‘Book for Parents of Gay Kids’ takes encouraging tone

The title couldn't be much clearer: 'The is a Book for the Parents of Gay Kids” is, in fact, a book for the parents of gay kids. Dannielle Owens-Reid and Kristen Russo have penned, as the book's subtitle puts it, 'A Question & Answer Guide to Everyday Life.”

In a phone interview, Owens-Reid and Russo answered some questions about the book and the tour they are embarking on, which includes a stop at Prairie Lights in Iowa City this afternoon at 4 p.m.

The book grows out of the duo's online work at everyoneisgay.com. The site had humble beginnings and was originally grounded in humor.

'We slowly started getting questions of a more serious nature,” Owens-Reid said, 'and decided to answer them from our life experience.”

Offering advice on serious issues of any kind might well be daunting, but Russo explained that it was quickly apparent that there was a need for their brand of honesty, humor, and experience. 'I don't think we would have continued if we hadn't received feedback that we were helping people,” she said.

And while the questions they receive vary widely, they find that the answers generally boil down to some simple principles: 'The answer is almost always in communicating with your kids, asking questions, and being patient with yourself and your process,” Russo said.

'This Is a Book for the Parents of Gay Kids” tackles a wide array of questions and issues ranging from a discussion of whether sexuality is a choice to practical advice fro sleepovers. According to Owens-Reid and Russo, only one chapter of the book proved challenging to compose.

'We did have a little bit of a time getting through the religion chapter,” Owens-Reid said. Unlike Russo, she wasn't raised in a religious household. 'I just didn't have that experience at all.”

Russo is Catholic, and so was very familiar with the ways in which issues of sexuality can collide with issues of faith. She was confident the chapter - which includes subsections like 'I'm afraid my child is going to hell” and 'I was my child to be happy, but I feel that marriage should be reserved for a man and a woman” - would be easy to write, but soon discovered she was mistaken.

'It involved lots of conversations with my very religious family members to write it in a way that was acceptable to them,” she said.

The authors' personal histories and stories are a key to the book's light, engaging, encouraging tone. In the opening pages, each author shares her coming out story, and more personal snippets - as well, as stories from parents and children - are scattered throughout the book. According to Owens-Reid, that approach works not only for them, but for their readers.

'I don't think we could ever write anything without including our stories,” she said. 'That's what appears to be most helpful.”

On their tour - which they are crowdfunding from their website - the pair hopes to, as Owens-Reid put it, 'have a conversation with people who don't have the opportunity to have these conversations.”

Their bookstore events will focus on the stories in the book, rather than the advice, and they hope to connect with a diverse crowd - not just those mentioned in book's title. 'With any luck,” Russo said, 'we'll reach parents who are just parents, too.”

At Prairie Lights, Owens-Reid and Russo will be joined by fiction writer Vivek Shraya, who will read from his collection of linked short stories, 'God Loves Hair,” which relates the childhood and adolescent experiences of a boy seeking to define his own unique identity (see review in Insight & Books).

While individuality and uniqueness of circumstance are important themes in 'This Is a Book for Parents of Gay Kids,” Owen-Reid and Russo also believe there is essential truth in the name of the website: Everyone is Gay. They admit that, at first, the name was just an attempt to be, in Russo's words, 'funny and sassy.”

That's changed over time.

'It's come to mean something completely different,” Owens-Reid said. 'It's more about the feelings we all have and the struggles we all have. We've turned it into something really beautiful and meaningful.”

But the humor still is important, too. Russo calls it, 'beauty in the giggles.”

If you go

' What: Authors Kristin Russo and Dannielle Owens-Reid will read from 'This is a Book for Parents of Gay Kids”

' Where: Prairie Lights Books, 15 S. Dubuque St., Iowa City

' When: 4 p.m. today

' Cost: Free

' Also: The event includes a reading from Vivek Shraya who will read from 'God Loves Hair”