Digging to Wonderland

This suburban California coming of age navigates Trinidads personal history in the shadow of Hollywood, against the dramas of the 1960s and 70s. Trinidads pieces teach us how memory and history are forms of yearning, and about what can and cannot be recovered. Amy Gerstler This is the writing of a poet who loves the world into language. Aaron Smith Poet David Trinidads past is rich fodder for a collection of memory pieces that wind the reader through the underbelly of 1960s and 70s Americaand Southern California, more specifically. In Trinidads recollections, the proximity to Hollywood both glamorizes and condemns the bustling suburbs. Stains of the Manson murders and adoration for The Boys in the Band are documented with the same care as fascinations with Barbie dolls and twelve-cent comic books. The struggles of an awkward gay teenager meld into the weighty anecdotes of a young man who befriends famous writers, acts as a historian for familial legacies, and confronts the limitations of desire. The title piece, Digging to Wonderland, presents a young David Trinidad and his friend Nancy as they tunnel into the ground of her backyard, in search of the next great adventure. Ultimately, we witness a childhood spent under the threat of annihilation: So the twinkly lights in the hills above Chatsworth were actually missiles armed with nuclear warheads. And without knowing it, I grew up under their spell.