Hey, everyone, Mark here.
I have a bit of non-movie related news to pass along.
You may not know this (and Ryan doesn’t know I’m doing this, though I should have done it long ago, since it was published in July of 2020), but I feel the need to let you all know that one of us has an actual, for-real, full-length book in publication that you can buy.
No, it’s not me (although I’ve had a few short stories put out in the past). In fact, it’s better than pretty much anything I’ve ever written because it’s not fiction.
It is his life story (so far).
More precisely, I suppose, it is the story of how he came to be, and what came after.
The Unexpected Son
by Ryan Michael Painter
From his own synopsis:
A gay man and a small-town beauty. An inexplicable marriage and the inevitable divorce. A miracle child, growing up during an unfathomable plague. Despite our heritage, we weren’t pioneers; we were accidental astronauts.
We were spaceship stowaways in a simple love story made complicated by the world but made extraordinary by its participants. For as long as I can remember, this book has always been “The Unexpected Son.” It feels somewhat ambiguous, but “AIDS in a Time of Mormonism,” “Love in a Time of Persecution,” or any other witty title that I could apply feels far more dramatic than the narrative itself. It was just a childhood to me.
It is a good story; I hope I tell it well.
It is, in fact, a very good story, and he does (also in fact) tell it well.
You can get it using this link, and in all seriousness, I recommend you do.