Excerpts from boys cry too:

“I had sex for the first time when I was six years old.”

And so begins a journey through the darkest impulses of the human spirit as John Mark Clubb recounts his upbringing in rural Kentucky, the sex abuse he endured for years at the hands of his former Baptist minister father; his escape to military service and college; his conflicting sexual impulses; his multiple marriages and homosexual encounters; and his spiral to the very bottom of existence before his salvation through therapy and the career he loved—flying airplanes.

“I’ve lied, cheated, and manipulated my way through sex with over 250 partners. Women have made up the lion’s share, but I’ve been with a fair number of men, too. I’ve gone through cycles where I think I’m gay and find men more attractive sexually than women. I know what triggers these impulses and responses. Wanting men usually comes during times of stress, or if I’m in a place where I don’t feel centered emotionally. These feelings come when I want to be used and debased by a man once again.”

"boys cry too" addresses the reader in plain, yet compelling language that is consistently riveting from the very beginning. Readers who were themselves survivors of sex abuse have said that by speaking the unspeakable, John has given them a voice with which to find hope and healing from their own experiences. Male readers have admitted that the story brings to the forefront many issues that men often do not have the social support to verbalize. Female readers have expressed their appreciation for the chance to read about how a man feels and about his fears, hopes, dreams, despair, and healing.

“I cringe with revulsion as I think back on the extremely sick nature of my relationship with my father. He created this relationship with me through his lies and behavior. From his example, I also learned to be narcissistic, self-absorbed, selfish, and abusive. My father taught me how to have sex. He taught me nothing about how to be a man.”

A unique book detailing the struggles, pain, and triumph over sex abuse from the perspective of an ordinary man whose situation was (and continues to be) all too typical, boys cry too will be a landmark among memoirs. John’s goal for the book is for it to be the catalyst for a national and international conversation among sex abuse survivors in order that through sharing their own stories and struggles, sex abuse will be brought out of the shadows and become recognized as one of the most endemic issues of our human experience.

“My hips are scarred from the scratches his fingernails caused the first time he raped me as I struggled to be free of the pain of his penis while I was trapped in his lap. As an adult, I called my childhood doctor and asked him if I had ever been seen about those cuts. The nurse was kind enough to climb into the attic and check out my medical records from that time. According to the records, my parents had told the doctor that I had fallen into a barbed wire fence and this was the reason for the scars. They’re almost perfectly symmetrical and in no way could have come from a fence. The doctor probably knew that.”

Though explicit, the language is not gratuitous. Rather, it reveals the brutality and the consequences of childhood sexual abuse that reach into adulthood and affect everyone with whom the victim has a relationship.

“I’ve been married three times and engaged numerous times to various women. When people ask me how long I was married, I ask them if they want to know just the last time or the cumulative total. I laugh, but I still cringe inside. I tell people that I don’t have girlfriends, I just have wives; or, I’m not single, I’m just between marriages. I’ve fathered nine children. Five of them are still alive. Two of them have been aborted. Two were miscarriages. I could either be a poster child for Planned Parenthood or a guest on the Jerry Springer show. Laugh outside, cringe inside.”

As a Navy Commander, a commercial airline pilot, small-business owner, and father of five children, John Clubb has the breadth of experience and the compassion to reach out to readers of all types. The sweeping narrative is sprinkled with welcome doses of dry humor, and the overarching metaphor, taking flight from one’s troubles only to land on the ground again where they must be faced, carries the story to its surprising and emotionally wrenching conclusion, in which John writes his parents personal letters of forgiveness.

In order of publication, you will find a list and summary of the various books and short stories of John Mark Clubb.