Lipstick on the Mic: Debora Iyall, Romeo Void

 

Native American punk poet. 

New wave lead singer and art teacher. 

Museum docent and animation voice actress.

Lifetime achievement award winner.

A girl in trouble may be a temporary thing, but an artist is forever. 

YA Book Club: The Pigman

 

The Misadventures of John and Lorraine

Two lonely kids - John and Lorraine - find a lonely man visiting the zoo while they are ditching school. They develop an unlikely friendship with Angelo Pignati, who is the title character, The Pigman. 

Lorraine is the product of a single-parent household, the daughter of a nurse who is perpetually angry and mean. She takes every opportunity to belittle her daughter, who, in John's point of view, is far more attractive than Lorraine realizes or her mom lets on. Her mother is also physically abusive, not above slapping her daughter to keep her in line. 

John's a mess too; he is also the product of abuse, a combination of verbal and neglect. His father is an alcoholic, and his mother has OCD,  more worried about a clean house than demonstrating kindness to her son. They prefer his older brother to him. 

The two find refuge with the Pigman, who indulges their whims, enjoys their company, and treats them with kindness and respect. They become increasingly protective of him after they discover that while he states his wife is away visiting her sister, she has, in fact, passed away. 

Of course, it goes haywire. 

There is an accident when the three spontaneously purchase roller skates, and the Pigman is hospitalized. Promising to take care of the house, John decides to throw a party instead, since he is never allowed to do this at home. Their friends take advantage, breaking, stealing, and destroying most of the contents of the house, including a raid on the deceased Mrs. Pignati's wardrobe. 

The Pigman comes home from the hospital early, and the kids are arrested. They go to apologize and make it up to him by taking him to the zoo. It is there that they discover his favorite animal, the gorilla, has passed away, and the Pigman dies of a broken heart. 

The story is told in alternating chapters from Lorraine's and John's points of view. The book, in their words, is their way of memorializing Mr. Pignati, and a way for them to sort their feelings about the incidents as they transpired, as well as a way for them to come to terms with the feelings they have for each other. While they do kiss and are inseparable, it is not determined if they are a couple by the end of the novel. 

Raised on Country Sunshine: Genre Bending

Play me some mountain music, Be-at-tle

Some songs on my list would make a redneck holler, "That's not country!" But when country music absorbs the spirit of gospel, soul, bluegrass, zydeco, folk, and rock, there's some bending of the rules. Did you know Elvis only played the Opry once, in 1954, and was told he was too rockabilly to return? 

Times have changed; even Ringo played the Opry in 2025. Onto our alternative list:

Indigo Girls, Closer to Fine

Little Feat, Dixie Chicken

The Beatles, I've Just Seen a Face

Everly Brothers, Close to You

Ray Charles, Georgia

Elvis Presley, That's All Right

Harry Choates, Jole Blon

Skeeter Davis, The End of the World

Bob Seger, Shame on the Moon

Lady Gaga, Joanne

Bruce Springsteen, Atlantic City

The Monkees, What Am I Doing Hanging 'Round?

That's It, Just One Line: Girls in Their Summer Clothes

 "Had a beautiful thing, maybe you just saved my life."

We are going to have a summer of Bruce!

The Fifth Beatle: Astrid Kirchherr

Beautiful and cool Astrid

Astrid was a photography student at Meisterschule für Mode, Textil, Grafik und Werbung in Hamburg when Klaus introduced her to the Beatles, who were playing at the Kaiserkeller. Kirchherr later said: "It was like a merry-go-round in my head, they looked absolutely astonishing... My whole life changed in a couple of minutes. All I wanted was to be with them and to know them."

It didn't take long for Astrid and Stuart Sutcliffe to become a couple and for Astrid's art school influence to impact the band. She asked to take publicity photos of them, and being dirt poor performers, they were happy to have professional shots to help them stand out in the crowd of bands on the scene. 

She gave them a look, style, and the Beatle haircuts. Her influence resulted in the look created on the album Meet the Beatles, handsome beatniks half-lit in black and white. 

Her style influenced great photographers of the next generation, including Annie Leibovitz and Richard Avedon. 

Astrid herself struggled after Stu's death in 1962, as people weren't as interested in her art as they were in her early photos of the Beatles. In an interesting twist of fate, she married drummer Gibson Kemp, who replaced Ringo Starr in Rory Storm and the Hurricanes. 

She went on to have shows and exhibitions throughout the world, including Liverpool, London, and here in the States at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. She died in 2020 at the age of 82. Beatles historian Mark Lewisohn praised her involvement with the band as "immeasurable" and credited her as an "intelligent, inspirational, innovative, daring, artistic, awake, aware, beautiful, smart, loving, and uplifting friend to many."

Lipstick on the Mic: Connie Francis

My dad had a thing for curly, short-haired brunettes.

Connie Francis was an Italian-American from New Jersey. Her dad would have put the Dance Moms to shame, entering her in countless talent shows and beauty pageants when she was just a child. 

She was beautiful, talented, AND smart - salutatorian of the Newark Arts High School, class of 1955. 

She appeared on various variety shows back in the day, waiting for her big break, including Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts and NBC's Startime Kids. She was hired to voice Tuesday Weld's singing in the movie Rock Rock Rock, which led to her being a ghost performer for the movie Jamboree. 

Then she scored her first major hit with the song Who's Sorry Now? when it debuted on American Bandstand, New Year's Day, 1958. A flurry of hits followed, including Stupid Cupid, My Happiness, Frankie, and Lipstick on Your Collar. 

My soft spot for Connie comes from the first-ever spring break movie and hit song Where the Boys Are, released in 1961. She sang and starred in the picture as Angie, who falls for jazz musician Basil. 

Connie went through some personal traumas in the 70s and 80s, including being raped while on tour and her brother's murder by the mafia. She has written several books, appeared in revues in Vegas, and finally retired in 2018. 

Because social media is a bizarre and often wonderful thing, her song Pretty Little Baby from 1961 became a viral hit in 2025, an achievement she was able to enjoy before her passing in July 2025. In a memorial post, The Beatles' social media lauded her as the first female rock star and noted she rivaled them in popularity in the early '60s. A lovely swan song. 

YA Book Club: To Tell Your Love

1950, the evolution of the American Teenager

To Tell Your Love is probably the oldest book I'm going to review this year, published in 1950 when teenagers were barely a cultural phenomenon. It predates rock and roll by five years; even my own mother was too young to read this, eight years old when it was first published. The book is several tales woven into one, each featuring one of the children in the Armacost family: 

• Theo, 21, is a pragmatic nurse who stumbled into a relationship while caring for the cantankerous grandfather of a reserved young man; 
• Anne, 16, is mourning the end of a relationship with a boy who was frankly not that into her; and
• Johnny, 14, the youngest sibling, is coming to terms with the awkwardness of growing up and perhaps loving himself. 

There are additional storylines as well. Nora, Anne's best friend, who quit school to marry far too young, struggles with the thought "Is this it?" as her schoolgirl romance gives way to the reality of too many bills, too many diapers, and not enough money. There's also Johnny's best friend and his family, whose gruff exterior belies the grace exhibited with casual generosity, overstuffed picnic baskets, and a championship trophy for July the cat. 

Even the bit players are fully fleshed characters in this small New York town. 

Stolz attended Columbia University at age 16, married at 18, and began writing in 1949 when an illness kept her homebound. She received the 1953 Child Study Association of America's Children's Book Award for In a Mirror, the Newbery Honors in 1962 for Belling the Tiger, and 1966 for The Noonday Friends, and her entire body of work was awarded the George G. Stone Recognition of Merit in 1982. She passed in 2006.