THE HEART IS MEAT

Through an unfolding series of raw moods and memories, author Backus transports himself back to 1983, when, as a young man out of college, he’d just arrived in Manhattan from Indiana, driving his dead grandmother’s 1968 Chevy Caprice to work at a pork-packing company with dreams of becoming a writer. His mundane work of meat processing is made entertaining courtesy of a dramatically animated crew of Vietnam veterans and local aggressive bruisers with names like Big Ed, Dinky Peter, Manny the Spic, Jersey City Johnny, and “pre-Vietnam era” Gummy. Also keeping him afloat and awake are afternoons fueled by a carefully calibrated combination of speed and heroin, though the speed made him “aggressive and profane and prone to street incidents with strangers.” Together with his exasperatingly tolerant girlfriend, Maya, in their East Village apartment with four cats, he works days and parties nightly, stumbling home dodging junkies and homeless encampments and fending off campy, brazen sex workers. Across random adventures with friends, family, colorful inner-city dwellers, and new job opportunities, the memoir reads like transgressive fiction as Backus dizzyingly re-creates scene after scene of pure 1980s Manhattan, immersing the reader into a forgotten early-AIDS era in New York history filled with music, queer leather biker bars, bathroom-stall meth snorting, sweaty disco dance floors, and conceptual art shows. The author concludes two years later, in 1985, when AIDS has begun ravaging the queer community and his relationship is dissolving. A bittersweet epilogue written in 2013 catches up with his former co-workers and reflects on the dwindling vitality evident across the Big Apple. Using a cleverly depicted, vivid blend of atmosphere and attitude, Backus reaches back decades to a twitchy era of drug-soaked reality to deliver a uniquely raw, significant slice of life in exacting detail.

May 1, 2025 - 05:14

Through an unfolding series of raw moods and memories, author Backus transports himself back to 1983, when, as a young man out of college, he’d just arrived in Manhattan from Indiana, driving his dead grandmother’s 1968 Chevy Caprice to work at a pork-packing company with dreams of becoming a writer. His mundane work of meat processing is made entertaining courtesy of a dramatically animated crew of Vietnam veterans and local aggressive bruisers with names like Big Ed, Dinky Peter, Manny the Spic, Jersey City Johnny, and “pre-Vietnam era” Gummy. Also keeping him afloat and awake are afternoons fueled by a carefully calibrated combination of speed and heroin, though the speed made him “aggressive and profane and prone to street incidents with strangers.” Together with his exasperatingly tolerant girlfriend, Maya, in their East Village apartment with four cats, he works days and parties nightly, stumbling home dodging junkies and homeless encampments and fending off campy, brazen sex workers. Across random adventures with friends, family, colorful inner-city dwellers, and new job opportunities, the memoir reads like transgressive fiction as Backus dizzyingly re-creates scene after scene of pure 1980s Manhattan, immersing the reader into a forgotten early-AIDS era in New York history filled with music, queer leather biker bars, bathroom-stall meth snorting, sweaty disco dance floors, and conceptual art shows. The author concludes two years later, in 1985, when AIDS has begun ravaging the queer community and his relationship is dissolving. A bittersweet epilogue written in 2013 catches up with his former co-workers and reflects on the dwindling vitality evident across the Big Apple. Using a cleverly depicted, vivid blend of atmosphere and attitude, Backus reaches back decades to a twitchy era of drug-soaked reality to deliver a uniquely raw, significant slice of life in exacting detail.