Readings at Parkside:
Tramps Like Us
~Joe Westmoreland
CELEBRATING THE REISSUE OF THIS TREASURED CULT CLASSIC
WITH ALEX AUDER, JOHANNA FATEMAN & JOE WESTMORELAND
The Parkside Lounge
317 East Houston Street
New York City
Sunday, June 22nd, 4pm
Abused by his father and stifled by closeted life as a teenager in Kansas City, Joe, the wide-eyed narrator of Tramps Like Us, graduates from high school in 1974 and hits the road hitchhiking. But it isn’t until he reunites with Ali, his hometown’s other queer outcast, that Joe finds a partner in crime. When the two of them finally wash up in New Orleans, they discover a hedonistic paradise of sex, drugs, and music, a world that only expands when they move to San Francisco in 1979.
Told with openhearted frankness, Joe Westmoreland’s Tramps Like Us is an exuberantly soulful adventure of self-discovery and belonging, set across a consequential American decade. In New Orleans and San Francisco, and on the roads in between, Joe and Ali find communities of misfits to call their own. The days and nights blur, a blend of LSD and heroin, new wave and disco, orgies and friends, and the thrilling spontaneity of youth—all of which is threatened the moment Joe, Ali, and seemingly everyone around them are diagnosed with HIV. But miraculously, the stories survive. As Eileen Myles writes, “I love this book most of all because it is so mortal.”
Back in print with MCD after two decades and with an introduction by Myles and an afterword by the author, Tramps Like Us is an ode to a nearly lost generation, an autofictional chronicle of America between gay liberation and the AIDS crisis, and an evergreen testament to the force of friendship.
Joe Westmoreland is the author of the novel Tramps Like Us, originally published in 2001. His writing has appeared in several anthologies, zines, and catalogues for art exhibitions. He lives with his partner, the artist Charles Atlas, in New York City.
Photo by Lori E Seid