Credit: photo by Ida V. Eskamani

The more personal your storytelling, the more universal the lessons. A Place for Us, equality activist and Pulse survivor Brandon J. Wolf’s first book and memoir, demonstrates that truth. Through wholeheartedness, unimaginable grief and the resolve to honor those no longer with us through action, Wolf inspires readers to love hard and claim our space.

The writer begins at the beginning, navigating his identity as a queer Black kid growing up in rural Oregon, facing the tremendous loss of his mother and a community denying him the right to feel safe and whole in his own skin. It was in Orlando where he finally found belonging and chosen family in his best friends Drew Leinonen and Juan Ramon Guerrero, and it was on June 12, 2016 that those precious lives were ripped away from everyone who loved them so deeply.

Forty-nine lives were lost that night at Pulse, stolen by a man armed with an assault rifle; dozens were injured and countless traumatized. Wolf honors the loss of his best friends and details his journey through grief, forgiveness and ultimately dedication to honoring those lives lost through action and loving unapologetically.

It’s a journey Orlando knows intimately. By putting pen to paper, Wolf is not only telling his story to the world, but that of our city, and of young queer Black and brown people everywhere.

Orlando Weekly: What was the genesis of this book?

Wolf: I had considered putting my journey to paper for years, but the timing never felt quite right. Until the summer of 2020. After George Floyd’s murder, as the nation grappled with such a brazen display of racist violence, the idea of A Place for Us began to crystallize for me. I knew then that I wanted to share the story of a queer, Black kid finding his place in the world. I wanted to tell the story of community and friendship.

Things came together quickly from there. I worked with a literary agent over the next few months to put together a compelling proposal, spent time meeting with publishers — I heard “no” dozens of times before a single “yes” — and signed the contract in Jan. 2021.

“Our joy is an act of resistance.”

Talk about your writing process.

Learning how to write a book might have been the most challenging part of putting A Place for Us into the world. First, I leaned on friends who had written books before. Asked endless questions. Peppered them with ideas. And did my own round of trial and error to figure out what worked best. I spent a couple of months on the coast of Mexico, detached from my daily grind, to build good writing habits and explore what brings out my creativity. Ultimately, what worked for me was carving out time to write each day, setting word count goals, and mixing up my writing environment so it never got stale. I’m a bit superstitious about writing, so I very rarely shared any draft content with friends. But once the draft had been submitted, they did get the first sneak peek.

How did you deal with being vulnerable and open in the stories you wrote down? A book often feels “forever” in a way that a blog post (or interview) would never be.

I knew from the beginning that I wanted to write a book that wasn’t varnished or squeaky-clean. I didn’t want to write a classic political memoir, dabbling in events from the past while staying polished enough to appease a room full of campaign consultants someday. I wanted to be honest. Vulnerable. Transparent. And staying true to that commitment made writing the book challenging sometimes. I struggled with sharing intensely personal and often painful stories publicly for the first time.

Though I’ve spoken about Pulse at length over the past seven years, it still stung to capture that night on the pages. But each time I felt old wounds bubbling up, I paused. Took a deep breath. And reminded myself of the mission: writing a book that is honest, vulnerable and transparent. Our community deserved that. Our stolen loved ones deserved that. And the next generation of young people, who may be wondering if the world will ever have space for them, deserved that.

You’ve mentioned that the book is a story of redemption, of forgiveness. Was this a theme that you were aware of from the beginning?

I knew from the time I was crafting my outline that forgiveness would be a key theme of the book. Because as much as I wanted to describe what had happened, I also wanted a roadmap to live between the lines. A blueprint for healing wounds, bridging divides and building community.

Forgiveness makes that possible. Grace makes that possible.

In a recent interview, you spoke about how dancing under a disco ball for you is now almost an act of defiance — that’s a profound insight.

We are at such a perilous moment in history. The right wing is waging war on freedom across the country. And their efforts to stifle us — whether by banning books, propagandizing history, policing expression or using the power of government to strip us of our humanity — are designed to sap us of our joy and rob us of our hope. Thus, existing unapologetically is an act of protest. Our joy is an act of resistance. And yes — whirling audaciously under our favorite disco balls, daring the world to try and stop us, is an act of defiance.

We deserve joy. And love. And peace. Refuse to let them take that from us.

You’ve moved on from Orlando recently. What is this next move all about?

It is bittersweet, but I am now in our nation’s capital continuing much of the work I have been doing in Florida. I now serve as the National Press Secretary for the Human Rights Campaign and lead the political communications team. This move is about taking what we’ve learned fighting on the frontlines in Florida and letting it inform our fight for freedom nationwide. It’s about amplifying the work being done at organizations like Equality Florida. It’s about elevating the stories of those being impacted by the rise of right-wing extremism. Know this: Florida did not lose a frontline warrior. You’ve simply gained a new national resource. I’m proud to continue being in the fight alongside you.


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This article appears in Sep 27 – Oct 3, 2023.