHT INTO...


"It's BRITNEY, BITCH!"

I know it never would've happened this way, but in my fantasy world, where pop stars whom we once loved to watch perform more than we loved to watch fuck up realize that if they are promising a comeback performance they can't deliver just decide to throw every SINGLE LAST SCRAP of good judgment to hell, say "screw this y'all--I'm a trashay mess and I'm proud of it!", and blow my mind...it could've happened.

Because hey: Britney, X-Tina, Madonna, and Missy Elliott blew my mind all those years ago with this VMA performance, so why not do it again? (I still remember sitting on my couch in Florida and watching this whole thing unfold, and literally seconds before The Kiss, saying "Aretheygonnakiss?Aretheygonnakiss?Aretheygonnakiss?" and when it happened, I think I leapt three feet in the air and started screaming like an idiot.)



Sadly, without Madonna's famously work-horse-like tendencies, I don't know if Britney will ever wow me again. Of course, she's only my age, so she technically has a long way to go. I just hope that she takes a little more time and care with her next "comeback." I'm sick of that term being thrown around so carelessly lately. It's only been four years since her last album, and I realize that's an eternity in pop-music terms, but it could've gone another year or so in order for her to properly get her shit together.

Unless she embraces my vision for the new tour. I can see it now: Gimme More, and Run for the Border Tour 2008: Brought to You By Taco Bell.



Hey, ain't no shame!

1. Earlier this week, I finished my (hopefully) final draft of the second book and turned it in to my editor. In the next couple of weeks, I'll find out if it's good (which i THINK it is) or if it's still a little crappy (which it very well might be). I'm so glad to be done for now! It was such an exhausting experience.

2. Last week, I decided to get my ass in gear (literally) and start jogging after work. I can't believe I've been working in Lower Manhattan for three years now and I've just now discovered how nice Battery Park City is with a good playlist on my Nano. How pretty is this? I jog by the World Financial Center, along the Hudson River, and I can see the Statue of Liberty. I love it!



3. I buzzed my hair two weekends ago, and I'm still loving it. Especially after a little author-photo shoot with my boyfriend and our friend Brian. (See new pics!)

4. It's been a total TV-on-DVD weekend at my house. The Office Season Three, Veronica Mars Season Two, and Heroes Season 1. I love the first two, but Heroes is still gonna have to grow on me. Or they'll at least have to get rid of the cartoonlike Japanese guy with the shrill, obnoxious voice.



The sad thing is, he's probably the reason a lot of people tune in to the show. He's so annoying! Who the fuck CARES if he can teleport? I wish I could teleport right through his scenes.

5. I know this happened a while ago, but I'm finally "done" with the new site for now, which took forEVER to do. Basically, this whole summer was either write/revise/work on Web site. And I'm so tired.

6. I'm reading an amazing old book called I Am Legend, which is about the last man on Earth after a vampire plague has destroyed the world. Basically. (I miss reading grown-up books.) I think Will Smith is gonna be in a movie version of it. As long as his son isn't in this one, and it's not all preachy, it should be all right.

7. I'm still not sick of "Shut Up and Drive" by Rihanna, and I heard that some karaoke rooms have it in their playbooks now. Look out, people!

8. We've decided to pay more in rent, and move to Brooklyn, and hopefully get an outdoor space for the little pugster. At the very least, we'll have a ton more space, and we won't be the only gay white boys on the block. As much as I love my neighborhood now, and how safe I feel, and how good the food in our building can sometimes smell, I'm getting a little weary of it. If I have to hear "Hey, white boy" one more time... I swear.

9. I'm sure you've all seen it and have heard about how much I love it, but the COVER for the second book (FAT HOOCHIE PROM QUEEN--I need to get used to saying it!) is fanTASTIC! I love my publishers. They're so smart.



10. My right-hand homo Aaron is coming into town from DC next weekend, and we're gonna have an equally stress-free weekend. Lovely weather, some champagne brunch, maybe a jog, and a trip to Jackson Heights in Queens to check out the Indian, Peruvian, Mexican, and Bangladeshi food...

Now there are a million things to get all stressed out about now (moving, packing, finding a place, getting $$$ to move, etc., etc., forever and ever) but for now, the weather's nice, the house is clean, and I have a Hefeweisen with a lemon in it, so I'm just gonna enjoy this lovely Sunday afternoon.

Happy end of summer, everyone! (And happy end-of-my-season-of-stressful-HELL to me!)

Wohoo! My second book Fat Hoochie Prom Queen, is set for a release date of May 6, 2008, and I just got the cover and it's F*%ING WONDERFUL!!!

Please check out the new nicomedina.com to see it (and a whole lot of other stuff), and let me know what you think.

So, there are a million things I could be blogging about that I've found interesting and/or exciting:

~~~~

The fact that Victoria Beckham now lives among us, which I just love. And to the dumb-ass reporter from St. Louis who slammed her "Coming to America" special ("To the Brits, they are Posh and Becks. To most Americans they're--who?"), I say...Who the fuck are you? I'd like to see you pull off alien-chic so well day after day. (I've been in a very VB/Spice Girls-obsessive mood lately.)

~~~~

I could also go on and on about how all of a sudden, young Hollywood seems to be completely insane. LiLo, what the hell are you doing? Haven't you learned to not keep your cocaine in your pocket and...um...I dunno...hire a driver!?!?!?

~~~~

I might as well add now that it's been made public that Stuart Price (the mastermind music producer behind Madonna's Drowned World Tour and Confessions on a Dance Floor album and tour) is now Kylie's producer for her upcoming album. (That's the amazing album that leaked a while back! It's soooo good.) Here's the story. I want to just say, though, that it's very highly unlikely that she "nabbed" him. Madonna has a tendency to seek out incredible up-and-coming producers, use them for a few albums and maybe some tours, and then move on...

...Which she did. Madonna's newest album will be produced and cowritten with Timbaland and Justin Timberlake. She's DONE with Stuart Price.

...And I've also read a few comments around the Internet that Kylie is being lame by using Madonna's producer AFTER Madonna, that she's being unoriginal. I'd like to correct that by saying that Madonna didn't birth Stuart Price, and he can be hired by anybody and everybody regardless! Plus, I don't hear anyone giving Madonna shit for using Timbaland, who is the most typical (though amazing) current producer to work with. I mean, he's worked with Bjork, Nelly Furtado, Justin...you name it. So lay off, people. Kylie and Stuart have made a fanTASTIC dance record, and I can't wait for its release.

~~~~
~~~~

And now to the POINT of this blog:

How do you people feel about the word "Hoochie"? Personally, I love it. I think it's funny to say, funny to read, and that it's not the same nasty, mean word that it used to be. In other words, I think it's come a long way since 2Live Crew's "Hoochie Mama" days:

("Mama just don't understand why i love your hoochie ass
Sex is what i need you for i got a good girl, but i need a whore.")

Anyways....
Like I was saying, I think it doesn't mean the nastiness it used to, and that it's time to RECLAIM the word, like reclaiming "dyke," "faggot," and "nigga" (<--Well, I'm not reclaiming the last one, since I might be slapped for that, but plenty of people have reclaimed that word, and use it in a non-derogatory way.)

Why do I ask, you might say?

Well, tell me what you guys think of this.

Do we love it or hate it? I had no idea it'd be up on Amazon so fast--especially since I thought the title was tentative.

But I kinda like the way it looks....

Opinions????

I spent the last three days of my life (minus an excursion to Gingerman on Saturday night, home to 32,391 beers on tap, or something along those lines) finishing up a draft of my second book. It's finally with my editor, and I feel as if I've been run over by a truck repeatedly.  Actually, that doesn't fully describe it. I have so much residual caffeine and toxins in my system that I feel wired and loopy yet more exhausted than I've been in a while, and for some reason, I'm constantly hungry, even though I know I shouldn't be. I'm sitting here at work, and all I want to do is go down to the sidewalk and get a knish or a hot dog with grilled onions and peppers. Does caffeine speed the metabolism? Maybe I'll lose some weight after all this.

ANYWAY,

There's a nice lil' interview I did with John Sullivan of Watermark, "Florida's Distinctive Gay and Lesbian Publication." Pick up a copy (complete with photos from the reading!) at all sorts of Florida locations, or read it online here.

All right, break's over. Guess I'd better get back to the day job.

So, this weekend in Florida was great! I took a little trip back to my hometown of Orlando to visit family and friends, and to have my first-ever "Homecoming" reading and signing for The Straight Road to Kylie. I'll try and keep it succinct, but who knows how well I'll do at that.

Tuesday July 3
So on Tuesday afternoon, we got let out of work at 3pm, so I decided to start my "vacation" early with some shopping in Soho with my new 0% APR Visa card. Dangerous, I know, but I swear I'll pay it off quick. I just needed some new clothes, dammit! It's been forEVER. So I spent a very frustrating 20 minutes in Zara, where everything was a size L or bigger. I mean, what the fuck? Is it that there are just no skinny people in the world anymore, or is it that they were all there before me? There were a few M's, but let's face it: I'm a 25-yr-old gay man who hasn't quite grown out of Smalls...though I'm getting very close. Very close. Some might say I'm already there. I have to change my ways. More on that later.

I ended up with two very cute collared shirts (since I have too many damn T-shirts--I really need to grow up) from Zara and H&M and a pair of everyday dark jeans from Levi's. And 5-dollar sunglasses I SWEEEAR I won't lose this time.


The next morning, I woke up.
......
At......
4:15 A.M.!!!!!! so I could get to Penn Station for a 5:15 train to Newark Airport. Ridiculous.

Got to Orlando by 10am on the Fourth and spent the day at my aunt and uncle's pool (um...I dunno if they know that) swimming and eating Chick-Fil-A, which I miss DEARLY. Why the hell don't they open up some franchises in NYC? I know that we're a fairly godless city and that Chick-Fil-A isn't open on Sundays and all that crap, but come on! I need it.

Then I drank wine and watched The West Wing with my parents on DVD and fantasized about what it would be like to have a compassionate, human, non-idiotic person running our country.

And then I cried.

Not really. Just took a nice nap, since I'd been up since the ass-crack of dawn.

Thursday July 5
Cutting to the chase, the next day (Thursday) I went to get my hair cut downtown at a chichi little salon for a mere 35 DOLLARS, which made me very happy to be home, but sad that I normally have to have Billy cut my hair in our bathroom in NY because I can't afford stylists every month in lovely NYC.

So with my hot new hair, I took a drive out to the Orlando Premium Outlets, where I bought my first pair of Seven jeans (!!!!), which BETTER last longer than my last pair of expensive jeans (Diesels). In my Diesels' defense, I did wear them so tight and so often that I'm fairly sure that friction between my upper thunder thighs was what wore them thin. Literally. Whatever. For $150, they better last through that and a whole lot more.

Then that evening, I met my best friend Erin for happy-hour drinks at RJ Gator's, where I enjoyed a couple margaritas and a couple beers in the outdoor soupy humidity of Central Florida. I'd forgotten how thick the air is down there sometimes. So after our drinks, we wandered into the mall and I checked out the local B&N to see if they had copies of my book, which they DID! So I spoke five feet away from the nearest employee (so she wouldn't think i was a lush) and asked if I could sign their stock, and happy happy day, they let me. :-)

FRIDAY JULY 6!!! Reading Day!
Ed came into town today at around noon, and we went out for sushi downtown and shot the shit, then went to shop at Millenia Mall, where neither of us found a DAMN THING. It's okay, since I'd already spent a good amount of money in NY and the outlets, and we had a nice time anyway. Even if the five-minute walk back to the car in the parking lot nearly killed me. GOD it gets hot in Florida.

**Random Observation: So much for being succinct**

Ed tried to take me to the Blue Martini for a midafternoon I'm-on-vacation-dammit cocktail, but lo and behold, it wasn't open at 3 in the afternoon. Feeling like a lush, I had Ed take us back downtown to the Grand Bohemian Hotel, where I enjoyed a couple of espresso/kahlua martinis and Ed ate a 2nd lunch. Yeah. Drinks at 3:30 felt a little silly, but I was on vacation! (And I'm cutting back, anyway.)

By 6:30, it was READING TIME!!!!!

All I can say is, "Wow." I was so happy with the turnout, and was so flattered to have been the center of attention. Some people had driven from as far away as Sarasota and Tampa, and I just felt so special. Friends, family, former teachers, complete strangers, all sorts of people were there. I also got to meet John Sullivan from Watermark, the gay Orlando publication that is going to run an interview with me soon. (I'll post a link when it becomes available.)

The event was at Urban Think! Bookstore in Thornton Park, my favorite little downtown neighborhood in Orlando. (The 'hood even makes a cameo in the book, so it was perfect.) It's a great store, and even has a little coffee/wine/beer bar. So, we let people trickle in for about an hour and get drinks and get happy and get situated, and at around 7:30, I started my reading.

I was pleased with myself, because I was able to read the words "fuck" and "shit" and the phrase "misplace my penis in her vagina" without my voice cracking or my hand shaking, since my "little" cousins (who really aren't "little" anymore) and grandfather were in attendance!!! But I read a bit from Chapter 3 and Chapter 7, answered a couple questions and Q&A, and signed about 30 books, and was generally a very happy boy. And I got a lot of laughs, which is really my goal every time....

...And now for the post-reading wrapup...

If someone had told me that I'd be at an outdoor table at Wild Side BBQ (also makes a Kylie cameo) with my former English teacher, her 18-yr-old and 28-yr-old daughters, my old high-school friend Lacy, and a very random (and very cool and very smart) 18-yr-old future Duke student who'd seen the blurb about my reading in the paper that day, (and Ed), I'd've laughed. Ed and Lacy were the only ones I'd PLANNED on going out with, and I'm glad we'd just gone with the flow, because it ended up being fantastic.

Well, actually, the fact that we all ended up at Parliament House, the INFAMOUS gay club-slash-motel (yes, I said "motel") was the funniest part. It was really a great night. Though I felt like an old fart, since I was practically winded after 10 minutes of dancing. That might've had to do with all the free Heinekens at dinner.

Oh, yeah. Heinekens. There were Heineken girls doing promo at Wild Side earlier, and I--feeling all cool and euphoric--opened my book to a page where there were Heineken mentions (lord knows I love my Heinies), and said that that should get me more free beer. And it did! The girls were so nice, and came back a couple times--and even gave me a shirt! (Which I left by accident at the table...DAMMIT!) It was total kismet.

So by 1am or so, everyone had gone home from P House and Ed and I were left to wander around the motel looking for trouble. Well, not really. Ed was sober (thank GOD), so we weren't in too much danger. We just wanted to see if there was any sort of skankalicious gay activity going on in the rooms. And when this dude hit on us all suave and said, "What're you two boys lookin' for?" all I could think to say was "Just some public fornication!" which broke him out of hitting-on-twentysomethings character and cracked him the fuck up.

Like I said, I love to get laughs.

And what better note to end on than that?

Oh. Besides Taco Bell drive-through. That was divine.

(Random note: I'm back in New York now and cutting back on drinking and junk food and have to finish my 2nd draft of my 2nd book this weekend. So if any of you see me drinking or about to drink or about to NOT go home and be productive and eat raw vegetables, KICK MY ASS! Except on Saturday.)

Saturday July 7
Let's just say I'm getting too old for all this shit. I was hurtin'.

Went to my uncle's wedding, too (!!), but I'm exhausted now. End of blog, kids.

Thanks to everyone for coming out to the Orlando reading! I felt like a freakin' SUPERSTAR, and I'm so appreciative of everyone's love and support. Truly. This was a great weekend, and it gave me the you're-so-awesome push I need to finish up the second book.

Well, that remains to be seen. :-)