FAIRMONT — An acclaimed West Virginia native author will read from his new memoir this week as part of Pierpont Community and Technical College’s reading series.
Jonathan Corcoran will read and discuss "No Son of Mine: A Memoir" at a free public event at Pierpont's Advanced Technology Center on Thursday, Oct. 17 at 6 p.m.
Corcoran's book, which was released in April, details how his hyper-religious mother disowned him after he came out to her when he was in college.
"He recounts the years of a seemingly unbreakable relationship with his late mother that ended abruptly as he embraced a new path, leaving the remnants of a complex relationship to be explored through grief, anger, questioning, and growth," according to a Pierpont news release.
“I hope readers of my book will come away with a better understanding of the complicated factors that shape families and family relationships, particularly within our wonderful and complex homeplace of West Virginia,” Corcoran said. “I hope that my book - my life story - offers folks a chance to reflect on how we love each other and how we can love each other better.
Corcoran, who lives in Brooklyn, teaches writing at New York University and in the low-residency Master of Fine Arts program at West Virginia Wesleyan College.
"This story is bigger than the LGBTQ+ community. It is about learning to treat our friends, loved ones, and neighbors with kindness and dignity. It's about choosing respect and kindness over the forces of hate,” he said.
No Son of Mine: A Memoir has received praise from other writers and literary magazines since its release.
“Jon Corcoran’s memoir of a beloved son’s twenty year cycle of rejection and grief is also the story of the conflicted mother who adored him, her youngest child and only son, but could not accept him. Every American should read this elegy about the politics of place and church, the loss of one home, and the triumphant forging of another," said fellow native West Virginian Jayne Anne Phillips, winner of the 2024 Pulitzer Prize in fiction for her novel "Night Watch."
The literary journal Kirkus Reviews said Corcoran was able to remain empathetic despite his entire past being "wiped clean" with his mother's disownment.
“Corcoran is a remarkably empathetic writer whose subtle portraits capture undeniably tender moments in the lives of his characters," Kirkus writes. "A lyrical and uncompromisingly honest memoir."
Prior to publishing his memoir, Corcoran has a collection of essays and stories that have been published in Belt Magazine, Salvation South, Still: The Journal, the Oxford University Press text book, How Writing Works, and more.
Corcoran has a bachelor of arts in literary arts from Brown University and a master of fine arts from Rutgers University-Newark.
Light refreshments and a question and answer session with Corcoran will follow the event. This literary reading is a collaboration between Pierpont’s Office of Student Involvement and writing program. The collaboration is the second of the series, with hopes of providing a showcase for diverse literary forms and voices in the Mountain State and beyond.