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FROM RICARDO:

To my family and friends, my new book is out and available to everyone. You can click on the ink below to purchase.
I want to thank you all for your love and support in this project.
Some of your names are written in the thank you section of the book.
My goal in this book was to explore solutions to achieve peace, love, and success.

https://www.amazon.com/Unchained-Mind-Ricardo-G-Williams/dp/152468371X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1489875076&sr=1-1&keywords=unchained+mind

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Writing a book is exhausting but satisfactory way to accomplish what you feel you need to accomplish.

In the mid 1980s I met, was interviewed and eventually quoted quite a bit in an excellent book by George Chauncey called “Gay New York 1890-1940” and which I always recommend to anyone who knows very little about gay life or those who think they know a lot about gay life.

I consider myself an expert in 3 fields: one being MY life, another about weight problems of all sorts and gay life through all my experiences in it for over 65 years. I have observed, seen and participated in gay life in New York, Florida, Texas, Oklahoma, Tennessee—well 49 out of 50 States plus Mexico, Central America, South America, Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti, the Caribbean, Canada, etc.

In the past two weeks I have read comments by two people who think they know it all but know nothing. One based her comments on knowing, maybe, 4 gay men, while another who thinks she is an expert on everything really knows very little about gay men, what they think, know and want. Oh yes there is also the one who lives in my complex who is married to a self hating gay alcoholic who enables them to justify why they are together when she doesn’t have a clue.

I have had 8 books published of which 3 dealt with my ‘fat’ before and after and after story (yes, two afters!), 2 which dealt with my 4 live in relationships, one which was a series of essays before I learned what blogs were and the other were books dealing with motivation and/or cookbooks. All were a labor of love and my last two were polished by the great and late LadyeSparks, an editor only a writer can dream of and, justifiably, used her red pen on me!

I, also, wrote and had a play produced which was a big failure and a screenplay of that play which was made and disappeared after the week it opened.

After reading the comments referred to above I decided to write about the gay life I have lived and observed since I came out in 1948 and up to the present day and my involvement physically, mentally, emotionally, politically and what I see are the main differences between the gay youth (anyone under 50!) of today to the gay youth of yesterday, which includes gay ‘marriage’ which I am against the model it is based on and don’t see as the end all, be all, of the gay equal rights fight. I’ll write about gay couples who follow the failing template of nongay marriages and will wind up becoming statistics of failure like they have.

I’ll respond to women who think they know how men—gay or nongay—think about sex, sexuality and women. I’ll write about what it means to be gay in 1948 and in 2017 and how similar it still is and the few, very few, differences that have taken place.

Writing a book is a very disciplined exercise for me including a certain amount of time doing research plus a certain amount of time actually writing and then the, for me, dreaded, rewriting.

There is also the legal aspect because ‘name dropping’ might be involved if I want to be honest, which I do, and I have, in 2 cases, promised not to name names though they and most of their relatives have died—ah, one of the advantages of being old.

Right now the aim is to write a 350-400 page book and, after a little ‘sweet talking’, signing my life away but most of all pleading, to get Nina Pettis of Nina Proofs to take that dreaded red pencil to my pages!

I have given myself a deadline of December 2017 to finish writing the first draft!

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I have 6 manuscripts sitting on my desk–one is a play, 2 are nonfiction and the other 3 are fiction. All in all I have 8 books published and I self published my last two. I wrote them all without any audience in mind–the one and only book I ever wrote with readers in mind was the last one published called “Letting It All Hang Out”. I mainly wrote to clear my head of ideas that have been there for awhile. Even the non-fiction books which were motivational for people who wanted to lose weight were my thoughts on my battle with fat.

Of the ones mentioned in the first paragraph the 3 I called fiction (and the play) are actually nonfiction (I don’t remember the term Truman Capote used regarding “In Cold Blood”)–though the characters are fictionalized (law suits, you know) the events, places, etc. are real.

The one completely fictionalized is “…And The Oscar Goes to…” where I was trying to put my mind in a actresses point of view.

“The Free Prisoner” –This was published in 2005 and, I think, my best book–it is about a gay boy in the Bronx ‘coming out’ in the 40s and 50s.

“Five Sided View Of A Man” –a two act play–1 set–6 characters–a man at 60 looks back on his life one decade at a time

“The Gay Pariahs” ) Gay life from the 1940s to the 1990s seen through the eyes of the main character and his friends, lovers, etc.

“For What We Had” A true love story from the meeting of the 2 main characters through a newspaper ad and what leads to the breakup and the aftermath–told through letters, notes, cards, diaries, etc.

“The Looks Of Love” 2 Gay, Jewish, Yankees move to the deep South in the 70s–though the relationship is a financial success it is a very destructive one.

When you write who are you writing for?

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I started writing when I was 10 and knew I wanted to be a writer when I won a writing contest at 12–I wrote an essay for the contest “Why Bing Crosby Is My Favorite Singer”–he wasn’t– (don’t worry kids if you haven’t heard of him–he was an Oscar winning actor, a shrewd real estate guy an world renown singer  with  one his big hits being “White Christmas”) and being a winner I won a Bing Crosby shirt! It was so easy I figured writing would be my career.

Long story short–I have had 8 books published–the last two self-published–a play produced–one performance–BUT it was made into a movie for which I got a nice sum. I don’t talk about the play or movie! Over the years I have written many articles for newspapers, magazines, untold amount letters to the editor and for awhile I was writing columns for 3 different local papers one being a dining column, another essays for the largest gay newspaper at the time in Fort Lauderdale and the third a gay bar guide for South Florida. Currently I am writing reviews of touring Broadway shows that play in Fort Lauderdale and Miami for broadwayshowbiz.com

When I was working for/with Weight Watchers and when I opened my own organization called Our Weigh I wrote cookbooks, motivational books and each organization’s monthly newspaper.

With all this, except for the 10 years in the weight reduction field, I didn’t make a living writing but being  a professional waiter, which I really loved doing but more about that another time.

When it came to writing I always wrote too much and that’s what the next part is about!