The Rib Joint

In this collection of linked, lyrical essays, Julia Koets writes, When you date in secret, the pressure is different. Youre weightless. Youre stuck in between jumping and landing. You exist in midair. Your bones start to thin. Growing up in a small town in the South, Julia and her childhood best friend Laura know the church as well as they know each others bodiesthe California-shaped scar on Julias right knee, the tapered thinness of Lauras fingers, the circumference of each others ponytails. When Lauras family moves away in middle school and Julia gets a crush on the new priests daughter at their church, Julia starts to more fully realize the consequences of being anything but straight in the South. After college, when Julia and her best friend Kate wait tables at a rib joint in Julias hometown, they are forced to face the price of the secrets theyve keptfrom their families, each other, and themselves. From astronaut Sally Rides obituary, to a UFO Welcome Center, to a shark tooth collection, to DC Comics Gay Ghost, this memoir-in-essays draws from mythology, religion, popular culture, and personal experience to examine how coming out is not a one-time act. At once heartrending and beautiful, The Rib Joint explores how fear and loss can inhabit our bodies and, contrastingly, how naming our desire allows us to feel the heart beating in our chest.