A Year in Reading: Edgar Gomez

I began this year moving from Puerto Rico to New York so that I could launch my debut memoir, . I’d planned a big party at a bookstore with a $30 wine budget and everything, but Omicron said the moment my plane arrived in Queens and the event was cancelled. At the last minute, the launch was switched to Zoom, and I ended up sitting in my living room in Jackson Heights in front of my laptop, wearing the knock-off JLO Versace dress a friend of a friend had let me borrow for my big night (all gay people are seven degrees of separation from a bootleg  Versace dress). I was honestly not that upset about the cancellation, because first, it was too cold outside to wear that dress, and second, there was this whole safety-pin-thong situation going on that no one needed to experience in-person anyway. Plus I got to have wine to myself. I’d say this set the tone for the books I would go on to read the rest of the year. I had a lot of grand plans, but mostly I just read whatever I had nearby because the weather outside was bad and my outfit was a public danger.