Probation

By Tom Mendicino

Book Overview

All it took to destroy Andy Nocera's seemingly perfect life was an anonymous tryst at an Interstate rest area. Sentenced to probation and thrown out by his wife, he spends his week as a traveling salesman, and his weekends at his mother's house where no questions are asked--and no explanations are offered. To clear his record, the State of North Carolina requires Andy to complete one year of therapy without another arrest. He attends his sessions reluctantly at first, struggling to comprehend why he would risk everything. Answers don't come easily, especially in the face of his mother's sudden illness and his repeated failure to live as an openly gay man. But as Andy searches his past, he gets an opportunity to rescue another lost soul--and a chance at a future that is different in every way from the one he had envisioned. With profound honesty, sharp wit, and genuine heart, this debut novel portrays one man's search--for love and passion, acceptance and redemption--and for the courage to really live. "If you're looking for a smart, engaging, witty, sad and unusual book about the complicated nature of family and love, try Tom Mendicino's Probation. You'll be glad you did." --Bart Yates "Probation is the rare novel that dares to take the reader on a journey through the dark night of the soul. An unflinching look at the dark side of self-discovery, it is ultimately a story of transformation and the worlds of possibilities hidden within each of us." --Michael Thomas Ford Tom Mendicino spent six raucous years roaming the country and eking out a living in the Sales Department of several New York publishing houses before attending the law school of the University of North Carolina. His stories, some of them excerpts from Probation, have appeared in several recent anthologies.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0758238789
• ISBN13: 9780758238788
• Release Date: April 2010
• Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corporation
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 1.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.8" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Amazing Read!

I just finished this book and all I can say is....WOW! I know this sounds really cliche, but I could not put this book down for more than a few minutes at a time. I don't know who this Tom Mendicino guy is, but I can guarantee, any book he puts out from here on I'm going to buy the day it comes out. It has been a long time since I have read a book this well written. Kind of reminded me of the reaction I had when I read my first Pat Conroy book many years ago.....Every page just blew me away. Buy this book, you definitely won't be disappointed!

Family and Love

Mendicino, Tom. "Probation", Kensington Books, 2010. Family and Love Amos Lassen Andy Nacera had a life in which all seemed perfect but all that was destroyed when he had anonymous sex at a rest area on the interstate. His wife threw him out and he was put on probation and his life changed completely. During the week he is a traveling salesman and on weekends he spends at his mother's house and noting is discussed or explained about the incident. This is one of the most unusual books I have ever read. It combines sadness, wit, family and love to give us a very human story that takes us to a dark place and we witness Andy as he discovers himself and then uses what he learns for transformation. We are with him as he finds passion and love and how he redeems himself and finds acceptance. We cheer for him when he learns how to live. When Andy was convicted he received a sentence of a year's probation and a year of therapy during which time he could not be arrested again. At first, he does not understand how he risked everything for a few moments of furtive sex and he cannot seem to understand how he allowed himself to reach that point. Things became more and more difficult for him, especially when his mother became ill. He does serious soul searching and finally reaches the place when he can save another life as well as his own and this changes his future. The novel is actually composed of two themes--a coming-out story and a look at family. During Andy's counseling sessions with a Jesuit priest, he finds that he cannot get answers and he is constantly wondering how one anonymous sexual encounter could change his life so drastically. There were three women in Andy's life--his wife, his mother and his sister and each reacts to Andy's arrest differently. Andy is just a regular guy who, like all of us, has a tragic flaw and that seems to be his love for the kind of sex he as arrested for--like something that we see going on with public officials in the U.S. today. It is the destructive forces that play on his life that he had spent hiding who and what he really was. This is a powerful first novel from Tom Mendicino and I suspect that we shall be hearing more form him. He creates characters that are real and he enters their minds and shows us what is going on there. Andy is a man who ruined his own life (so he feels) but we are with him as he fights his way back to redemption.