Literary Fiction/Coming of Age
Publisher: Literary Vagabond Books
Poor Billy Green! When he was just turning four, his father tried to throw him in the trash. He was a smart kid but that just seemed to create enemies. His mom did everything to protect him. But this was Detroit, armpit of the wasteland! Catholic school didn’t help much, except the time he got his first kiss from an atheist nun. Home life was dismal. Was his father capable of anything but drinking beer and farting? And what was with that neighbor who made puppets and tried to molest Billy? Golly! Detroit was sucking the life out of him. At such a young age. Then adolescence swirled around him. Like water in a toilet bowl. High school was a B movie. Only without a plot. So finally he did something about it. Billy ran away … to college. Cornell University. That was a good move for sure! He studied hard, lost his virginity, met the love of his life. Things were definitely looking up! What could possibly go wrong?
Other Books in The Man Who Loved Too Much Series
The Billy Green saga continues! Billy’s challenging, sometimes humorous, sometimes tragic, always unpredictable journey.
He was more determined than ever to find meaning in life and comfort in love.
Billy came to know one thing for sure.
Love is real.
He could now with the absolute cocksure confidence of pure enlightenment, scoff at the naysayers and spit in the face of the purveyors of romantic nihilism, the cynics who say that love is an illusion.
Billy knew the real score.
Love is the light that never dims.
Love is a wine that flows in our hearts.
Love is a wonder that has no beginning or end.
Love is a master key that opens the gates of perfection.
Love is the language our souls use to speak to one another.
Love is the trafficking of fantasies and transcending of mortality.
Love is an energy that can neither be created or destroyed.
Love is God Allah Yahweh Shiva Qat Aphrodite.
Love is touch smell feel taste listen pray.
Love is the poetry of the senses.
Love is metaphysical gravity.
Love is the gift of oneself.
Love is sweet tyranny.
All you need is love.
Descartes. You almost got it right.
Je aime, donc je suis.
Yes. That’s how it should go.
I love, therefore I am.
Valentines Day solipcism.
But does it ever turn out the way we planned? The way we hoped and dreamed?
How do we function in a world which is both as randomly and intentionally cruel, as it is randomly and intentionally kind? Can we make sense of our lives when so much around us makes no sense?
In this, the final book of the trilogy, we find out what it means to be a "man who loves too much". More importantly, we discover if Billy Green is such a man.
Excerpt
THE EARLY YEARS
1986 – 1995
Balloons
It was an especially cold Thanksgiving on Woodward Avenue in Detroit. Today was the annual Thanksgiving Day Parade and the crowd alternated between shivering and cheering. People shuffled and stomped, attempting to keep their feet from freezing. Gusts of steamy cold blew from their dripping noses and through clenched teeth.
Suddenly Billy started screaming. “My balloon!! My Balloon!!”
“Harold, do something. His balloon!”
“Goddammit, Irene. Do I look like I have wings? It’s too late.”
Up up it went. The string had slipped from Billy’s grasp and the balloon was off to wherever balloons go. The stratosphere? Balloon heaven?
“You stupid little fuck. I told you to let me tie it to your wrist. But you’re so goddamn smart. |