John Fram
author of seven books, most recently When We Were Magic, published by Simon Pulse in March.
JOHN Fram’s debut novel, The Bright Lands, is a gripping exploration of queerness, masculinity, monstrosity, and small-town football. This book is True Detective meets Friday Night Lights but even darker. No, darker than that. The Bright Lands is a deft combination of genres—suspense, horror, coming-of-age—that shines a light on the monsters that spread when secrets are hidden for so long they take on a life of their own. I’ve never read anything like it. I had the immense pleasure of reading an early copy of The Bright Lands and the even bigger privilege of discussing it with Fram. A transplant from Waco, Texas, to Manhattan, Fram brings a uniquely tender perspective to a story only he could tell.
What sent you down the road that led to your writing this particular book?
This book grew out of two desires that, from some angles, might seem contradictory. The first was the desire to see a queer hero in a crime story. Who could be a better amateur detective than a gay man, someone who has trained himself from childhood to sniff out
