Works by
Jim Nason
(Writer)

Fiction

• The Housekeeping Journals (2007) -- Nominated 2007 Lambda Literary Gay Men's Debut Fiction Awards ; Nominated 2007 Lambda Literary Award for Male Fiction
  In The Housekeeping Journals, the self-oppressed narrator, Tony, takes on a homemaking job to put himself through university as a social work student. He performs domestic tasks traditionally deemed ‘women’s work’, and in the land of laundry and dirty dishes finds himself involved in the complex lives of his clients who live with addiction, AIDS, mental illness, poverty and shame.
  
  Chapters are introduced by Mrs. Neatson’s Easy Steps to Domestic Bliss for the Busy Housewife, a voice from the nineteen-fifties offering tips to the Lady of that era. These tips, with their surreal tone of glamour and richness, run parallel with the myth-making, real-life survival needs of the novel’s characters – an elderly, crippled man living with his drug-dealing grandson; a demented drag queen about to get evicted from his apartment; a mother holding the hand of her dying son as she reflects on her youth and her lost lover.
  
  Although Tony is 6’ 5”, in his carnivalesque world-turned-upside-down, he perceives himself as small and invisible. In the Housekeeping Journals, he “cleans house” as he explores childhood memories and his grief and guilt surrounding his younger brother Stephen’s death at the hands of his violent and mean-spirited stepfather, Frankie Pearce. Tony learns through the courage of his clients, and ultimately emerges with grace and humor as an emotionally daring and sexually adventurous man.

Poetry

• The Fist of Remembering (2006)
  The Fist of Remembering is a collection of poetry that starts with death and ends with life. Nason begins with the death of his partner from cancer, and then weaves through his experience, remembering, grieving, and celebrating his love following the death. These poems are breath-taking, moving from despair to hope, and from austerity to the rediscovery of sensuality. They are filled with elegant, and sometimes wry turns of phrase and memorable imagery. This is a beautiful collection.