BOOKS

A ghost in the radical right's machine

Stranger at the Gate by Mel White

Simon & Schuster, $22.50 hardcover

Reviewed by John Lovegren

As a longtime ghostwriter for the religious right, White must have found it oddly refreshing and curiously difficult to write his own autobiography. His is a recognizable style, as he has ghosted for such luminaries (?) as Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Billy Graham, Jim & Tammy Faye, et al., religious figures he continues to admire, though perhaps with less of the blind faith of former years.

He is currently Dean of Dallas's Cathedral of Hope, the largest gay church in the world. Raised in a fundamentalist evangelical household, but having the sinister cloud of homosexuality festering beneath his beautifully controlled exterior, he lived a life of unceasing over-achievement attempting to compensate for and suppress his natural orientation. Given his recent exposure on various TV and radio talk shows, the overachievement habit is hard to kick. One of the more touching aspects of the book is the obvious love between him and his (now ex-) wife of several decades. Gushy romances can be enjoyable to witness, even when the parties involved are of opposite sexes. Ex-Mrs. White has written a forward to the book which shows that the stillprofound admiration in their relationship is not one-sided.

The book opens with recollections from early years, high school, college, etc., highlighting the numerous accolades offered for his mountain of accomplishments and revealing the simultaneous undercurrent of being a round peg in a square hole. The frequent asides explaining the inner pain and anguish of a gay person who grows up

in a happy and functional fundamentalist household (they really do exist) suggest a certain victim mentality, which becomes a bit tiresome after a few chapters. About half way through the text one wants to reach into the pages, grab the man's shoulders, and yell, "so GET OVER IT, ALREADY!" Fortunately, he does. After the requisite battles through misdirected prayer, analysis, and the ex-gay/Exodus farce, he finally emerges the way God created him. This is obviously a man who feels everything very deeply, sometimes too deeply, an entire lifetime filled with an impassioned need to spread the Message to everyone, and sparing no expense in doing so. His message has perhaps a different twist than in his earlier years, but he is still spreading it with undiminished fervor.

After discovering the humanity and blinders-on approach of his religious heroes, he does not discard them as totally useless—a useful discernment not discovered by many of the ex-fundamentalist gay survivors. His past also gives him insight to the people and strategies of the religious right (there must be a better word than "right")—such as several wonderfully convincing, if frightening, parallels between their tactics and strategies and those of Nazi Germany.

White's writing is fluid and easy to read. His story is profitable to those from similar backgrounds (i.e., You are not alone), those curious about growing up in such an environment, and anyone wanting a good bio. Coming out for such a public figure and in such a no-holds-barred manner (he's done 60 Minutes, public radio, several magazines) will probably limit his future chances of writing for the conservative religious factions. Now that he's worked through the life-story thing, it will be interesting to see his future output.

MAY 6, 1994

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Dreams come true, Pookie

Happily Ever After by Stacy Chandler

Reviewed by Doreen Cudnik Happily Ever After, a self-published book by native Ohioan Stacy Chandler, is a delightful collection of snippets about everything from weed-whacking the garden, to dealing with your partner's hospital stay, to meeting the In-Laws. I knew I was going to like this book after glancing at the bold print prologue which contains a warning to homophobic readers to "put this book down immediately! This book could open your mind or send you to hell!!! Go directly to your Bible."

Each brief story reads quickly and had me laughing out loud at times. You need to read no further than the dedication to realize that Chandler is crazy in love with her partner, known affectionately to us as "Pook," "Pookie," "Pook Pook," "Pookyness," "Pookness," "Pootie," "PuPu," and "Putums." When reading through the book, anytime you see any of these "P" words, you can be sure she is talking about the woman she lovingly refers to as the "Goddess of my Universe." Pook responds by saying, "Darling, thank you for sharing our most intimate moments with the entire world. I'm going to have a headache for the next ten years!" But you can tell that compiling this book was a labor of love for both of them.

Stacy describes herself as a "42 year old Polish, lesbian landlady, with a ferocious mental appetite for lesbian writing." She writes, she says, because it gives her a sense of community with lesbians worldwide. She

and her partner are avid travelers, having just returned from New Zealand (a country they both highly recommend). In 1997, on their twentieth anniversary, Stacy and PuPu will be taking an Olivia Cruise to Greece, so that they can have their Holy Union on the Isle of Lesbos.

When finished, I felt like I had spent the weekend with friends that I don't see often enough, catching up on all the stuff that's happened in their lives since last we met. You know the couple: the two that after over a decade of togetherness still stare

lovingly into each other's eyes, laugh at each other's bad jokes, and make all their partner-less friends green with envy! Chandler writes, "Pootie and I have just celebrated our sixteenth anniversary. To preserve our herstory, I have written about our good times and bad in hopes of discovering why we are so lucky." My question is, where are all the women like this in Ohio?! Ah, well... that's another column.

This is the perfect book for all the dreamers out there. Chandler says she wrote Happily Ever After to make lesbians laugh, and to present a positive point of view of the lesbian life. "We are not all tortured, lonely souls," she writes. She encourages her lesbian sisters to "keep on dreaming, because eventually all of your dreams will come true."

Copies of Happily Ever After can be ordered through Speculators, Inc., P.O. Box 99038, Troy, MI 48099 for $10 per book (plus shipping and applicable sales tax). Specify whether you would like your book(s) autographed. Who knows, maybe some of that Stacy/Pookie luck will rub off!

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