God's Other Children - a London Memoir

Enthusiastically recommended by respective Black and LGBTQ history websites, this profoundly engaging non-fiction title by Londoner Vernal Scott, a diversity professional and Atheist, has a throbbing and unapologetic LGBTQ pulse. Upsetting and inadvertently entertaining, his Polari ''First Book Prize'' shortlisted memoir regularly prompts readers to weep or erupt in belly laughter. The six hundred pages includes illuminating photos and are reminiscent in places of Philadelphia, "the...
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Enthusiastically recommended by respective Black and LGBTQ history websites, this profoundly engaging non-fiction title by Londoner Vernal Scott, a diversity professional and Atheist, has a throbbing and unapologetic LGBTQ pulse. Upsetting and inadvertently entertaining, his Polari ''First Book Prize'' shortlisted memoir regularly prompts readers to weep or erupt in belly laughter. The six hundred pages includes illuminating photos and are reminiscent in places of Philadelphia, "the AIDS film" starring Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington. Legendary surprises include Princess Diana, Whitney Houston, George Michael, Gloria Gaynor, Tina Turner, Dionne Warwick, Luther Vandross, and others. Exposing challenging issues concerning Black and LGBTQ cultures, sexuality, sex, religion and death, Scott takes the reader to the horrific frontline of the 1980s/90s HIV and AIDS health crisis where the various real-life accounts make heartbreaking reading, especially so when AIDS comes home... He writes: "A dignified death by the symptoms of old age was not to be our kind fate. Abandoned and alone in the fight of our lives, wider society, influenced by a vicious media, deemed us deserving of our suffering: our crippling fear; our unimaginable pain; our unyielding tears prompted by precious last goodbyes; our deaths. Our dashed hopes and dreams were destined to lie among the ashes of the cremation furnaces that would consume what AIDS had already destroyed. It was only yesterday that we were sweating up the dancefloor to I Feel Love and I Will Survive, and we had every reason to believe that we would do just that; survive and thrive, but our fleshless reflection in the bathroom mirror was confirmation that the good times had turned and a big disease with a little name was now playing Russian roulette with our lives. Swallowed up by clothes that no longer fit, it was now the survival of, not the fittest or most determined, but simply, it seemed, the luckiest. Stunned by the terror-inducing reality of an imminent death, AIDS had sabotaged our far too temporary rendezvous with happiness and the illusion of longevity of life that we assumed had been promised by our birth. When our mothers delivered us into the world, their tears of joy belied our pending fate and the fact that our eager infant eyes would mature only long enough to cry a tortured goodbye. AIDS would summon our mothers'' tears again; this time to moisten the soil that would bury us. Our deaths were later splashed across the daily press as grotesque entertainment for the ignorant and heartless; who ridiculed us in our plight, but who would never, themselves, be capable of the extraordinary courage that it took to be a person living...and dying of AIDS." Suicide, voodoo, and LGBT baby-making are among the many topics covered. In his provocative chapter ''The Circumcision of Religion'', Scott could be described as vitriolic about his newly adopted atheism, writing: "It is my view that sexual activity between consenting adults, of whatever sexuality, is no one else''s business. Our penises, vaginas, nipples, butts, ears, lips and every other erogenous zone exist to be enjoyed without guilt, shame or fear. Only an odd god would spend his time looking down from heaven at what I do with my penis while millions of adults and children regularly die of war, terror, starvation, preventable disease and natural disasters. That would be a very odd god, indeed! To continue to believe in god, despite life''s harsh reminders of his absence, would be to engage in a kind of spiritual masturbation; pleasuring oneself with fantasies of an imaginary supernatural lover whose prowess stimulates his indoctrinated believers, from the seamstress in Jamaica to the President of the USA, to an orgasmic "Hallelujah!!!" whilst remaining completely invisible to them." Scott''s writing deeply impacts the heart and mind, as confirmed by the copious 5star Amazon UK reader reviews, which essentially shout, ''READ THIS BOOK!''