Boy Wander: A Coming of Age Memoir

Jobert Abueva

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Winner First Place in both the LGBTQ Non-fiction and First-time Non-fiction categories of the 2023 International Firebird Book Awards!

Boy wonder by day. Boy toy by night.

A child TV personality from a prominent Filipino family and the son of an accomplished academic, Jobert Abueva was a high achiever at his all-boys Catholic international school in Tokyo, Japan. Whatever Jobert did, he had to be the best, racking up achievements. He was a favorite among his fellow students, who elected him twice to the Student Council as vice president and president. Jobert was a brain bowl, excelling on the school's debating team, a speech all-star, and a varsity track hero. He wrote for the school newspaper and yearbook and performed in school plays. A golden boy who could do no wrong. But Jobert had a secret nobody could know. At night, led a clandestine existence turning tricks with foreign male guests at Tokyo's world-renowned Imperial Hotel. So it's not surprising that he had to be the best and was handsomely paid for it. More exciting and better pay than delivering newspapers. A BMOC (Big Man on Campus), he juggled dual identities of boy wonder and boy toy, sure that if exposed, he would be shunned by his friends and devastate all who groomed him for greatness.

Boy Wander is an intimate coming-of-age portrait of the author's sexuality as seen through the eyes of a child of the 1960s and 70s and a teenager before the advent of AIDS and finally as a young man arriving in America. From Manila, Kathmandu, Bangkok, and Kyoto to New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, the author navigates denial and acceptance, erotic and unconditional love, transience, and transnationalism. Even as the world has become more accepting over the decades, this book's present-day relevance provides inspiration to those struggling to reconcile family values and societal expectations with being true to themselves.

Book Details

Publisher: Rattling Good Yarns Press
Publish Date: May 3rd, 2023
Pages: 216
Language: English
Edition: undefined - undefined
Dimensions: 9.00in - 6.00in - 0.49in - 0.71lb
EAN: 9781955826273
Categories: • LGBTQ+• Asian & Asian American• Memoirs

About the Author

Abueva, Jobert: - "Jobert E. Abueva is winner of the Lambda Literary J. Michael Samuel Prize and Writer's Advice Flash Memoir contest. He is also recipient of the Arch and Bruce Brown Foundation Literary Award for historical LGBTQ short fiction as well as two National Arts Club literary scholarships. His writings have been featured in The New York Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Beyond Queer Words, Harrington Gay Men's Fiction Quarterly and Poetry Nippon. Jobert holds degrees from the University of Michigan - Ann Arbor (BA) and Columbia Business School (MBA). Born in Manila, Philippines, he is a global marketer by day, and resides in New Hope, Pennsylvania. Read more at jobertabueva.net or follow him on Twitter (@jabueva), Facebook (@joberteabueva) and Instagram (@jobert_abueva)."

Praise for this book

Boy Wander is heartbreaking, painfully poignant, and a memoir of hope and survival. Jobert Abueva takes the reader from the sun-drenched landscapes of 1970's Martial Law-era Philippines to the early-1980s United States, under the rule of Reagan and a culture fearful of gay identity. One part a migration narrative across Asia during turbulent times, and another part a coming-of-age tale about accepting oneself despite the questioning stares of the world around them. Boy Wander is a story of a different place and time, and one that I won't soon forget.

-J.R. Jamison, award-winning author of Hillbilly Queer and host of the NPR podcast The Facing Project

Boy Wander (by Jobert E. Abueva) is a richly vivid, fast-paced coming-of-age novel--beautifully written with a narrative voice that matures as the narrator does. Recounting poignant episodes from his childhood and youth in the Philippines, Nepal, Thailand, the United States, and most especially Japan (where teenage Abueva becomes a call-boy), Abueva demonstrates the universality of the coming-out struggle even with its infinite, personal variations of inner turmoil and gradual awakening, of innocent and sometimes shame-inducing explorations. A thought-provoking and touching read.

-Daniel M. Jaffe, author of Foreign Affairs: Male Tales of Lust & Love

Boy Wander is an unflinchingly honest and compelling coming-of-age/coming-out memoir that I could not put down.

-Damian McNicholl, author of A Son Called Gabriel

Boy Wander: A Coming of Age Memoir, by Jobert E. Abueva, is the moving account of young Jobert's experiences as the son of parents who have their own approaches to encouraging and molding his future. Jobert is an elementary student when his life is impacted by abuse-abuse on which he dwells and keeps to himself. Around the same time, Jobert realizes he has strong feelings for a boy in his school. Abueva's writing brings young Jobert to life. His feelings, his struggles, and his fears are almost palpable. I found myself wanting to reach through time and space to comfort Jobert ... I was moved to tears ... There are some books that move you and some that simply take your breath with their honesty and biting reality. Abueva's work, Boy Wander: A Coming of Age Memoir, is of the latter. Nowhere will readers find a more open and honest look at childhood and all of its challenges. I recommend Abueva's work to anyone interested in exploring a new author who, without a doubt, writes from the heart.

- Literary Titan

"The book (Boy Wander) is a wonder of its kind. First we can immerse ourselves in the mores of many Asian locals of the period. We witness the certitude of a young boy's / young man's sexual maturation and self-assurance."

-Rainbow Book Reviews