Events

Philadelphian Tom Mendicino is the author of the novel PROBATION (Kensington,
$15.00 pb).

Unspoken truths rise to the surface and lies unravel in Probation, a timely and provocative novel.

After being arrested for solicitation in a public restroom on Interstate 85, Andy Nocera is placed on probation.

Subsequently, he is thrown out by his wife and fired by his father-in-law, leaving him no other option but to take refuge at his mother's house, where no questions are asked. The "highlight" of his week is his counseling session with a psychiatrist who's also a Jesuit priest. Answers don't come easy, especially in the face of his mother being diagnosed with an aggressive lymphoma, but Andy gradually begins to search for the reasons why he would risk everything for an anonymous sexual encounter.

In PROBATION, debut novelist Tom Mendicino has crafted a powerful novel that is part coming-out story and part family chronicle as Andy struggles to find acceptance, redemption and true love. Along the way, the women in his life are on their own journeys with his wife, mother and sister all reacting to the arrest in very different ways. Fans of Tom Perrota (LITTLE CHILDREN and JOE COLLEGE) will enjoy PROBATION, which has a similar generally well-intentioned, but flawed ordinary guy for a protagonist. In light of the admitted and alleged misadventures in public sex by married elected officials and celebrities in the headlines, Tom Mendicino puts an honest, sharp-witted face to this very timely subject. PROBATION is a powerful novel about the struggle for human connection from a truly gifted new writer.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

TOM MENDICINO spent six raucous years roaming the country and eking out a living in the sales department of several New York publishing houses before attending the law school of the University of North Carolina. His stories, some of them excerpts from PROBATION, have appeared in several recent anthologies. Readers can visit his website at www.tommendicino.com.