It’s been nearly a year since we hosted our first QLP Book Club. Over that time I’ve been thrilled to talk to so many talented authors about their novels and how they intersected with various topics of queer love. But I have to admit, I was disappointed that I hadn’t yet had the opportunity to focus on female-bodied desire. So I was thrilled to have author Mac Crane as our latest selection. In A Sharp Endless Need, the intensity of high school basketball serves as a high-stakes arena for grief, queer awakening, and the crushing weight of perfectionism. Set in a small Pennsylvania town in 2004, the novel follows star point guard Mack Morris as they navigate a senior year defined by the death of their father and an all-consuming obsession with new teammate Liv Cooper. As Mac writes at one point in this moving, heartbreaking and—ultimately—hopeful novel, basketball is "more erotic than dancing" and a form of "f*****g without touching." As someone who has never quite loved team sports and used to be fearful of athletic folks of all genders and persuasions, I have to say, Mac does an incredible job of showing the erotics of bball. Or as Mac stated quite bluntly: “Is basketball sex?” Thanks for reading The Queer Love Project! This post is public so feel free to share it. What’s so fantastic about the queer love angle is that it’s less about a "coming out" story and more about the visceral, often messy collision of desire and survival. I read Mac’s first book—I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself—and loved it, but it’s so different. It’s a speculative fiction novel about a queer mother grieving her wife's death while raising a child in a dystopian surveillance state. Although I know every author hates this question, A Sharp Endless Need seems to have some autobiographical elements, so I asked Mac (the author) to share the inspiration and impetus to devote your creative energy to explore Mack, the character’s, story. Mac shared that they did play basketball in college, but the book is obviously not autobiographical. First, however, we discussed that byline change from Marisa to Mac and whether it had anything to do with the character. “Everybody is like, ‘Oh wow, way to change it up,’ I realized my name can be something different, and I wished my name was Mac. It’s not my alter ego, but it is writing a different version of myself. I realized: Oh, you can change yourself.” Interestingly, Mac also talked about allowing themself to write about sports in literary fiction and how that doesn’t seem like someone writers have permission to do. “There’s still the age-old idea about jock versus nerd. Or how sports are not intellectual,” Mac explained. “This thing was a part of my life for 20 years, but I don’t think I can write about it.” Since the novel is set in the early 2000s—and it captures a specific era of "Bush-era homophobia" and the pre-social media world of AIM and shared cell phones—I was curious: How did Mac think Mack and Liv’s relationship would differ if the story were set today? In particular, would their young queer love have evolved in any significant ways since then (especially with apps, etc.)? “It was interesting to write about that precipice of technology,” Mac admitted. “I did share a phone with my mom. But I didn’t feel any stress about that.” A fascinating area that we discussed with the erotics of women’s sports—in contrast to male athletes in sports—something I had no frame of reference about. “It’s often different in women’s sports; queerness is more acceptable. For them, they’re comfortable expressing themselves, their eroticism, their chemistry, their communication through those micro-movements of joy and celebration through basketball.” Plus, we talked about Sheryl Swoopes (who first emerged from the closet in 2005) and Brittney Griner, and how there are more out WNBA players now, but that a lack of openly queer people in college or pro sports was still a thing in 2004. In the same vein, I mentioned the struggle for Abby Wambach and Megan Rapinoe (who I profiled in 2011, when she came out publicly) in soccer. Then Mac talked about basketball as a form of prayer and playing the game as a type of church (check that out around the 18:00 minute mark). Also, how a basketball season can mirror a Shakespearean tragedy and provides great fodder for drama, conflict and tension. Afterward, we talked about the infamous “bathtub scene.” This is one that fans of the book who recommended it to me said I had to discuss. Although, I played a couple of the audio clips with the narrator, Dani Martineck, who I think brings a wonderful element to the audiobook, I intentionally didn’t want to spoil this scene for any of the people who haven’t read (or listened) to it yet. But to fill you in: On the court, Mack seems like the “alpha”—the point guard in control. In the bathtub, however, they are physically and emotionally naked. The bathtub scene is one of the few moments where Mack allows themself to be cared for rather than having to perform. I asked Mac to share how they crafted this moment, and it’s a great response (you can listen in at the 25:03-minute moment in the video). Mac approached it as a cinematic moment and hopes this will enter into the queer canon of bathtub scenes (like The Talented Mr. Ripley and Saltburn). We discussed so many other elements of this novel, so I hope you enjoy listening in and discovering why A Sharp Endless Need is one of my favorite books that I’ve read from the past five years and clearly deserves to be included in a new canon of queer literature that explores love and relationships. To wrap things up, I asked about Mac’s new book out this summer Perverts, a collection of 17 stories. It’s been described as: “A provocative and uproarious collection about pleasure, performance, and pain, Perverts is an exaltation of the awesome depravity of queer modernity.” And at least one writer has called Mac the “queer George Saunders,” which seemed to pique the interest of several of the subscribers who joined us for the live conversation. Thanks to all who joined us for the latest QLP Book Club. Stay tuned for the next selection, which will be announced soon and take place in June. If you have any recommendations, please don’t hesitate to leave them in the comments or in our chat or DM us directly. And if you want to join us for one of the upcoming live events taking place this spring or summer, then go to the link below. Until next time! The Queer Love Project is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to The Queer Love Project at queerloveproject.substack.com/subscribe
