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Johnny Was & Other Tall Tales
a short fiction collection by Lambda Literary Award
and EAA Award winner Greg Wharton
Praise for Johnny Was & Other Tall Tales
"Local Mission District writer Greg Wharton presents this new book of erotic vignettes for your reading pleasure prefaced in an introduction supposedly (and suitably) written naked. He's the ultra-creative and talented editor of such web 'zines as SuspectThoughts.com and VelvetMafia.com; and with these 24 bits and chunks of unadulterated forays into the deep, dark canyons of sexuality, he branches out into our fantasies.
"Admittedly derived from 'parts of real people both known and not known,' each tale dips quickly into a daydreamy world of sex and fiery male desire, and, then, just as swiftly, slips back out and onto the next vision. The tales shoot off like machine-gun fire, and should capture the interest of not only erotica readers, but of those horny career boys with the attention span of a housefly.
"This book can be appreciated in the bedroom just as much as a bus or train, because Wharton's ideas are hurled at the reader one after the other, each with their own unique personality, their own brand of sexing, their own way of shocking and teasing, and even romancing each raunchy fantasy to life.
"While not everything will appeal to every reader (though there's nothing outwardly revolting), there's enough variety here to titillate even the coldest of hearts. Whether it be spying on a hunky neighbor, a boring family camping trip that just got hot, the telltale smirk from a stranger, or a deliciously detailed hookup at Blow Buddies, Wharton nails every sexual scenario to the wall and leaves it there, dangling, for us to ponder.
"There's sex as a weapon, tattoo sex, mind-blowing boyhood sex, safe sex, Coach sex, Saran Wrap sex, tranny sex, sex with spit, screwing as a way to deceive and seduce, and the title story, where the hazards of sex can sometimes outweigh the heft of life itself.
"M. Christian, another of San Francisco's brilliant literary successes, contributes an appreciative, slyly covetous introduction, commenting that Wharton's hardcore fables are 'just like life.' After reading this untamed, fanciful collection of wants, needs, and unrestrained desires, we should count our blessings that life isn't like these tales—not all at once, anyway"
—Jim Piechota, Bay Area Reporter
"On Wanking, Tickling, and Being Adored:
"Johnny Was & Other Tall Tales is a varied, versatile collection of 24 short erotic stories. Greg Wharton says in his Preface that he is attracted to the "darker emotions"--and it shows. Those stories one might call the "shadow spots" of the book that shine brightest.
"The title story sets the tone for much of what is to follow. "Johnny Was" is a compelling love story between a sadist with a penchant for extreme edge play and a young man with a death wish. In "That Grin," a man tells the story of his sexuality and its formative influences: being tickled by an uncle, and being tickled and wrestled to the ground by older boys. The protagonist doesn't complain about being abused or revel in his role as victim; instead, the demon has become the desired. Tickle Torture has become the kink the man now lives for. "That Grin" also illustrates a theme that is present in a number of Wharton's other stories: the way in which sexuality and identity can arise from traumatic experience.
"Compare, for example, "Blood Oranges and Cotton Candy", a coming of age story. As a boy, Paul was raped by his brother's friend, Jared; yet at a moment of crisis in his life, it is Jared whom Paul seeks out:
Jared, the man who I feared the most, yet dreamed of and desired the most. He's the reason I'm so fucked up - or at least he's who I've always blamed. He's the reason I'm such a slut - or at least he's who I've always blamed. He's the man I always look for in other men, and he's who I see when I close my eyes with the other men.
"It is clear that desire, far from being a simple thing for Wharton's characters, is fraught with peril.
"In "Love," it is the beloved's life that's in danger. A man gives a list of the ordeals and torments his beloved must undergo before he will make an admission of love. We begin with asphyxiation and end with adoration, and all the various emotions--anger and tenderness both--that fall under the glyph of love are expressed. As a dissection of the constituent elements of desire, this story is an extraordinary achievement. It also offers a convincing explanation for the diminished attraction of card games in evening society.
"In a collection as varied as Johnny Was, we naturally get many stories of a lighter hue. In "Walking Olive," a dog-walker loses a dog while wanking on a client's bed. The fun here lies in the tone of voice: very arch, very camp. There are whimsical, amusing fantasies like "Cock-Sucking in America" and exquisitely framed vignettes like "Bibles 10% Sale." The latter is a story in which love has been lost and sex is all that is left between two people. It ends with a beautiful moment of epiphany: "Under the blizzard white evening sky, I spill my bitter white love for you on the snow around my knees, and I swallow yours." Then we have "His Baby," a tender story about two lovers, Sam and Roberto, who are forced to flee Chicago after stealing money from the mob. The story has a nice noir vibe, but reads in parts like a fragment.
"Some of the more minor stories, such as "Cropped", will describe a certain kick (here, being whipped) and tell you what it is like, giving a distillation of the experience. Others are What-If stories, wishes that might plausibly be fulfilled. They could happen, why not? A favourite is "Blue", in which a man who hasn't had sex for a while looks over to the apartment opposite and sees another man wanking; he wanks as he watches, then realizes the other man can see him…what happens next?
"Greg Wharton's stories engage our heart and hippocampus as well as our libido. There are graphic descriptions of sexual and sometimes violent acts yet, for all that, very little casual sex. After reading this collection, you might consider the phrase "casual sex" to be a found oxymoron, like, say, military intelligence or reality television. Sex occurs here, as it does for all of us, as part of some larger life project, whether of love, obsession or need. And even where the sex is "unusual," Wharton never lets us forget that there is always, as it were, a person appended to the appendage.
"A superb collection, Johnny Was and Other Tall Tales is head and shoulders (or head and scrotum) above most contemporary erotic fiction.
—Paul Kane, Chroma
Johnny Was & Other Tall Tales, edgy erotica unsafe at any speed
"Greg Wharton has edited a number of anthologies and edits two web magazines, but it's his own stories that are so unusual. Wild and sexy, often crossing over to the dark side of love, they constantly take you where you didn't expect to go. Ready or not you go along for the ride, and the two dozen stories in Johnny Was & Other Tall Tales pass through obsession, night life, back rooms, neighbors' windows, haunting memories, raw sex, and even romance. Young author Kirk Read says, 'Greg Wharton skewers the greatest hits of porn-coach, Daddy, sex worker-with his gift for creating real people and gritty atmospheres.' And Patrick Califia warns, 'Hopeless romantics and hardened perverts, beware. Greg Wharton's spare but lyrical accounts of love gone--where else but wrong?--will wring your heart dry. His characters yearn and fuck and fuck up among the ruins that Eros has made of Everyman's suburbs, schools, parks, highways and motels." Often red hot, these stories take you on a wide variety of honest and erotic adventures."
—Mandate
"Johnny Was is a deliciously off-kilter collection of short stories that is sure to leave you hard--and feeling at least a little bit guilty about it. The tales that Wharton has included in this offering are all about gay sex at its best, and as such almost all of them are at once tender and more than a little bit sinister.
"Make no mistake, this is not a book for the faint of heart--if vanilla is your flavor you might be well served to look elsewhere for a casual boner-inducing read. However, if classics like Lolita and The Story of O left you questioning that bulge in your pants, you will definitely enjoy Johnny Was.
"Over the course of the book's twenty plus saucy vignettes, Wharton convincingly explores countless varieties of kink, including: bondage, S&M, prostitution, and foot fetish to name just a few. In addition to this decidedly conventional fare, however, Johnny Was also broaches such taboo subjects as statutory rape, murder, necrophilia and incest, but it does so in a quirky manner that is decidedly more arousing than it is repulsive. While some of the stories--those in which characters get shot, choked, or partially dismembered--are more than a little bit unsettling, all of them are, for the most part, incredibly hot.
"The prose is simple and to the point, although Wharton seems to include a number clever allusions that will surely be appreciated by some readers. The sex itself is simply and consistently described in such a way that each character's unique desires and emotions are quite believable. Wharton's own desires are also apparent, as he seems to be fixated on erections that are not only huge and intimidating, but also enticing--regardless of their bearer's over-all physical make-up. On several occasions, I found myself more than a little bit aroused due to a particularly interesting description of someone's member or of a sexual act, only to discover that it was taking place in a nursing home, or that the subject was wearing his own crusty undergarments on his head.
"But that's what makes the book fun: it's a definite roller coaster ride of sexuality and emotion, one that is simultaneously invigorating and somewhat scary. As I have already suggested, the thrill of this read comes through its ability to get you excited when you probably shouldn't be. As I learned the hard way, reading Johnny Was on the bus ride home--immediately after getting a fairly large gauge Prince Albert piercing--is one of those times!"
—Scott Hayward, S.M.U.T. Magazine
"Suspect Thoughts Press continues to put out provocative literature, and this time around, it's from Press editor Greg Wharton. Like Pulling Taffy, it would be easy to dismiss this book as straightforward erotica—but that's taking the easy way out. The stories in Johnny Was are chock-full of hot, angry, passionate, messy sex. That's how sex really is, though, and Wharton is honest enough not to pretty it up. Besides, the driving force here is the heart, not the libido. The key to Wharton's writing is relating to emotions as the characters attempt to find love and warmth in an imperfect world."
"A"
—Robbie Daw, Instinct
"Wharton's succinct and arousing collection of arguably pornographic stories is 'unputdownable.' Whether you believe his tales—including doing his hunk of a brother-in-law—are slightly fictionalized accounts of his real-life encounters or just the kind of fantasies we'd all like to bring to life, they're always captiviating, and at times, heartbreaking."
—Ghalib Shiraz Dhalla, Genre
"Every now and then, a writer comes along and does something truly remarkable with gay erotic fiction: He makes it literature. That's exactly what author Greg Wharton does in Johnny Was, a collection of spare, expressive stories that have appeared in several stroke mags and compilations, plus a few new tales. Wharton writes in haunting, lyrical prose that aches with the cruel truth of what it's like to be gay, revealing his lovelorn yet horny characters with more depth than we've come to expect from the genre, yet keeping one finger firmly on the pulse of our throbbing cocks. The situations, familiar as they may be, are true to life in the sense that most of us can relate to having 'been there' at one time or another in our lives, which makes the scenarios even hotter, while the sexual passages themselves burst with horned-up originality. 'Before my face found its target, I heard him moan,' Wharton writes in "Riding with Walter," one of several highlights in the book. 'Long and deep, as if he were in ecstasy. My cock jerked in its confinement. Then my lips grazed his ass, first up one smooth cheek then the other, until my nose, full of his heavy scent, guided my mouth to the puckered asshole. A first date kiss.' Yummy. With this colorful entry in the stroke fiction canon, Wharton takes his place alongside a very exclusive handful of writers who understand that the best erotica is the kind that stimulates the intellect as well as the loins."
—Ken Knox, Unzipped
"The term 'erotic fiction' usually calls to mind the standard stroke magazine one-offs concerned exclusively with metaphors for large erections and a clinical rundown of tab-A-fits-into-slot-B descriptions. While the short stories in this collection fall into the erotic fiction category due to recurring themes of lust and desire, their depth and power allow them to transcend that simple label. Fear not: There is still plenty of sex in Johnny Was--out there, pushing-the-limits-of-your-dark-imagination sex. But author Greg Wharton is far more concerned with what is going on in the characters' minds than with their various body parts. Mostly utilizing a compelling first-person narrative, Wharton invites us to experience his characters' inner longings and obsessions, often delving into darker and even disturbing erotic territory. But they all speak with such a naked honesty that the reader is swept along for the ride and even allowed to become aroused by ideas and turns of events that might be studiously avoided in real life. In 'Blood Oranges and Cotton Candy,' for example, Wharton explores the mind of an undertaker's son who is raped in a graveyard by his brother's homophobic friend. And yet it is not a story of regret or rage, but an erotic remembrance, one of obsession and a twisted--but nonetheless true--kind of love. Ranging wildly in subject matter, and always surprising, all of the stories explore a longing and desire so all-consuming that it becomes the characters' universe. So it comes as no surprise in the final story, 'Gravity,' when a man who has been dumped by his boyfriend after a wildly passionate affair is then swept up into rampaging tornado while standing naked in the middle of a field. These are passions too large for the body alone to hold, and the world itself reacts to the intensity of the characters' emotions. The stories are short (none more than 10 pages, and many only three), so they are easy to read in one sitting. But those few pages are intense and evocative enough to stick with you and excite the most important erotic organ of all: the mind."
—Brian Shepp, Frontiers Newsmagazine
"Greg's new book Johnny Was & Other Tall Tales is a collection of short stories which need a Government Health Warning against reading more than two at a time. One story is enough to make you explode--so much drama, emotion, horror, love, tenderness, hot sex, and general wickedness. It's two wanks per story--or you're repressed!"
—11th (2004) Charity Erotic Awards
"Existing just outside the realm of 'stroke fiction,' these poignant and sometimes disturbing tales offer unique insight into the lives of gay men, detailing the ins and outs of love, sex and voyeuristic tendencies. The writing is sharp, incisive and daring and raises the bar for what is commonly perceived as erotic fiction. "
—Colt Spencer, AVN
"Wharton is a naughty man with a witty tongue. His collection of stories ranges from hot, steamy stories to even hotter, sexier stories. But lest you think this collection of tales is only aimed at the one-hand reader's list, Wharton deftly and astutely skews the sacred cows of queer life with aplomb. A great read from start to finish."
—De Kwok, Tablet
"In addition to editing quality anthologies—including The Best of the Best Meat Erotica, Of the Flesh: Dangerous New Fiction, and with M. Christian, Lover Under Foot: An Erotic Celebration of Feet—and publishing pretty good books: see Satyriasis by Ian Philips, My Name is Rand by Wayne Courtois, and Pulling Taffy by Matt Bernstein Sycamore, Wharton writes. Johnny Was is his first collection. It's smutty, sure, with stories about hot coaches, sexy daddys, very happy hustlers, masters of the whip—but transcendently so. Like Philips (his husband—they were married earlier this year in San Francisco), like Currier, like Williams, like Greco, Wharton infuses his fiction with erotic thrills and chills. But, as he says in his introduction, these aren't 'classically structured stroke stories'—they can ignite desire, but their real, gritty power lies in how he fuses dynamic imagination with lyrical reality. Every story is a treat, but I'll single out one, 'Husband, Sire, It'—as intense (and autobiographical) as Ian Philips' own 'Nearer My Greg to Thee.' If anyone ever edits a collection of short stories by couples, these two tales would set the standard."
—Richard Labonte, Books to Watch Out For
"Tall tales could easily be defined as reality-based stories taken to a level of exaggeration. Such parables may extend the parameters of believability altogether, creating a world of inconceivable fantasy. However, in Greg Wharton's collection of short fiction, Johnny Was & Other Tall Tales, the author uses sincere emotion and familiar territory to bend the rules of the definitive tall tale as he steers each story toward the reality of gay culture.
"In Johnny Was, Wharton provides 24 pieces of short fiction filled with erotically charged scenarios that revolve around the hardships of romantic love and the delectable pleasures of perpetual lust. Within his arousing plots, Wharton creates a cast of memorable characters with whom readers can easily identify as they brave situations many gay men have encountered or, at least, fantasized about. Though some of the stories take a melancholic turn, Wharton's exclusive style is ever-present and speaks of the unwanted veracity that can often sting the queer eye.
"In the title story, a grim scene is set between lovers Johnny and David as each character's viewpoint vibrantly comes to life to show the perception of love to be not always as it appears. Love that has been lost (in more ways than one) is the subject of 'Blood Oranges and Cotton Candy,' as a long dead sister, opposite the main character, gives insightful advice to a brother searching for affection. 'Swept Away' is a coming-of-age and coming-out story that tells the tale of a young man whose discovered journal speaks volumes about his feelings for a high school football player.
"Reaching into the cornucopia of Sopranos-style life, 'Lola' presents the tragic romance of a man for a transsexual who cannot escape the possessive rage of another lover. Overt jealously is the subject of 'Finger,' as the main character discovers what radical measures a person will go to, in order to escape the suffocating embrace of unwanted love. Other stories in Wharton's sublime collection, such as 'Cropped' and 'Spit,' delve into an atmosphere of leather and fetish play.
"Still, innocence and sensitivity remain, as Wharton effectively manufactures the anxiousness of first-time jitters within young and innocent gay characters that embellish such stories as 'Camping' and 'That Grin.'
"Whether he conveys tales of coming out, fetish performance, or morbid realism, Greg Wharton proves to be a master at homoerotic fiction with Johnny Was. His voice is brazenly ripe and unrestrained, like a freight train transporting an orgy of lust to an erotic Heaven or Hell before making a pit stop at a local circuit party. Wharton provides an addictive read saturated with vivacious characters that fuck, suck and buck beyond the credible settings within this latest anthology.
"Both romantics and perverts will find that the stories in Johnny Was & Other Tall Tales are similar to a tall glass of water - clear, quenchable, and refreshing."
—Andrew Wolter, X-Factor
"This collection of short stories is full of robust characters and real emotion. They are stories of the ridiculaous things we do for affection, how stupid lust can make us and how beautiful and terrifying it can be to feel ove. Author Greg Wharton paints a picture of what can happen when interest turns into obsession and love into eternal heartbreak.
"It is easy to relate to the characters in these stories because they seem so real, and their situations could easily be ones that you have been in yourself.
"Wharton uses people and experiences from his own life—and some made up—to create the characters in the tales he spins. One involves a teenage boy who falls in love with the first touch he receives from his first real obsession, Jackson. The raw emotion pulls the reader into his mind.
"Then there's Paul, who is just trying to live through his difficulties and get away from his family, including his homophobic brother, and high school. How many of us can't relate to that?"
—Goldie VanHeel, Stonewall News Northwest
"I do love sex" writes Greg Wharton in his introduction to Johnny Was, the author's first collection of gay erotica. Johnny Was might be Greg's first collection, but the author is no stranger to the genre, having already edited six erotica anthologies and serving as editor for to web magazines suspecthoughts.com and velvetmafia.com. The man knows what he's talking about and evidence of his lusciously imaginative know-how runs thick throughout the book.
"An erotic writer" writes Wharton, "like any genre writer-should have a firm grasp of the material (s)he writes." Greg goes on to admit that his dedication to his work is such that he sometimes takes a grip of the material several times a day - for the sake of the work of course. The hard, hard work certainly seems to pay off. Johnny Was is hot, sexy, and leaves you wanting more, and can pretty much turn anyone with a heart beat and an ounce of libido on. Or if you've got the libido of a sixteen year old boy (aka me o most days), getting through the 190 pages of this book of erotic tall tales can be laborious and timely, for the subject of the book is such that one has to allow for in between story bed breaks. Though I did lose a whole afternoon, I believe it was all worth it.
"Wharton is not exclusive in his collection; rather Johnny Was is like a sexual all-u-can-eat literary buffet. Sure, the main course is homosexual sex, but Wharton also eagerly serves up a mixture of sides that range from young jock's locker room adventures, all the way to hardcore S/M fantasies. There's something to satisfy a range of desires, whether you like being tied up and spanked, or vice versa, or whatever else you might be into, chances are that Wharton's written about it.
"Most of the stories in this collection go straight to the point: desire and sex. That's fine, considering that Wharton is quite talented at writing out sex scenarios without making it sound like an excerpt from a high school biology textbook. On the other hand, the stories that particularly stand out in Johnny Was are those that go beyond the fuck-line; stories like "Blood Oranges and Cotton Candy," "Cock Sucking in America," "Lola," "Gravity," and Coyote." Wharton is truly at his best in these stories, for he allows his characters to develop beyond the bedroom, and leads them to escape into plot lines that are often surreal, some almost bordering science fiction (see "Coyote"). It is in these settings that Greg's characters come to life, and where his talents as a writer are most obvious.
"Johnny Was is Wharton's first book, and for this reason the collection is full of chances and experiments in style. Some of Greg's experiments are clearly better than others, but none fall completely flat. You can ask nothing else from a first book. I do hope to see Wharton continue to write erotica, for he is very good at it; even more so, I hope to see Wharton continue to develop his skills as an erotica writer capable of going beyond the porn-plot, for he is even better at that."
—Audrey Gagnon, TRADE: Queer Things
"On shelves now, Johnny Was & Other Tall Tales, is a captivating new collection of erotic short fiction from author Greg Wharton. Whether exploring the exotic realms of sadomasochism ('Husband, Sire, It' and 'Johnny Was'), sexual fetish ('Dinner With Jesus'), or Butch/ Femme stereotypes ('Spit') Wharton infuses each story, no matter how imaginative or improbable, with a healthy dose of human truth. Although the twenty-four stories contain a sexual core, the circumstances of characters' situation are as relevant, if not more so, than the detailed descriptions of various practices and positions. The people populating the world of Johnny Was could be the next-door neighbor, our best friend or ourselves; the issues raised are, no doubt, heightened within the fictional context, but contain the wisdom of experience nonetheless."
—EXP Magazine
"Greg Wharton is no stranger to ISO. His imaginative erotica has appeared in some of our favorite anthologies, but now, we get him all to ourselves with his own collection, Johnny Was. Greg shows he can stimulate us with an incredible blend of everything from romance to perversion in these original stories that are so real you’ll believe he experienced each of them. Incredibly steamy and thought-provoking, Greg Wharton goes beyond standard erotica as he takes on sexuality...in this outstanding collection."
—InsightOut Book Club
"The characters in Greg's stories don't act like puppets or playthings, though we might have fun with them and Greg certainly does, but rather these are people. They don't act the way we want them to, or expect them to, but like real people. They stumble, they dream, they hope—the way we all do. That's special. No, that's fucking incredible, that's what that is."
—M. Christian, from the foreword Word Envy
"These short stories are edgy, filled with characters who are all over the place, full of different voices, backgrounded with grit and funk. Wharton's work is in the proud tradition of underground literature, looking through the other end of the telescope.
—Calamus Bookstore E-newsletter
"I found at least one of them, Greg Wharton's S/M-edged 'Butterflies and Myths,' literally orgasmic, though not for the cute butterfly asides."
—Sean Kennedy, HX Magazine
[from a review of Best Gay Erotica 2004]
"Hopeless romantics and hardened perverts, beware. Greg Wharton's spare but lyrical accounts of love gone—where else but wrong?—will wring your heart dry. His characters yearn and fuck and fuck up among the ruins that Eros has made of Everyman's suburbs, schools, parks, highways, and motels. Reading these stories, you may forget what the difference is between laughter and tears; arousal and regret."
—Patrick Califia
Greg Wharton takes his place with Dennis Cooper, Scott Heim, Brian Pera, and JT Leroy as a barker-cum-bard on the Pomo-Pinocchio Island of Misfit Boys Craving Other Misfit Boys. His siren song is deceptively simple but no less deadly. By the end of Johnny Was, your heart won't be all that's aching."
—Ian Philips
"Greg Wharton skewers the greatest hits of porn—coach, Daddy, sex worker—with his gift for creating real people and gritty atmosphere. You're there with these people, in motel rooms across America, beneath cum-stained sheets."
—Kirk Read
"Greg Wharton is a damn fine tour guide through the darker alleyways of desire."
—Simon Sheppard
release: September 2003
gay fiction/erotica
softcover, 5X8
192 pages
$16.95
0-9710846-6-1
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